A Quick Exploration of the Difference Between 'Art' and 'Animation'

All too often, I see the phrase ‘animation’ getting tossed around without a proper knowledge of what the word entails. Although, for the record, I also see people talk about wanting to watch anime with ‘good graphics’ so at least most of us aren’t that bad, but nonetheless, I think a lot of people confuse a series having ‘good art’ with having ‘good animation.’ There are a lot of ways I could explain this with examples unrelated to one-another, but I think the more effective way to illustrate this is with Haibane Renmei and Texhnolyze – two shows with art designed by my favorite artist, Yoshitoshi ABe.

Why I See Gensokyo More Clearly Than Any Anime World

This is the only result I got for 'Gensokyo map' ROFL

One of the things that anime is surprisingly not very good at is creating a fully-realized fictional ‘world.’ When you open up a fantasy book (and fantasy is of course the best genre for fictional worlds) you are often confronted with a ‘world map’ right off the bat. You will be given details about all sorts of countries and locations and customs, etc., to bring this world to life as you read. The reason that this doesn’t really happen in anime is for the same reason it does happen a whole lot in JRPGs – time.

200 (+) Anime Worth Taking With Us Into the Next Decade

100 Characters For 100 Otaku (Part Eighteen: 15-11)

The eighteenth post in “100 Characters For 100 Otaku.”

It’s truly down to the wire as we enter the final three posts in “100 Characters For 100 Otaku!” Has your favorite character shown up yet? If not, don’t fret – while it’s true I may have left them out on purpose, there’s a high chance I have never heard of your favorite character or not seen enough of their work. If there is someone you think I should know about, by all means, recommend them to me as convincingly as you can! Meanwhile, let’s see 15 through 11!

100 Characters For 100 Otaku (Part Fifteen: 30-26)

The fifteenth post in “100 Characters For 100 Otaku.”

We’re three-fourths of the way through “100 Characters For 100 Otaku!” Originally, the series was only going to be five posts long, with each containing twenty characters! I quickly realized this was not possible when I started writing the first post in my notebook, and decided to shorten it to ten posts, but once I transferred it to the computer, I knew it would have to be twenty! Today’s quarry are numbers 30 down through 26, so let’s check ’em out!

Mai Waifus – Because Anime Made Me a Polygamist

Every blog needs a Mai Waifu post, and ever since Ghostlightning delivered one of the best I’ve read a couple months ago, I’ve been wanting to do my own. I wanted to make sure it was a very perfect and specific post. Not just about women I find attractive (would take millions of words) but true women that I really think would make good wives. I know I’ll have fun with this, so lets roll!

Haibane Renmei Volume 1 DVD Features

I am fairly certain there were 2 releases of Haibane Renmei – originally, the individual DVDs and artbox from when the company was Pioneer Entertainment, and then the much prettier box set that I am pretty sure was made during Geneon time before that company hit the can. I bought Haibane volume one with the less attractive box waaay back because I had found it cheap and I collected the DVDs over the course of about 4 years. So mine is Pioneer released, and therefor I don’t know if the content was changed for Geneon.

Haibane Renmei ep 2 – I Wonder If The Town I Know Is Beyond That Wall?

Before Aria came along, there wasn’t really much competition for ‘best anime town ever’ with Haibane dominating the category. Episode 2 is mostly about exploring some of the town and introducing Rakka to some of it’s facets. It’s not a full-scale town rundown, as only so much can be done in one day, but we definitely start to get a sense of things. But first things first.