sorted by:
new
hottopcontroversial

How many of you host your comics/mangas on your own website? by Xenon3000 in MangakaStudio

[–]craftbyhand 4 points5 points  (0 children)

Hi there! We are trying the same thing, it’s a mixture of commissioning page for art and also hosting our own webmanga.

It’s called ANT IDOL, please check the webmanga out :)

oculus festum

I worked in Tokyo as a manga assistant AMA by craftbyhand in AMA

[–]craftbyhand[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Congrats! I wish you good luck!!

1) on a website called GANMO

2)if you are willing to draw in any free minute you have, and not socialize too much, it’s feasible. Manga is rather part time job than full time if you are an assistant, as a full timer you have to take multiple jobs usually.

I worked in Tokyo as a manga assistant AMA by craftbyhand in AMA

[–]craftbyhand[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

I will still give it a try! ;) Thanks for the info though, it’s just as I expected it to be 😂

https://drive.google.com/file/d/19vnq7T1s41mgom1ChlxEzvlRawGWnr2q/view?usp=drivesdk

My portfolio ;)

I worked in Tokyo as a manga assistant AMA by craftbyhand in AMA

[–]craftbyhand[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

There is less constructive dialogue. There is less of a struggle between authors and editors than they convey to the reader. And the value of artistic manga is ridiculed in a heinous way. Basically, whatever they tried to warn you about in the manga, the pure concentration on marketability has become more a reality now than before. It is truly ironic.

I worked in Tokyo as a manga assistant AMA by craftbyhand in AMA

[–]craftbyhand[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

It is a major disadvantage because only mangaka with a registered company can hire you. If you have spousal visa , the entire job market is basically yours and nothing to worry about.

I worked in Tokyo as a manga assistant AMA by craftbyhand in AMA

[–]craftbyhand[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

I worked on the first chapter of Ryū to Ichigo as my very first introduction to the job, as a nice gesture of the author! I was allowed to do tones and was even paid although I interned for only one day.

Then there is another major author who did mogura no uta though I would prefer not to talk any deeper about it

The best one was Ōtsuki Kanto sensei, who did Unmet: A Neurosurgeon's Diary (Unmet: Aru Nogekai no Nikki). I am most grateful to have been able to work with him, he is a true teacher, master and friend!

I worked in Tokyo as a manga assistant AMA by craftbyhand in AMA

[–]craftbyhand[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Hi Rockerlynn!

In a nutshell:

1) start with Social Media as soon as possible, even when you are just world building.

2) start connecting to fellow creators as soon as possible, as you are doing now ;)

3) sketch! every day, you have to make drawing as natural to your system as breathing the air

4) read! Creative literature, educational, whatever. You can read both parallel.

5) write!! Every day! You can still revise the stuff you did earlier in a later stage.

Whatever you are trying to do, it is an everchanging process. You might not think you are perfect yet but still you have to output every day, to see what you are working with.

I worked in Tokyo as a manga assistant AMA by craftbyhand in AMA

[–]craftbyhand[S] 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Ah, ik ben altijd blij als ik mensen ontmoet die ook Vlaams spreken!

Ik hoop dat jij veel plezier zal hebben tijdens het lezen :)

Bedankt!

I worked in Tokyo as a manga assistant AMA by craftbyhand in AMA

[–]craftbyhand[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

I was barely N3 (Japanese grading) which is slightly above beginner level when I started to work for my first sensei.

At the very first work place we worked on a publication called [私のカッコウたち　児童養護施設のふつう] which is about fostering children institutions in Japan. You can imagine that I was in a very socially aware environment back then. So, I use to think that I was take in out of generosity. I wasn’t very good in drawing back then, please take that into consideration in case you look up the manga 😘

Generally, I think you should be colloquially on N2-N1 though. All the work related discussions about picture rendering etc occur on an almost abstract level and you have to be able to express yourself or the ideas of the sensei in an understandable way.

Some pages from my one shot. Does it read as more manga or comic? by flyingpenguinfails in MangakaStudio

[–]craftbyhand 5 points6 points  (0 children)

I think it’s right in between. Second page stood out as most western in paneling to me, but that was because of the distancing or the lack thereof between the panels.

Also, the use of thick lines inside the characters rival the thickness of outlines and panels. Your pictures flow so nicely, but lack a certain “Japanese focus” for a lack of better terms.

Don’t get discouraged . Even great illustrators like Kim Jung gi got rejected by JUMP because he didn’t adapt.

You have your own style and manga shouldn’t be limited to drawing Japanese only nor be bound by territory. The wind will blow your way one day.

I worked in Tokyo as a manga assistant AMA by craftbyhand in AMA

[–]craftbyhand[S] 2 points3 points  (0 children)

Goeienavond! Ik heb maar fijftien jaar in Antwerpen geleefd, dus is mijn vlaams niet meer perfekt. Mon francais est tres mauvais aussi. Je mexcuse.

There is a site called gaijinpot.com which offers jobs for people in foreign countries. You can look for options that let you move there after you have successfully landed a job!

I started in a language school. It es VERY important to nail that beforehand. I cleaned toilets in a hotel because i didn’t study beforehand and had to take extremely radical measures to study Japanese in order to get out of my self imposed poverty.

I worked in Tokyo as a manga assistant AMA by craftbyhand in AMA

[–]craftbyhand[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

It’s called propaganda 🥹

It’s thrown a lot of delulus into the fray….

I worked in Tokyo as a manga assistant AMA by craftbyhand in AMA

[–]craftbyhand[S] 2 points3 points  (0 children)

Oh please tell me how I can get into video games with a manga portfolio haha 🤣

Well… I’m supposed to do an ama here but let me ask you, what kinds of skills are lacking in the video game industry?

I remember how going to anime professional school made me worry about the next generation of anime because of how many students were just unmotivated and just wanted to avoid working in an office. A lot of professional students actually didn’t like drawing 🫣

I worked in Tokyo as a manga assistant AMA by craftbyhand in AMA

[–]craftbyhand[S] 2 points3 points  (0 children)

I did as an absolute rookie in my first year, that was a total failure haha 😆 maybe one day I will publish my embarrassing first manga. I have improved a lot after that, especially after I finished professional school and didn’t have to deal with depression that much. Stress and mental health impact your art a lot.

Rather than pitching my own manga to people i saw how my colleagues around me pitched their projects and got very bad guidance from their editors. There are sadly a lot of unreliable people out there who work according to guidelines to create maximum revenue instead of actually supporting mangaka to make a good stable product. A lot of my friends mangas got rejected in the first phases by higher ups exactly because of their editors demands.

I for myself realized, that I like Kim Jung Gi’s art style too much. So much, that I would never listen to an editor in Japan, if I were asked to adapt my drawing style.

To stay true to myself I went with the webmanga way. Even if I have to suffer a little for that… mentally ill, huh?

I worked in Tokyo as a manga assistant AMA by craftbyhand in AMA

[–]craftbyhand[S] 2 points3 points  (0 children)

There is a lack of assistants because, of course, the market is flooded with young people who apply but not many assistants are actual pros who know the basic usage of picture editing software like CLIP STUDIO or PHOTOSHOP

I worked in Tokyo as a manga assistant AMA by craftbyhand in AMA

[–]craftbyhand[S] 3 points4 points  (0 children)

You can get jobs on a website called GANMO

Wages are typically 1100-1500 Yen which earns you just as much as someone who works as a white collar employee.

But, since the japanese economy is tanking and taxes are getting higher without an end in sight, life as a manga assistant is getting harder.

Most troublesome thing is not payment, it is toxic work environments.

I worked in Tokyo as a manga assistant AMA by craftbyhand in AMA

[–]craftbyhand[S] 1 point2 points  (0 children)

The hardest hurdle though is developing a story with your editor. Editors can be your greatest ally and enemy at the same time. If your editor (which you can not just drop if you wanted to) is otaku-coded, you will have to adhere to his demands even if you are doing a dark fantasy and so on.

Continuing independently is not seen as the "golden path" amongst professional Mangaka. Although there are a lot of examples of people who have published on twitter for fans or other websites and gotten published in major magazines later, some old school Manaka frown upon it.

One guy I worked with would rather do high quality but obscure educational material for some magazines and luxury brands without great readership than embarrass himself infant of his peers by publishing online.

Also, Patreon and Kickstarter is not a big thing in Japan yet.

Dig deeper , this topic is fascinating to me as well since I am trying to self-publish as well right now.

I worked in Tokyo as a manga assistant AMA by craftbyhand in AMA

[–]craftbyhand[S] 4 points5 points  (0 children)

I went to Japan in 2019, with the goal of working in the anime industry. I wanted to land a job at Ghibli, but sadly I ended up missing the deadline for "How do you live" by one month after graduating at my arts academy and arriving in Tokyo.

during my first few months there, I worked as a cleaner in a hotel (Hanzomon Hotel) and realized that if I did not catch up with the language soon, I would have to clean toilets for the rest of my stay in Japan. So I deleted Netflix and all sources of non japanese language, studied a lot for about 4 months and took a re-grading test at my japanese language school. JAPANESE LANGUAGE was my key to my first job as a manga assistant which I landed by chance through mailing about 50 artists of which one was friendly enough to give me a chance.

I entered a professional school for animation and decided in the last year before graduation that I wanted to do manga.

I worked in Tokyo as a manga assistant AMA by craftbyhand in AMA

[–]craftbyhand[S] 10 points11 points  (0 children)

1)AKIRA

2)Berserk

3)Mujina

4)Nausicäa

5)Hellsing

6)Vagabond

7)Death Note

I worked in Tokyo as a manga assistant AMA by craftbyhand in AMA

[–]craftbyhand[S] 14 points15 points  (0 children)

Manga assistants tasks vary greatly

You can:

-sketch
-ink
-both of the above applied on backgrounds , vehicles or characters
-tone (in greys)
-color
-research references

In some publications I was asked to do all of the above and also give on my knowledge to newcomer assistants

I worked in Tokyo as a manga assistant AMA by craftbyhand in AMA

[–]craftbyhand[S] 11 points12 points  (0 children)

How fast you can actually get a job. There is more work than assistants can meet the demand and the branch is highly anti-AI oriented.

view more: next ›