Ask John: Who is John’s Favorite Character Designer?

Question:
Who is your favorite anime character designer and what has he worked on? Who are the most influential designers right now and what have they done?

Answer:
I never realized how difficult it would be to narrow down a singular favorite character designer until I was actually pressed to do so. It’s only now that I realize that while I recognize the work of many different character designers, I don’t generally follow any particular character designers absolutely. Rather, I like characters and shows, and may prefer some character renditions over others. There are character designers that I respect and character designers whom I’ve loved at one time, but it’s difficult for me to identify a singular artist whose work I adore in total.

To clarify, I have a lot of respect for character designers Nobuteru Yuuki and Yoshiyuki Sadamoto. Yuuki has an amazing flexibility. He’s able to create original characters, as in Escaflowne, as well as adapt phenomenally well to other artists’ styles. Nobuteru Yuuki did a brilliant job of adapting the character designs of CLAMP, Yukito Kishiro, and Mamoru Nagano respectively in the X movie, Gunnm OAV series, and Five Star Stories movie. His work on anime including Sukeban Deka and the Lodoss War OAV series further illustrate his ability to master extremely different types of character design styles. Yoshiyuki Sadamoto has created the character designs for memorable Gainax projects such as Royal Space Force, Secret of Blue Water, FLCL, and Evangelion. He’s also notably responsible for the distinct and memorable character designs of .Hack. So while I wouldn’t say that I’m exactly a fan of his character designs, per se, I do respect his ability to create iconic character designs. I love (most of) the titles that Yoshiyuki Sadamoto was drawn for, and I love the characters in those shows, but it’s not exclusively the visual design of those characters that I love; it’s their personalities and context within their relative shows, in addition to their graphic design, which I like. So the credit for my interest in Yoshiyuki Sadamoto created characters can’t go to Sadamoto exclusively.

If I’d been asked this question a number of years ago, I would have answered Kenichi Sonoda or Keiji Goto, roughly depending on the decade. In the 1980s I worshiped everything that Kenichi Sonoda drew, including Bubblegum Crisis, Riding Bean, Gall Force, Otaku no Video, Suchi Pai, and even Gunsmith Cats. I collected all of his illustration collection books, and even bought his Privates Lives Gall Force manga, although I don’t normally collect manga. But into the 90s and 2000s I saw Sonoda’s style become more streamlined, and to me it seemed as though his character design style lost its originality. The promotional art and manga that Sonoda has done recently, such as Wrestloid Baby, seems to lack the energy and creative spirit present in his early work. In the early 1990s I was enthused by the character design of Keiji Goto in Hyper Police, Those Who Hunt Elves, Gatekeepers, Nadesico, and even the Double Cast video game. But Goto’s contemporary work including his plentiful original character illustrations often seen in Megami Magazine have seemed to prioritize visual design over even logical practicality. By that, I mean that his recent character designs seem to be intentionally obtrusive, as if calling attention to themselves instead of seeming natural. I think that good character designs should be distinctive and memorable, but appear as believable, real people. Keiji Goto’s early works did that, but more recently his character designs seem to call attention to themselves as graphic art designs more than as characters.

Before actually revealing my picks, I’d like to first mention some narrowly missed candidates: Mutsumi Inomata, Tsukasa Dokite, and Hiroaki Gohda. Inomata’s soft and warm character designs are always a pleasure to look at, although I’m not as particularly a fan of her Cyber Formula work as I’m partial to her drafting from Leda, Windaria, Utsunomiko, and Namco’s Tales of Destiny. But oddly, even though I think her character art is beautiful, I don’t think of her as one of my favorite character designers. I want to mention Tsukasa Dokite and Hiroaki Gohda for their work on Dirty Pair and the Onegai Teacher/Twins franchises respectively, but both artists simply don’t have enough long enough resumes as character designers for me to say that I love their character design work. Both men are far more active in the anime industry in other roles beside character design.

So now if I’m forced to actually choose, I’ll still escape being nailed down by citing three different artists in different fields.

First, I absolutely adore every character illustration I’ve ever seen from the Japanese fan artist Blade, of the Blade/Galaxist doujinshi circle. Blade typically draws petit, elf-like cat girls and seems to have a special fondness for the Cham Cham character from SNK’s Samurai Spirits 2 video game. Many of Blade’s comics and illustrations are also adult in nature. I think that owning 7 imported Blade/Galaxist doujinshi qualifies me as a devoted fan. But as far as I know, Blade has never done any work on professional, studio animation.

Conducting my train of thought on to it’s next stop, I come to manga artist Kiyohiko Azuma. From Azumanga Daioh to his gorgeous renditions of Tenchi Muyo’s Ayeka and Ryoko, to Mahou Yuugi, to Yotsubato! I simply love the look of Azuma’s characters. Even without knowing the first thing about their personalities or the stories they come from, I think that characters Azuma Kiyohiko draws are appealing to look at, and I think they convey a lot of personality just within their visual design. Azumanga Daioh’s Sakaki, Koyomi and Ayumu, for instance, exemplify their personalities perfectly without ever speaking a single word. Their appearance alone conveys multitudes about their character. The same applies to the weird, simplemindedness of Padudu from Mahou Yuugi, and the playful innocence of Yotsuba.

Finally that brings me to the one anime character designer that for whom I can say I absolutely love every character he’s ever drawn: Satoshi Urushihara. From his early Langrisser game character designs and Legend of Lemnear to his current original cover artwork for Tenma Magazine and his Front Innocent anime, Urushihara’s character designs may sometimes seem extravagant, but unlike Keiji Goto’s contemporary work, even Urushihara’s most gaudy characters manage to still seem natural within their context. Urushihara’s characters never seem out of place or unnatural. And the fact that Urushihara almost exclusively draws stunningly detailed, impossibly beautiful and sensual women, frequently in nude and erotic poses, certainly contributes to my interest.

In conclusion, upon first consideration of who the most influential character designers in the industry right now are, two names came to my mind: Hayao Miyazaki and Hisashi Hirai. In a purely practical sense, I can’t think of a more powerful and influential character designer in anime than Hayao Miyazaki (excluding the late Osamu Tezuka, without whom contemporary anime probably wouldn’t look as it does today). We don’t usually think of Miyazaki as a character designer because we so often include that duty into his role as a creator and director. But Miyazaki is personally responsible for creating the look of some of the most famous animated characters of all time, including Nausicaa and Totoro. In a more conventional sense, since 1999 Hisashi Hirai has burst upon the anime scene with the impact that Keiji Goto made in the early 1990s. Through Ryvius, Scryed, Gundam Seed and Fafner, Hirai’s distinctive style of character design hasn’t changed much, but it is highly distinctive, highly unique, and has been responsible for some of the most identifiable, memorable and well liked character designs of the contemporary anime industry.