Voice acting in Japan

Do you know the name of the voice actor or actress of your flavor cartoon character? Probably not. But in Japan, voice actors and actresses of anime are very popular.

The role of voice actors or actresses, particularly voice actresses, is very important for a anime. A great voice actor or actress has to be able to bring out the emotions and the uniqueness of the voice-over character through sound no matter what the characters say, making he or she alive. Some people even decide whether to watch a anime based on the list of the participating voice actor or actress! Since the basic salary of a voice actor or actress is not very high (in fact lower than the average wage of Japanese workers), many of them will also perform in front of the screens, like singing of being MC of an event.

     

Once they become more well-known, they can have more job opportunities and earn more money, like selling their CD or holding their own concerts. There is a magazine for introducing voice actors and actresses only, and some famous voice actors or actresses even have fan clubs (both local and international)! In other words, voice actors and actresses are kind of idols in the Japanese music industry as well.

      

Among all voice actors and actresses, Nana Mizuki should be the most popular one. Originally Nana Mizuki was trained to be a enka (a kind of Japanese traditional song) singer, but later she decided to be a anime voice actress due to her passion of anime. Besides the voice-over job, Nana Mizuki often participate in some singing events.

Later, as her voice and songs getting more popular, she started to hold annual concert. Not only being the first voice actress singing in the NHK Kohaku Uta Gassen, the biggest annual singing event on the New Year’s Eve, the “queen of anime music” become the first voice actress holding personal concert in the Tokyo Dome!

      

Compared with other countries, since the anime industry in Japan is more mature and bigger, the demand of voice actors and actresses is larger as well as their social status and flame. In fact, no matter which country you are living in, voice actors and actresses is a hard job and requires lots of training. Therefore, next time when you are watching a anime, try to find out who is in charge of the voice-over of your flavor character.

Comic, anime and movie

Although some of you may not “officially” read a comic, but I’m pretty sure that all of you must know some comic characters: Batman, Iron man and so on. Why is that? It’s because comic usually related to other cultural products like anime and movie (I guess most of you first know Batman is from the Batman movie instead of from it’s original comics!).

    

In Japan, with the development of digitization, it’s common that some famous comics transformed into anime. Many well-known comics, like Bleach, One Piece and Naruto has been transformed into anime. Compared with originally created anime, those comic-based anime are usually produced in serials (there are almost 600 episodes of the anime of One Piece!), as there are already groups of fans and producers do not need to worry about the audience rating. Also, instead of simply copying the original story line to the anime, producers usually add some original scenes to it, making it a little bit different from the original comics. Some anime may even become animation movies, with a original new story!

    

As in the USA, several comics may be transformed into anime as well, but more commonly, those popular comic will be transformed into movie, acted by real person. Maybe anime is misunderstood as the “cartoon” that is for kids only. And that may be the reason why anime is less popular in the USA and Europe.

        

Recommendation: Hayao Miyazaki

Do you think that the image of my blog background and header impressive? If so, you must have a look with other masterpieces of the painter, the Japanese comic and anime master: Hayao Miyazaki!

Hayao Miyazaki the amazing film director, animator, manga artist and screenwriter is one of the most important figure of the Japanese comic and animate industry. He is the first person who combine animate and film together. All his movie involve messages, such as the relationship between human and environment and feminism, which make audience reflect deeply. And the technique of his painting is awesome as well! Despite his age of 72 year, he insisted to produce his animate movie mainly by hand-painting (all the background of his films are hand-painted by himself!).

The film My Neighbor Totoro

Among all his incredible production, the film Nausicaä of the Valley of the Wind is my favor. The story is about Nausicaä, a young princess of the Valley of the Wind who wanna stop Tolmekia, a kingdom from using an ancient weapon to eliminate a jungle of mutant giant insects and using those insects to launch war. Despite the anti-war message, the film also bring out the question of the balance among human, technology and environment.

Nausicaä and the mutant giant insects

In the story, the world is basically contaminated due to the rapid technological development. Human cannot breath without a mask, and those mutant giant insects are the by-product of the development too. And the Village of the Wind is the only place that is not contaminated yet. This is very sad that, despite the advanced technology people have in the movie, they have lost a lot like the precious environment as the cost. It make me worry that whether we will have the similar future if we keep overdevelop our only planet.

Of cause, there are still plenty of messages behind the movie. You wanna know the rest of them? Watch it by yourself! You must find a different, unique perspective on this animate film!

P.S. The songs of Hayao Miyazaki’s films are very emotional and touching too. Most of the film songs are produced by Hayao Miyazaki’s partner: Joe Hisaishi. Here’s one of the most favor songs of Joe Hisaishi, the theme song of the Laputa: Castle in the Sky.

Welcome to my Comic World!

Welcome to my blog: Comic World!!!

As you guess from the name of my blog, I will write something about comic and animation and share some of my experience and view on this blog.

In this blog, I will not just introduce different genre of comic to you, but I will also try to illustrate that comic is more than merely entertainment. In fact, many sociologists have done researches on comics. Of course, it is impossible for me, an undergraduate student, to be as professional as those scholars, but I will try to give a different perspective for you to look at comic itself.