Forum - View topicAnime characters non-japanese?
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x_Hisoka_x
 Posts: 260 Location: Formerly: Anime_Newcomer |
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I was just wondering why japanese animation characters don't look at all japanese. I prefer them the way they are now but they just look more American to me.
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IchigoK90
 Posts: 1634 Location: Scarborough, Ontario |
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How should I say this...............they're animated characters. You can't really expect much realism from animated characters. Besides what do you define as looking Japanese? Squinty eyed? Yellow? Thin?
"Believe it!" - IchigoK90 |
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Hoenheim
 Posts: 44 Location: Santa Barbara, California |
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I can't remember exactly how this was used, but I heard they made the characters look less Japanese to make anime easier to internationalize. The way anime characters look now is more nationalitaly (if that word made sence) neutral to the world it seems, with most of North America and Europe.
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jaybug39
 Posts: 552 Location: Oregon, Is it FOOTBALL yet? |
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So, in order not to stereotype, the characters must look American, of european extract?
Although I do agree with Hoenheim, in that the look is a way to more internationalize anime. |
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Keonyn
 Subscriber Posts: 5567 Location: Coon Rapids, MN |
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I don't think they look more american, you could easily say they look more russian or australian or european. They look like anime characters, they don't really have much basis in reality, but if you want to nitpick they do more closely resemble the general appearance of people from europe or of european descent, which includes much of the US.
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Swissman
Posts: 788 Location: Switzerland |
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More nitpick: This only concerns a part of all existing character designs (for example, this would be correct for WMT-shows or many works from Ghibli). Some shows have more "asian" looking characters (think of Akira, Jin-Roh or the Kenshin OAVs). On the other hand, many well known anime designs like those from the nineties with sharp edges (think of Sadamoto's Ayanami Rey or Shinji Ikari) or the standart "moe" designs of nowadays shows (think of Haruhi) do in no way resemble any people from any continent. Their look is a class of their own – they're simply "anime" characters and don't resemble any ethnicity. |
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bluepita
 Posts: 465 |
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I have also heard in similar discussions that the characters do look Japanese to people from Japan. One story from a professor at my university. She is from Japan, and her husband from America. When this discussion came up, each was shocked at the other's response. He had no idea that the anime characters appeared Japanese to her, and of course, she had no idea he thought they looked American.
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IchigoK90
Posts: 1634 Location: Scarborough, Ontario |
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I'm just gonna say this bluntly soo who friggin cares about ethnicity in anime? Unless it deals with an aspect of the show I don't really give a crap whether they look japanese, european, russian (which would qualify as eurasian) or whatever. Putting it simply I watch anime for the content not what ethnicity the characters resemble.
"Believe it!" - IchigoK90 |
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dormcat
Encyclopedia Editor
 Posts: 9902 Location: New Taipei City, Taiwan, ROC |
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http://utd500.utdallas.edu/~hairston/nausicaa_lecture_1_p2.html |
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fighterholic
Posts: 9193 |
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Sometimes you can't make out a person's nationality in anime unless they say they're name and it doesn't sound like a Japanese name. Like they might have a really dark skinned looking person and he/she will be Japanese. And then to what I've seen of anime characters, even most Japanese will have blond hair, while Japanese in real life have mainly black hair.
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opaquescum
Posts: 235 |
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I think that the reason is far simpler then many of you guys think. Picture yourself in a cubicle for eight hours a day drawing characters. Okay got that firmly in your head good. Now imagine that you have to draw the same character every day. Got that in your head good. Now imagine that every character you are going to draw for the next thirty or fourty years is going to look roughly the same.
I hope you got the point now. That would suck, and probabally drive you mad. So they choose to draw wildly varied characters, and will quickly incorporate different racial aspects into characters. This gives them the chance to have fun with their art, and it makes it easier to differentiate one anime character from another. The human face is one of the harder things to animate afterall. Now if you want to discuss racial types, and I am going to blunt so please do not take offense if you want to look up the reference material you can. Japanese people are hard to distinguish to caucasians, but not to fellow japanese. This is if I recall correctly a genetic trait. Afterall if you live in a limited genepool. Which by default has also seen selective breeding then many people are going to look very similar. Anyway when two japanese people look at one another they look for traits that distinguish. Now if I recall correctly its the structure of the cheeks, and how they are set. Which might be hard for a non japanese person to see. Now as for americans we are mutts. That means even though we might have similar genetic programming we get by fine. Since so much about appearance varies from person to person. Though if you go to say Finland, and tried to differentiate people, and you were of finish descent you probabally would not have all that hard a time. Even though it is a limited genepool with the above mentioned selective breeding. So if your going on pure racial characteristics. I am betting its far easier to differentiate between characters in a series based on eye colors, or hair color, or eyeshape then it is to try more subtle features. Many of which may be much harder to do a good job with. Anyway seven different shades of eye color has to be more fun then every character haveing the same eye color. |
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P€|\||§_|\/|ast@
 Posts: 3498 Location: IN your nightmares |
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I get questions similar to A_N's question occasionally at work. I suppose a better word to use to repesent how anime characters look is "Caucasian" as it doesn't imply any specific nationality. But it is caucasian people who typically notice this particular aspect of anime characters. The answer I usually give is that the appearance of anime characters is only an interpretation based on how the viewer compares that image with her or himself. In other words our interpretation of what the art is supposed to resemble is different than that of someone who is not caucasian.
I think it is somewhat of an overgeneralization to say that through the perception of the Japanese, anime characters do not appear nor are intended to appear as caucasian people. But there is some truth in it. Just as with us, to the Japanese, anime characters just look like anime characters, and there is little importance placed in their design to portray realistic looking people. One analogy I like to use is sculptures of human figures by ancient Aztec and Inca societies. Some of these have very distorted emphasis placed on certain human features, but alot from the same time periods look very similar. I think this is proof to the fact that different cultures perceive themselves in many different ways than others. The development of the anime style is both a conglomeration of technical necessity and cultural expression that may be misinterpreted by other cultures. |
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bink1227
Posts: 26 |
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what race is mickey mouse? what race is tom or jerry? are they american? can you tell by their eyes? can you tell by jasmin's eyes from alladin that she's arabic or does she just have an awesome tan?
animated characters have big eyes so they can express emotion more clearly. they're simplified and easy to draw because it would probably drive animators mad to sit around and draw what actual humans looked like for 8-24 frames/second. also, i find it kind of ignorant to say all japanese people look the same or all finnish people look the same. if you don't pay attention, everybody looks the same: two eyes, two ears, a mouth, hair, a nose... Last edited by bink1227 on Tue Jun 27, 2006 11:30 pm; edited 1 time in total |
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bluepita
Posts: 465 |
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Ha ha, not only is this the university I was talking about, but this is one of the two lectures I have heard Marc give. Funny coincidence, since I am pretty sure I have never said where I go to school here.  If you have ever had the chance to listen to Dr. Hairston talk, he has got some really interesting things to say.
In regards to an earlier post in which someone asks if this question matters, I think it does in some areas. For instance, if anime characters were indeed intentionally 'Americanized,' what does this say about the influence of the West on anime? Not the animation points discussed by Marc in the referenced lecture, but in two other ways, both the commercial side and the cultural. Do overseas sales influence Japanese animation? How much of an influence was WWII on Japan? Did the loss and subsequent influence of McArthur cause Japan to idealize the West in any way? Most of the answers can be found outside of anime, but often studying the relatively small characteristics of a country's pop culture can provide valuable insights. Is this what all or most want out of anime? I doubt it, but it is a developing subject in academia. Sorry for rambling. Just very interested in the academic side of anime.
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Zalis116
Moderator
 Posts: 6897 Location: Kazune City |
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From what I've heard, they look non-Japanese because anime (+Osamu Tezuka) was originally inspired by Disney/Western animation, so anime imitated the Caucasian styling/shading of characters. If characters did look authentically Japanese, it might be harder to distinguish between them, since animated characters are inherently less detailed than actual people and even those with that "special genetic trait" would have difficulty. The outlandish hair colors also serve to make characters easier to identify.
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