Research

Manga Magazines/Books

The Manga in a form of magazine are usually shorter than the books they present one chapter of the series of the stories. Manga books are longer than a magazine they are usually A5 size with black and white pages whereas magazines are A4 in most cases colourful as the cost of production is cheaper, however it is all depending on a manga and the idea, concept behind it. The other type of magazine style manga is only a page long manga released in a full length magazine, its function is to amuse and work as an extra attachment to the content to attract the audience even more.

There are few examples of magazine style manga I looked at to get the better understanding of the subject. For my final product I am planning to do the short manga magazine which would be just an extra addition to some of the girly magazine. However it will be all separate with its own front cover and theme.

The first magna comic I research was El Cazador de Almas- The Soul Chaser in spanish version by Studio Kawaii. I was interested into it as on the front cover there was a lot going on. It was colourful and stands out well. It also reminded me of my theme therefore it is good for me to find some similar products to mine.

By the first glance of the front cover, I am getting this feeling of mystery. I can also assume that the comic will be about the religion because of the crosses within the font of the title. 

I did include this comic in my research because I really liked the way the paged are lay out and the narrative is coming into the reader face quite strongly. Also I think the boxes and pictures are presented in unusual way.  Therefore it is creating the tension which is what the comic should do.  

The other thing I noticed about this comic is a good shading of the pictures making them look real. The composition of the pictures is amazing. The reader easily can get into the comic and enjoy reading it by the clear and interesting positioning of text and the balance between narrative and images. 

The next comics I looked at was Todd Allison & the Petunia Violet by Nozmo. I was intrigue by its front cover really simple, yet had something hypnotized about it. The characters didn’t remind me of conventional manga style, the artist used modern manga style which means that the characters are not having massive eyes and they don’t have all the stereotypical features for manga. They look more like normal humans. 

The structure of the pages is uncomplicated which make this manga clearer to read and in my opinion it is good as the manga is colourful and there would be too much going on at the same time.  The colours are emphasizing the mood and reflecting the character personalities very well. On a second page of a comic I really like the idea of the hand and the cigarette some going out of the box, frame and be on the pure background. It gave the moment more dramatic effect and made this scene more exciting.

Also this comic was edited on the computer I can assume it because of the graphic used throughout the comics. Therefore this comic’s links to my work a little bit as I would like to draw the outlines for my comics, scan it into the computer and create similar effect they achieved in Todd Allison & the Petunia Violet. Hopefully I will be able to attain comparable result.

Last comic I decided to discuss about is [笑顔を君にあげたい] - I Want To Give You Your Smile by Krazeh Kai. It has a beautiful cover that is an opposite of Todd Allison & the Petunia Violet. This time I had to deal with conventional manga comics. What I really like about it was the fact that the illustrations where realistic.

The disadvantage of this comic is the lack of color inside the book. In my personal opinion it should have the colors to make it look more effective. Where it comes to narrative I like that the artist included the sounds in the comic like on the picture below when the girl is opening the drink.  

By looking at third page I got the feeling that this comic might over exaggerate about the characters, the meaning behind it is that the artist could focus to much about characters rather than the surroundings which are also the key element in the comics as they are responsible of the imaginary part of the reader's brains.  

In a summary my initial plan for my comic would be to mix all the advantages from my researched comics and  create my own one that will have the lay out from The Soul Chaser, the graphic style from Todd Allison & the Petunia Violet and the detailed narrative from I Want To Give You Your Smile.

Manga Online Comics

The online comics are the ones that can be read online only, those are updated by the artist in a set period of time. Usually online comics are revealing page by page to interest the reader and  get their attention the examples of online comics website are shown below.   

http://www.mangavolume.com/

This website is a collection of various comics magazines and books that had been scanned into the computer and then uploaded to website so that the readers can have the free access to it whenever they want to. 

http://www.lackadaisycats.com/comic.php

Whereas this website is only about one comic that it is like I mentioned before updated by the artist. The theme of the website and color scheme is matching the style of the comic giving out to the viewer the story atmosphere   

www.distillum.com

Distillum is similar to Daisy Cats however it is about different genre. The functions of the website are the same, it has a cast, comics chapters and subscription.