Fanime 2010: Mostly Panels and Some Socializing

Saw this stylish tiger on my way back from eating out

Fanime 2010 was Memorial Day weekend (May 28th-31st) and even though it felt like the same sort of convention as in 2009, it was more personally entertaining than last year because I met up with many of the other writers/bloggers there for lunch and other times over the course of the weekend. I also attended some interesting panels as well as a few that weren’t as compelling.

Jump to: Friday | Saturday | Sunday | The Rest

FRIDAY #
My first panel of the convention was Being A Strong Woman in the Industry on Friday night, presented by Karen Dyer, who was staying on stage from the previous panel, Reuben and CAPCOM – Mo-Cap and Action! Karen admitted that the title was somewhat misleading. She has voiced Sheva in Resident Evil 5 as well as acting and performing on many stages. She explained her Eva La Dare burlesque persona and showed a music video for an upcoming single “Candy Love”, which was shot over the course of five hours using a Canon 7D. The single is expected to be released this summer, though no dates are final.

Karen also told some funny anecdotes about having to voice all of Sheva’s different possible deaths, working with Michael Jackson, and having to do a bed scene with Ice-T for a movie.

SATURDAY #
Saturday began for me with the History of Gainax panelist featuring Hiroyuki Yamagi and his interpreter. Yamagi first talked about how the company formed in 1983 and showed the Daicon IV short and a collage put together (we were told) by Hideaki Anno of Gainax’s work up until Petit Princess Yucie. He pointed out that while researching the history of the studio for the panel, he discovered it had no releases in years ending in “6″ (1986, 1996, 2006) and that those are times when they were working on new projects: 1986 – Wings of Honneamise, 1996 – Evangelion (the movies), 2006 – Gurren Lagann.

Dark Horse editor Carl Gustav Horn posed a couple questions to Yamaga before leaving to do his own panel: first, how does only speaking Japanese in the office affect their international business strategy and second, does Gainax get any awareness of how foreign audiences like their works? Yamaga said they used to have non-Japanese working for them but now they just rely on translators and that even though he’s gone overseas, he still doesn’t know what foreigners like so Gainax will continue to make projects for a Japanese audience.

[Related Yamaga links: ANN interview; Otaku USA writeup of panel]

Right after that and a brisk walk away was Dark Horse Manga and Carl Horn to lay out the imprint’s releases through about September. No new license announcements this time around but Carl made sure to pitch Evangelion: Campus Apocalypse as Shinji becoming cool because he’s got a gun in this alternate universe series and something distinctly different since it was originally serialized in the shojo magazine Asuka. (The romantic comedy manga Angelic Days was also serialized in Asuka; Shinji Ikari Raising Project runs in Shonen Ace and so did the main Evangelion series before being moved to Young Ace when that magazine launched.)

When Carl was asked putting manga on digital devices, he said they’re looking into it. Titles would be on a case-by-case basis and they have to consider their retailers’ needs as well. He emphasized that books are three-dimensional objects – “that’s why we put effort into the books” – and that Dark Horse is a publisher, not a content provider.

Following Dark Horse was a blogger lunch meetup at Sonoma Chicken Coop organized by Deb Aoki. In attendance were Deb, Gia Manry and John Martone (both formerly of Anime Vice), Heidi Kemps, Danielle Orihuela-Gruber, Sam Kusek, Emily, Nancy Thistelwaite (who does editing for Viz), Jason Yadao of the then-Honolulu Star Bulletin (now the Honolulu Star-Advertiser), and Sean & Mike from Colony Drop. Sean later wrote a report for Otaku USA focusing on how little anime-focused content there was at the convention.

The Intern in the Manga Industry panel had Stevie Wegrzyn, Danielle, and Sam talking about their experiences interning for Tokyopop and, in Sam’s case, with Fanscape, a social media marketing firm. Each got in using similar methods: Stevie applied as a sophomore in college and was currently in negotiation to be hired, Sam got his through a scholarship program at Emerson and one of his assignments was Naruto Shippuden, and Danielle went for an editorial internship which involved copy editing and researching licenses. Stevie said it’s not really what you’re doing but more what’s going on around you.

Even if you don’t have plans to work in a creative media field anytime soon, they provided some good advice that could be applied to many job areas: when applying, always look at the qualifications and reword; personalize your cover letter and mention notable skills like words per minute or computer program experience; never sell yourself short; ask for criticism; be patient. (Danielle also recently posted some guidance – and warnings – to potential manga interns on All About Manga.)

Late Saturday night was Gilles Poitras’ Sex Trade in Anime & Manga panel, which required 18+ ID checks. Gilles primarily used books written by others for his research and lamented the lack of good, reliable information about the Japanese sex trade available in English. He recommended Tokyo Vice and Pink Box while also mentioning other books that are out of print and aren’t entirely useful for conducting research. He pointed to scenes in manga and anime like GTO, Ikebukuro West Gate Park, and City Hunter to demonstrate certain terms and elements including compensated dating – you can see the list of what he covered in his own writeup.

(Gia, who now writes for ANN, posted a long interview with Gilles that begins with a focus on this subject before moving onto other things. Gilles also wrote up the panel on his blog.)

Pre-panel entertainment: Danemon Ban short (1935)

SUNDAY #
The next morning, I went to Older Titles for Newer Fans, where Gilles & Jonathan Osborne talked about & showed clips from eight anime that are more than 10 years old and still in print. Among the more familiar Cowboy Bebop and Escaflowne were more obscure offerings such as Hakkenden, The Dagger of Kamui, and Doomed Megalopolis. In talking about Gundam 0083, Jonathan commented that he liked Cima having a zebra skin chair.

K Valentine presented Working as an Anime Critic Sunday afternoon and the small audience in attendance seemed to share his cynical tone. The advice he gave was nothing surprising but I thought the Artists’ Alley raffle giveaway was a nice way to promote some of his friends’ tables.

All About Figure Collecting was presented by Heidi Kemps and had expanded from one hour to two after the panel afterward, DIY Deco Den & Sweets Jewelry, was canceled. She introduced the different types of figures from action figures to fixed pose and was starting to move onto specific manufacturers when I left halfway through to attend the Nujabes panel next door. (Destroy All Podcasts DX has an audio recording of the panel.)

Rest in Peace: Nujabes was a learning experience since I never really identified him with the music in Samurai Champloo until I heard of his death in February. Many people stepped up to the microphone and paid tribute to the late music producer and I could feel the deep relationship they felt to his music. The session wrapped up with a call-and-response rap led by hip-hop artists Noka and Lone Wolf and the songs mentioned included “Feather”, “Aruarian Dance” and “Eclipse”. By the end, I got the sense that his music was one way that a popular anime (in Champloo) introduced people to Japanese hip-hop or simply provided them an aural refuge from the stresses of the world.

Some friends from my old anime club put on Touhou Hijack LOL, based on a thesis by Tomoaki Hirai entitled “Tōhō Project and Its Connections with Classical Aspects of Folklore and Culture of Japan”. Using NicoNicoDouga videos to illustrate points, the spread of Touhou’s popularity was explained along with the religious meaning behind the characters and games.

The final panel I attended for the weekend was Character Design at 12am Sunday night into Monday, which I noticed on the schedule only a few hours before. It was pretty low-key with artist BentoBoxBobby giving some advice about designing characters, presenting artwork to potential clients, and how to maintain a steady flow of ideas. Some books he recommended for serious artists were The Elements of Color by Johannes Itten, Manga Mania: Magical Girls and Friends by Christopher Hart, and the annual Artist’s and Graphic Designer’s Market.

I couldn’t resist asking Glenn if I could get a picture of his jacket.

The Rest #
Let’s wrap up on the rest of the activities. During a couple trips to the dealer’s hall, I picked up a few small boxed figures, three manga volumes (Eden vol. 2, Ghost Talker’s Daydream vol. 1, Gakuen Prince vol. 2), a water bottle from the Red Cross after donating, and a Kanji de Manga book. I actually managed to strike up a conversation with Manga University founder Glenn Kardy about Japanese baseball after seeing his Yakult Swallows jacket draped over a chair.

The swap meet found me gaining many Mixx/Tokyopop Magazine back issues, some individual comic volumes, FLCL manga volumes 1 & 2, X-Day vol. 1 (I’d bought vol. 2 the previous weekend), and a used library copy of Samurai from Outer Space. I only took one brisk, cursory look through Artist Alley and didn’t return a second time, which shouldn’t be taken personally. I didn’t feel like spending a lot of time in there, unlike last year, and I guess my defense is I’m not enough into fanart to buy from many artists, even though I acknowledge a fair percentage is original art.

During some downtime, I watched some older anime in the video rooms: Fushigi Yugi eps. 1-2 on Sunday night and Ranma 1/2 eps. 1-5 at the head-nodding-off-into-shoulder-tapping-as-a-warning time of 4-6am Monday morning (don’t think I’ll try *that* again!). I might watch more of Fushigi Yugi but I’m not so inclined to continue with Ranma.

As press, I felt less pressure this year to try to cover the convention hard – I didn’t try to take any video of panels but I did take a bunch of handwritten notes. I think it was due to increased confidence from no longer being a university student (and therefore not having homework waiting back home) and from seeing peers I’d seen last year or met in person for the first time over the weekend.