The Eastern Edge

I got a lot more done than I thought I would last night and this morning, so here is the Urasawa translation I had been picking away at for the last little while (for those who don't know, I read during my morning commutes and punch on-the-fly translations into my cell phone. That's why it takes me so damn long!).

Some of you may have seen my post with some of Urasawa's rough work. Well, this is the whole thing. It ends up complementing the final part of the Quick Japan interview very well because he discusses this there too.
Anyway, the following is translated from Urasawa's own words.

Enjoy!

Before I begin drawing, I meet with Nagasaki and we toss around scenarios. We go back and forth at lightening speed with ideas like we're dealing cards, saying things like "No, that's not it." "That's good." and the drafts start to take shape in my head and as we piece together the story in that way.
Then I draw the neemu (ネーム：Japanese word for storyboard-like layout drafts), and then do the pencils, inks, and, depending on the situation, colouring, but compared to other comic artists I do my drawing very quickly. I do take a little time from the meeting until I begin to draw the neemu.

Back at the studio I start by doing things like tiding up the bookshelves and cleaning the windows (laughs). While everyone around me is wondering what in the world I'm doing, I'm getting into my groove. Well, I guess you could say I'm wasting time, too (laughs). I'm going through the story as discussed in the meeting in my head thinking, "This panel should be like this, then this, then that, this, this, this.... That's it!"

After that I go to my table and blast out the drawings. The speed I draw at is very important because if I take my time then I loose the feel. Drawing is intrinsically something that takes time, though, so in order to keep that initial feel, I add facial expressions to the characters in my neemu. I draw the facial expressions of the people on the page quickly using simple lines. Even though I do that, but I can almost never reproduce those expressions in my pencils, or my final inks, as well as I did them on the neemu (laughs).
A little raise of the eyebrows, or an expression of surprise… Those things are always drawn better when I’m in the moment. Female expressions are particularly difficult, and usually have to be aesthetically pleasing, so even the smallest mistake will completely ruin the characters ‘acting’.

The trouble is, will I be able to produce a drawing of the ideal acting that I have in my head. It’s a matter of whether I’ve got the skill in my drawing hand or not. For example if I’m drawing Kanna, whether she’s crying, laughing, or just standing there, I’ve got her face in my head but sometimes when I try to draw that it turns out completely differently. I feel like, "Ah, stupid right hand!"

At times like that I'm drawing mostly with my mind's eye, so it's like I'm trying to trace what's in my head with my hand, and telling my hand not to try and take control at all. I do it while sort of telling my hand it’s not allowed to assert itself or make the drawing it’s own.

The strong hand (drawing hand) is a thief. That might be useful when drawing certain patterns, but the A,B,C,D flow of an acting flow is all in the realm of the final experience. It’s a problem when my hand tries to steal that. In my comics I’m basically going for certain faces on my characters, or as we say “Face Manga” (顔漫画: kao manga). This is something I've been disliked for in the manga world; those long sequences of faces with word balloons. I think that’s probably because the editors have come to think that the faces the artist draws are just signs or symbols. However, I have come to question the general trend that shuns “Face Manga”. I feel like, "What’s wrong with going for the faces of the actors as they act!?" The angle of the face, the sight lines of the eyes, all of those things are of the utmost importance, so I couldn't understand why I was being told it was no good.

I'm sometimes asked, "How is it that you are able to draw the same face over and over again?" and I always answer, "I never draw the same face again, even once." A character that appears in volume one, panel one of a comic has a completely different face from that same character in volume 11.
They carry the burden of the whole story to that point, and they have specific expressions that only exist at that moment in time in volume 11. It’s exactly the same as actors. So there is a reason for even the angle of the drawing for an expression in a given panel. We (comic artists) are doing things that are so difficult, but it’s not often that people understand this. Many tend to think we’re just pumping out drawings with the same faces.

Honestly, the situation in Japan where comics are released in weekly anthologies is a very abnormal one. Everyone has become accustomed to it and deals with it like it was nothing, but people overseas think that producing comics of this quality on a weekly basis is insane. ... Yeah, it really is insane.
50 years ago, knowing it was something extremely difficult to do, weekly comics were created on a trial basis for the first time. But even after that initial trial period, it continued and is still the way it is now. It’s actually impossible. But it’s going through the impossible that has made today’s manga culture prosperous. It's an amazing story!