Even it's an oneshot, it is too short to make readers feel sympathy with characters. Ideology of both is simple but how much the story provided information even made it so trivial. Tragedy made for the sake of tragedy, the author should have given a background about living in human village and more wideshot. Beside good illustration, story telling method is important as well.
Even it's an oneshot, it is too short to make readers feel sympathy with characters. Ideology of both is simple but how much the story provided information even made it so trivial. Tragedy made for the sake of tragedy, the author should have given a background about living in human village and more wideshot. Beside good illustration, story telling method is important as well.
You can clearly see how few wideshot appears in each page, only close or focus shot. If you wanna draw comic, don't make that mistake.
We don't need a wide shot when it's such a character focused comic, peaking at 3 characters in the scene at a time. Not to mention, it's a fan doujin, so the writer can safely assume some investment in the character of Reimu - which is why the story focuses on her predecessor's thoughts more often.
I also wouldn't call this story telling method bad for their absence, either - the focus on close and focus shots allows for greater detail on their expressions. Watch Reimus eyes throughout the comic. At first, when she sees the scene of her father's death, they're sharp, white-irised, with pinprick pupils. For most of the comic, her irises are big and glazed, with no pupil at all, but she goes back to the first eye design when fighting her mom... only to go to white, pupil-less and scratchy afterwards. Then, in the flash forward, we don't see her eyes once.
Contrast with her mother, who is the opposite, nearly always white with pupils clearly visible. The only time she couldn't be described like that, is when she's happy acting as Reimu's mother. Hell, even when she's shaded in darkness, her eyes are practically radiant white.
It's pretty clear there's a windows to the soul theme happening there. Specifically, I believe that glazing over effect - normally otherwise associated with things like being depressed or brainwashed - is used here to indicate where the characters are avoiding confronting their reality - that the Shrine maiden will have to kill other humans if they stray too far from humanity. When that truth comes in, when they accept or are confronted with that fact, they snap out of the trance of being a happy family and snap into focus. It's also why we don't get a view of Reimu's eyes in the flash-forward - to give that bit of ambiguity about how seriously she's answering the question. Is she seriously ready to do it, focused and alert at the possibility? Is she glazed over, avoiding confronting it, and giving a facetious answer?
That's the most obvious standout aspect to me, and stuffing in wideshots for the sake of it could have risked breaking that ability to follow their emotional journey. I could talk about the fields of red spider lilies as well, their association with death and funerals, the clear symbolism in having her
This is all, of course, putting aside the fact that we're getting this comic for free, even from the original pixiv; it's translated for free; and yet you're complaining like it's a comic you had to not just buy, but pay an exorbitant premium for, and with the confidence and self-assurance that can only come from the dunning-kreuger effect.
We don't need a wide shot when it's such a character focused comic, peaking at 3 characters in the scene at a time. Not to mention, it's a fan doujin, so the writer can safely assume some investment in the character of Reimu - which is why the story focuses on her predecessor's thoughts more often.
I also wouldn't call this story telling method bad for their absence, either - the focus on close and focus shots allows for greater detail on their expressions. Watch Reimus eyes throughout the comic. At first, when she sees the scene of her father's death, they're sharp, white-irised, with pinprick pupils. For most of the comic, her irises are big and glazed, with no pupil at all, but she goes back to the first eye design when fighting her mom... only to go to white, pupil-less and scratchy afterwards. Then, in the flash forward, we don't see her eyes once.
Contrast with her mother, who is the opposite, nearly always white with pupils clearly visible. The only time she couldn't be described like that, is when she's happy acting as Reimu's mother. Hell, even when she's shaded in darkness, her eyes are practically radiant white.
It's pretty clear there's a windows to the soul theme happening there. Specifically, I believe that glazing over effect - normally otherwise associated with things like being depressed or brainwashed - is used here to indicate where the characters are avoiding confronting their reality - that the Shrine maiden will have to kill other humans if they stray too far from humanity. When that truth comes in, when they accept or are confronted with that fact, they snap out of the trance of being a happy family and snap into focus. It's also why we don't get a view of Reimu's eyes in the flash-forward - to give that bit of ambiguity about how seriously she's answering the question. Is she seriously ready to do it, focused and alert at the possibility? Is she glazed over, avoiding confronting it, and giving a facetious answer?
That's the most obvious standout aspect to me, and stuffing in wideshots for the sake of it could have risked breaking that ability to follow their emotional journey. I could talk about the fields of red spider lilies as well, their association with death and funerals, the clear symbolism in having her
This is all, of course, putting aside the fact that we're getting this comic for free, even from the original pixiv; it's translated for free; and yet you're complaining like it's a comic you had to not just buy, but pay an exorbitant premium for, and with the confidence and self-assurance that can only come from the dunning-kreuger effect.
Free or not, I can criticize it and it may help or worth for someone. The weight of the act couldn't be describe to its fullest because of the ambiguous background surrounding them, the back edge of close shot not only make the story telling less effective but also make a bad layout. What I'm talking about is how the author couldn't balance the space, so the reason behind their act seem clear but actually not. I didn't see any contact of Reimu and her father and his death is the premise for the story. Their eyes expressions are not something worth to praise, It's monotone and normal mangaka uses it often. The wideshot doesn't ruin the flow of emotion, the lack of it is the real reason. How can you know a world cruel if It wasn't shown, how to sympathy with someone if you don't know where their motivation come from? From themselve? Not convinced enough for me, like fighting their own illusion, hate something because I hate it. The reason was mentioned in the story but It was only mention in Reimu's speech and left in corner. Niy_(nenenoa) can describe the sorrow in Marisa really good, only let her appear at the first and the end of the story without her father's appearance by the world around them alone, that degree of skill is not easy to achieve and he could balance the information from speech and background, even good and diversity camera angle. The emotion is hard to convey only using only character's face of course some pro mangakas can do it, but it is risk and not always effective, that's why they make character be overwhelmed by the background as you can see in many movies or manga. The monster which you can see is the scariest and emotion expression alike, so how can it ruin the flow not those focus shot with the same expression? I'm still in process of learning how to draw, make my own doujin and get critique is normal for me, so I don't care if I get more.
Wide shots serve an artistic purpose, the same way that focus shots do. Is there a particular task that wide shots would be better at achieving by dint of being wide shots?
Wide shots serve an artistic purpose, the same way that focus shots do. Is there a particular task that wide shots would be better at achieving by dint of being wide shots?
Yes, there is. 'Artistic purpose' is something ambiguous so I won't mention it because I heard too much in drawing class. In term of describing the landscape, not only that it give us the exact position where the character is, include place, atmosphere and situation, further more stretching story's pace. If your character is in hardship, sorrow, lost or wander in some place, the wide shot is the most recommended. For example, in evangelion while Shinji was running from his father, wandering around, most of time they used wide shot for reason, not make you get fed of Shinji's face which didn't change from the start, help us feel the gap between him and the world, lost in the crowd. In chainsaw man, Asa was always alone and hardly made any contact so behind her there was always the appearance of apartments which is cold, boring and weigh, If you noticed, the camera faced directly to the facade because horizontal and vertical line is static while diagonal, curve line is dynamic so the direct shot is better to convey her mind.
In this oneshot, mid shot, close shot are over used so I accidently finished it too fast without realizing it. Because the pacing is too fast so you can't blame anyone if they feel something so trivial, for instance the daily life of Reimu with her predecessor which used only mid shot give a feeling of looking at other's photos, sparing no space for readers to let them feel the same atmosphere as characters, so the pacing came in a flash. To make it more effective in coveying atmosphere, all shots are needed not only see her, her family, but we somehow feel as a part of it. Not mention, human turning into youkai is a sin, so at least the root and reason for that belief should be shown, even it is a fact like 1+1=2, no one care, people want to see why and how that obsession exist.
I'm not at all sure I agree with you, but I think I at least have a better grasp of your reasoning here, which I appreciate. Is your implication here that wide shots are always going to be better? Is there such a thing as a situation in which a close or focus shot is better for conveying something? A wide shot is broad, dramatic, it suggests a single frozen moment and the enormity of the world – but the frames in which Reimu stabs the previous Hakurei are intimate, they're focused perfectly and purely on the two of them, they're forgetting entirely the life that Reimu is saving, because she just killed her own mother and their moral considerations/conflicts in those last moments aren't quite as real as losing a family member. I'd honestly say that that wants to be close, not wide.
I'll also say that fanworks are genuinely coming out of a different climate from, and have different expectations than, original works. We know that it's forbidden for humans to turn into yokai, because that's how the established, canon setting works. It's my personal understanding that it's a question of population dynamics – yokai need human lives/fear/energy/etc. to function, and yokai will always be stronger than humans; there's an obvious incentive for each individual human villager to become a yokai, but if they all do it, all the yokai will starve.
But what purpose – narrative, emotional, et cetera – does knowing that serve, in this particular story? If we take a panel aside to have the former Hakurei shrine maiden say, "Reimu, your dad had to die because [POPULATION DYNAMICS]," how does that increase our investment in the story as readers? How does it raise the emotional stakes? We know that's how it works. We know it seems senseless and painful and causes enormous human suffering, and that people do it anyway. Nothing is particularly enhanced, and I doubt any character motives are affected, by understanding the reasons why.
I'm not at all sure I agree with you, but I think I at least have a better grasp of your reasoning here, which I appreciate. Is your implication here that wide shots are always going to be better? Is there such a thing as a situation in which a close or focus shot is better for conveying something? A wide shot is broad, dramatic, it suggests a single frozen moment and the enormity of the world – but the frames in which Reimu stabs the previous Hakurei are intimate, they're focused perfectly and purely on the two of them, they're forgetting entirely the life that Reimu is saving, because she just killed her own mother and their moral considerations/conflicts in those last moments aren't quite as real as losing a family member. I'd honestly say that that wants to be close, not wide.
I'll also say that fanworks are genuinely coming out of a different climate from, and have different expectations than, original works. We know that it's forbidden for humans to turn into yokai, because that's how the established, canon setting works. It's my personal understanding that it's a question of population dynamics – yokai need human lives/fear/energy/etc. to function, and yokai will always be stronger than humans; there's an obvious incentive for each individual human villager to become a yokai, but if they all do it, all the yokai will starve.
But what purpose – narrative, emotional, et cetera – does knowing that serve, in this particular story? If we take a panel aside to have the former Hakurei shrine maiden say, "Reimu, your dad had to die because [POPULATION DYNAMICS]," how does that increase our investment in the story as readers? How does it raise the emotional stakes? We know that's how it works. We know it seems senseless and painful and causes enormous human suffering, and that people do it anyway. Nothing is particularly enhanced, and I doubt any character motives are affected, by understanding the reasons why.
You seem didn't understand what I meant. I didn't say anything about "wideshot is better", what I meant is "Wideshot is good for its purpose, as other shot, and shouldn't be ignored". If it was me, I would use the close and focus shot on Reimu to expose emotion of the scene too, then instead of continuing focus on their face I can change to different angle, their fingers for example to convey the life and lifeless or useless shot like bird so why using only close and mid shot? The face is not only device to expose emotion. The way you bring up the reason is surprisingly laughable, I can come up with more ways to speak up a reason without mention it for example how your life become worse after turning into youkai for that kid at last, or the losing in humanity in process of being shrine maiden and killing humanoid creature, plenty of ways. The way you came up with is for lazy writing only, you do what you do because of the scrip then you are nothing more than a robot, no clear reason, no conflict.
Even it's an oneshot, it is too short to make readers feel sympathy with characters. Ideology of both is simple but how much the story provided information even made it so trivial. Tragedy made for the sake of tragedy, the author should have given a background about living in human village and more wideshot. Beside good illustration, story telling method is important as well.
Compared to 98% of the several hundreds of touhou doujins I read, this short one that had a worse artstyle than all of them is the one that left an impression of me It's better to tell a good short story than a bad long one
Compared to 98% of the several hundereds of touhou doujins I read, this short one that had a worse artstyle than all of them is the one that left an impression of me It's better to tell a good short story than a bad long one
If you think so, then good for you.
But do you know? The number of page in this doujin is about average, same with most. It didn't make use of it's limited pages. In the scene of human village part, human and youkai blend together so what is the sin of human turning into youkai if they can live in the same place and mean no harm? Reimu became far from humanity part is skipped after her human part showed so did she actually change or she was like that from the beginning? The premise of Reimu being rejected is meaningless, she wanted to be stronger so she could find connection with other human but did she try? Who knows?
Come back to the main problem, conflict between 2 ideologies. Her predecessor's responsibility serves for what? If human and youkai can live in the same society, so they are just 2 different species like in Parasites, but the case in gensokyo is even more optimistic. Therefore, her act has no solid ground, not worth to argue.
Not to mention, the pacing is too fast. With limited amount of pages, they usually try to loose up the pacing then fasten it in climax. But here, building up conflict process was left behind, final battle suddenly came even we all known it would be one from the start.
Everything I mentioned can be handle in that limited amount of pages. If someone tell me that I should appreciate because I read it free, so I should pay money to raise my speech and artist is some kind of god who can give or take away from you any right?
Dude, you're not a professional critic. Everything you're saying is subjective. No one cares that you finished it "too fast", it's not meant to be a long read. We don't need to know why becoming a youkai is a sin, it's already explained in canon. It doesn't need to be mentioned here, because this story is clearly intended for Touhou fans, and expects they'll know the reason already, and it doesn't even matter if they don't, because it's not what the story is about. It's extraneous information. We don't need to see Reimu with her father before he's killed, she told us everything we need to know about her situation. You can glean a lot about her life in the village just from what she says when she asks to be trained, she quite literally tells you exactly why her father was trying to become a youkai, but you seemingly didn't catch any of that, while trying to sit here and act like an authority on what makes a good story.
When you're a famous author, you can come back here and act like an expert.
Dude, you're not a professional critic. Everything you're saying is subjective. No one cares that you finished it "too fast", it's not meant to be a long read. We don't need to know why becoming a youkai is a sin, it's already explained in canon. It doesn't need to be mentioned here, because this story is clearly intended for Touhou fans, and expects they'll know the reason already, and it doesn't even matter if they don't, because it's not what the story is about. It's extraneous information. We don't need to see Reimu with her father before he's killed, she told us everything we need to know about her situation. You can glean a lot about her life in the village just from what she says when she asks to be trained, she quite literally tells you exactly why her father was trying to become a youkai, but you seemingly didn't catch any of that, while trying to sit here and act like an authority on what makes a good story.
When you're a famous author, you can come back here and act like an expert.
The problem I finished it too fast isn't subjective as you think, It was because of the fast pacing. And the Reimu's part where she explains the reason, no problem about it but it exists as the reason so where is the goal she talked about? I understand what the author want to convey but how it was is arguable.
If you need an expert, what kind of expert do you need? I brought up the problem here that the poor choice of camera angle, how the pacing was handled which made the story isn't conveyed well as intend. Is it subjective?
Now, what do you think if I say I'm a professional critic. Will what I said change, or you will scare of my position, my job then what I said become right?
But do you know? The number of page in this doujin is about average, same with most. It didn't make use of it's limited pages. In the scene of human village part, human and youkai blend together so what is the sin of human turning into youkai if they can live in the same place and mean no harm? Reimu became far from humanity part is skipped after her human part showed so did she actually change or she was like that from the beginning? The premise of Reimu being rejected is meaningless, she wanted to be stronger so she could find connection with other human but did she try? Who knows?
Because these things don't have to matter. You don't need an exposition (As for the human village, the sin is for a villager to become a youkai, not for youkai to just exist) for everything. Sometimes it's better to just stick to the important parts. I've seen many stories that have walls and walls of dialogue that add little to nothing to the story. Meaningless flavour text that doesn't really do anything. What would we actually gain from learning about the human village? How important would it be for every character to have a full backstory? Then all that happens is that you can't see the forest for the trees
The reason people are deriding you for sounding like a professional critic, is because you are asserting your opinion as fact in the face of strong evidence that it's not actually as cut and dry as you make it out to be, and further suggesting that these things you identify as problems are cases suggesting the author lacks some quality or resolve to make a "good" doujin. That's why I mentioned the Dunning-Kreuger effect - your comments consistently have an air of amateurish elitism. I'm not surprised you've mentioned drawing classes or wanting to make your own doujin in some of your other comments - they'd put you smack-dab in the range of the pre-professional, the golden age for Dunning-Kreuger.
You've been consistently downvoted, with a peak of seven times on your first point. I'll also say I haven't downvoted you once, so there's at least eight people who feel strongly enough against your opinion to express against it, with at most one other person who supported it. On pixiv, the doujin has several thousand likes and bookmarks, despite only being made last month. At this point, you should be moving from "I can't relate to this doujin because X" to "why can't I relate to this doujin when many others can? Is it something about the doujin, or something about me specifically?" There's a variety of possible reasons, sometimes things just don't suit certain people, you might be very familiar with this sort of work or not familiar enough with the source material, you might just not be in the right mood to receive this type of work, or the very act of trying to analyse it may have stripped your ability to enjoy it.
Might I suggest that someone willing and able to draw literal fields of spider-lilies is not someone lacking the resolve or the talent to draw wide shots if they thought it would make their doujin better. May I further suggest that, rather than removing wideshots because they lack some quality, their confidence and talent told them they could defy convention and yet improve their work by focusing in on other aspects.
On those points, I really feel you shouldn't have been so flippant about my comment about the eyes. My point was that they were putting unusual focus on the eyes - using certain eyes in different ways than usual. How often do you see dull, glazed eyes as eyes of relative happiness? Looking at their recent works (post #4657409 for example), I think it's safe to say that the artist puts a lot of emphasis on the eyes. You dismissed it in a single sentence in favour of criticising their works lack of wide shots, when I pointed out that the lack of wide shots was probably to increase the emphasis on the eyes. I mean, look at pages like post #6514790, post #6514999, and post #6514927. You should at the very least give some sort of assessment of the thing they defied the norms for.
The difference between a apprentice and a professional of a craft is that the former has the essentials down, but the latter knows when those essentials can and should be challenged or defied to improve the quality of the work.
You've mentioned a variety of other works and artists. Can I recommend one myself? You should look up Akane-banashi, a currently ongoing manga series, particularly from chapter 62 onwards, the most recent arc translated officially. It's a story about Rakugo apprentices training and competing against each other to become masters of their craft. What that arc focuses on is how a variety of different audiences (ranging from deeply traditionalistic and professional critics to a streaming audience) react to different performance techniques. What stands out is that there are two different performances that defy the traditional Rakugo performance, one in a way that extremely irritates the traditionalist judge, and one that is considered borderline heretical among usual practicioners. However, because that judge is experienced and professional, they realise that the reason why they did that was for the audience, because of their driving ambitions, and what they truly believe in, they score better than the rote performance that irritated him far less. It's not the first time Akane-banashi has stressed how important understanding and appealing to your audience outweighs simply knowing the techniques by rote.
There's also, and I wish I could find the scene, another example from my own more limited schooling on the matter of how to use shots and when. They talked about using close in shots for intense 1-on-1 discussions, for quite a while, and gave us several video examples. Then they gave us an example from, I want to say a mafia movie? Where they used a slightly wider shot that showed people on either side of the main people talking. They did this so that, when the scary mafia boss seemed to take offense at the other guy's banter, they could show them all reacting in increasing awkwardness and dread as the discussion got more and more tense, only for the whole things to ultimately be played off by laughs within the team when the other guy said something like "you really had me going there" - with the group of thugs visibly relaxing. That was like an introductory class, just a subset of a much more general class about writing and so on, and they still made a point to say rules aren't absolute.
The only absolute rule in any art form is that there are no absolute rules. And there are plenty of works that completely remove one common aspect or another, and are seen as masterpieces in spite, or even because, of that difference.
This is all, of course, putting aside the other aspect of this - the artist is actually a fairly accomplished doujin artist, usually focused on tragedy but with some humorous cases too. They're accomplished enough that there is a pixiv meme about their writing and a joke tag just for them. All of which makes your initial assertive tone that it's bad work even sillier, in the wake of your admitted learning state.
That's not to say professional doujin artists are not critiqueable or anything like that. I couldn't make the comments I did on post #5332782, made by another multiple-doujin writer, without believing that. But you'll note that none of the three people talking there are stating our opinions as objective fact; we're all using "probably" and "it feels like". you are not, and even when people are saying your statements are subjective opinions, you're trying to assert them as fact.
Assuming you're serious, you will probably become at least a decent doujin artist in time. You're certainly passionate, and that's a very important aspect. But if you keep sticking to the rote norms, and asserting those rote norms are better in the face of public opinion preferring the defiance, you'll struggle to become a real standout one without refining those fundamentals to a razor-sharp edge greater than basically any artist has done before.
Are you talking about Goodfellas? I remember the scene you say there word for word. The protagonist says something that seems to piss off the other guy (who's known for being a hothead, to the point that he's killed people who angered him before) and the scene gets more and more intense with him becoming visibly angrier (and as you said, everyone getting more and more nervous) as the protagonist tries to deescalate the situation, with the protagonist then realising the other guy was winding him up and laughing it off and everyone breathing a sigh of relief and laughing
Are you talking about Goodfellas? I remember the scene you say there word for word. The protagonist says something that seems to piss off the other guy (who's known for being a hothead, to the point that he killed people who angered him before) and the scene gets more and more intese with him becoming visibly angrier (and as you said, everyone getting more and more nervous) as the protagonist tries to deescalate the situation, with the scene ending by the other guy laughing it off and everyone breathing a sigh of relief and laughing
Yes! My fucking god, the moment I heard his voice I knew this was the right clip. I've never watched goodfellas, but I absolutely remember seeing just that one scene.
And the fact he's named Tommy Devito also surprisingly makes sense. I knew he had a really distinct voice, (if I thought harder, I might have realised this guy was basically the originator of mafia guys having that nasally tone) but whenever I tried to think of a name for the actor or the character my brain just fed back "Danny DeVito" and it was driving me nuts because I KNEW that was wrong.
I came back after a few days. First, I appreciate that you took your time to reply my comments and didn't down vote me.
Now, I will say with more careful choice of word. The author wants to emphasize the eyes, and achieved it, I don't deny. But I don't like the way he used it and I read this doujin with my normal mood. The density of direct face angle shot is too high, which reminds me the students in my drawing class, they keep stick with a specific angle to be good at it before the test. I understand the reason, they want to pass the test to get in university not becoming good at drawing, but the way they're following brings a contrary effect, makes them understand the structure slower. Not surprise they often hide the mistake under the label of style and it is not creative. That is the feeling this doujin gave me, he treated each page as independent individual emphasize all of them so the special is not special anymore. That's why I told this doujin's pacing is not good, because each page is a sole illustration.
The example you gave, It's not the same case with this doujin. It's a scene not a film, so it should be applied for 4-koma not a whole doujin. Not to mention how the atmosphere changes during the conversation. The part villager said about Reimu becoming a greater monster even stronger than her predecessor, the part Reimu became better is not emphasized enough to make a surprisingly tense up for the greater monster, this is the worst handled part in this doujin in my opinion.
Last word, sorry for being sarcasm. Seeing discussion under touhou tag is enjoyable so I hope that I could see more in the future.
P/s: I took a glimpse at his previous works which I find was handled better than this one.
Even it's an oneshot, it is too short to make readers feel sympathy with characters. Ideology of both is simple but how much the story provided information even made it so trivial. Tragedy made for the sake of tragedy, the author should have given a background about living in human village and more wideshot. Beside good illustration, story telling method is important as well.
Sounds to me it's more like a preference than anything else. Just don't go making it seem like all of the readers are like you and probably a lot of us won't have much problem with your criticism.
This was such a sad doujin. Hope Reimu won't be forced to kill Marisa. Oh and it seems like I've read a couple of his works on dynasty scans already. Pretty much all of them were depressing as heck but still nice to read once in a while cause they are kinda different compared to the usual touhou doujins that get translated.
I'd kill youand then myself.
「No One Left to Ask After Me」
Published 7 May 2017 Hakurei Shrine Reitaisai 14