Showing posts with label ROBOT. Show all posts
Showing posts with label ROBOT. Show all posts
Let's revisit an infamous artist known saucy women with barely-there outfits, twisted anatomy – The one, the classic Hyung Tae-Kim.
Hyung-Tae Kim (born February, 1978, Seoul) is a Korean manhwa artist. He has designed characters for video games such as the Magna Carta series, and the later installments of War of Genesis series. He also's worked on OXIDE series of artbooks.
Get a load of that scapula! And those glutes...
As a manhwa artist, he specializes in a weird deformation technique where the artist disregards anatomical accuracy to achieve a specific feel to the character. This is an interesting point because this is what makes manhwa, well… manhwa. Honestly, despite my being new to the wide world of anime and manga in general, I have yet to see another artist with the style this guy has.
Hyung has also made some stuff for Udon Studios. Notably for the Street Fighter, "Robot" and the "Apple" artbooks. Pretty slick stuff.
According to a fansite, “Hyung-tae Kim designs his characters with perfect structures, including stylish and dazzling outfits.” The exemplary use of colors helps flesh out his characters well beyond most conventional anime-style artists. Hmm... I did see one of Mr. Kim's art pieces where there was a fat guy...
Kim's body of work has achieve such worldwide acclaim that he was even hired for various art commissions in Japan! Can you imagine that?? An artist so good even the Japanese would take notice!
He’s also done some work in a Ragnarok Online art book. For those unaware what I'm talking about, Ragnarok Online is a game that kick-started the Massively Multiplayer Online Role Playing Game culture in my home country. I actually haven't seen Mr. Kim's art for this game or the book, but despite his familiar style not being in the game per se, the manhwa art-style is still prevalent, from character designs and to the items, etc. I forget to mention the 'muted' color palette that manhwa artists seem to love so much.
Yeah, maybe his art isn’t for everyone. Maybe some of you cynical artists want an artist prefer more... anatomically possible characters, or they just hate the "anime" style. (a term of derision among many artists) I don’t know, whenever I see this guy’s art, I get all inspired. There’s something to this guy’s style that is just surpasses most other anime artists I’ve seen in the past. Seriously!
The Apple artbook is features some of Hyung's best.
Anyway, It's time for me to end this post, with a video that might actually be relevant this time! My dear, Void, I leave you with the promo video for Blade and Soul. See for yourself if Mr. Kim's designs were translated well to 3D. Go on! Watch if you have nothing else better to do!
I've always adored the manga/manhwa/anime visual style. Critics say it's a knock off of the Japanese visual style, but I don't care. You may have read about my favorite artists of this style before. Do you not recall? I've written other fluff pieces in the past about this stuff! Here are the links:
The interesting about APPLE though is that the talent pool will be derived solely from Korea.
Most of the guys (and gals?) involved with this this project are the artists behind some of Korea's most popular Massively Multiplayer Online Role Playing Games.
Seoul Visual Works partnered with Udon to make this dream come true. Founder Eddie Yu has this to say about the project:
“They want to create something more personal and subjective. APPLE is a showcase for those illustrators and their personal creations...
...APPLE isn't a big budget project but the creators are happy to contribute to a worthwhile project, one in which they can see what other artists are up to, learn from them, and study the current trends.”
Big.
The only bad thing about these books is that they never come cheap. $35.00 is still a lot of money. Time to break the bank again...
Check out: http://www.udonentertainment.com/apple/
The Koreans have gained notoriety as some of the most skilled illustrators in the world, thanks to their works in video games, artbooks, and even animation. This line of artbooks will only solidify the Koreans grip on the young, unsuspecting artists. Outsourcing is awesome!!! *Sigh*
However, lets look back at the amazing ROBOT series, and see the roots of this project, and what all the fuss is about.
The hook of ROBOT was always to the disturbing mix of really nifty looking anime artwork with the European style of coloring/graphics, coupled with the visual and storytelling abilities of Japanese manga.
I just don't know. In the comic world, (probably more popular in Europe) there is something known as the "painted comics". Painted comics are literally just that, every panel, every frame is painstakingly painted and detailed to such a level that a page looks almost like a work of art. The Blacksad and Hipflask comic series are what comes to mind when I say this.
But when you throw in that style to anime? I don't know, there is that magic in it that makes it look even more dreamlike. Yoshitoshi ABE, one of the regular contributors of ROBOT, manages to pull this off quite well. His series has achieved quite a bit of fame from readers of the books.
Another highlight of the books is the work of Imperial Boy (image above), and how he paints these massive worlds, and crams it with unimaginable detail. And what's crazier is that with one page you would have this view of the overall world. The next page would be a "section" of that world, like a cramped walkway or something. He really wants to capture the feel of a crazy world, and he does it quite well. It's weird, but its great.
Good day to you!
