Remember that Ghibli AI art phase that popped up about a month ago? I am not into AI art because I am an artist (Japanese comic/manga anime influenced) and I can make my own art so when I saw my friends using AI to make themselves look like a Studio Ghibli character, I decided to make my own SG influenced art.
I did look up reference for Hayao Miyazakai’s art style since it’s a little different than my style. I did use a photo I took at a recent The Birthday Massacre concert for the background. I figured I would draw a picture of me with my Ibanez 300e bass because why not?
Anyways, here’s the finished picture:
Not a Ghibli movie? What??? I need to watch my Blu-ray again because I think they put Studio Ghibli on at the beginning of it.
Trivia for you… Remember that old “The Hobbit” animation from the 70s? It was animated by Topcraft in Tokyo, a now-defunct Japanese animation studio whose animation team re-formed as Studio Ghibli under Hayao Miyazaki (copied from Wikipedia). I did not know that till recently.
I didn’t cry at all during Grave of the Fireflies. I think a lot of my friends ruined it for me before I even had the chance to see it. They told me how sad it is and how it made them cry so I held off on it for the longest time because… I still tear up at the end of Titanic. Anyways, I finally watched it with my Japanese wife and she pointed out all the things the main character kid was doing that was wrong and selfish that eventually led up to the two of them dying and I didn’t cry at all. I was more mad at the kid than I was sad for him. Maybe I over braced myself for the sadness because I didn’t want to cry. So I feel bad about not being sad or crying.
It’s semi autobiographical. The director lived through it. He survived, his little sister did not. My mom’s best friend lived in Kyoto during the war where the movie is placed, and the family got a cucumber each day from the government to feed a family of 6. No one helped the kids as no one had anything to share. Cruel, but real.
Wings of Mayonnaise (as my friends and I jokingly called it because we couldn’t pronounce Honneamise) was pretty dang cool too! I think I only saw it once in the 90s.
When I was there in '23, my wife and I went to the Ghibli Museum there. Really fun place! I enjoyed it a lot but was upset there was hardly any Nausicaa stuff. There was one poster I saw in a display room and there were a couple models in the gift shop… and that was it. I was so sad. Nausicaa is my complete and total favorite movie (it’s on my Top Ten list of fave movies) and I was sad there wasn’t more for her.
Here’s the video I shot there:
I think that was survivor’s guilt in part, as the director and his sister wandered the country side and she didn’t make it. he probably looks back and sees all his mistakes.
I need to find that now…
I don’t think it’s streaming anywhere though. I only watched it on 5th to 6th gen VHS trading back in the day (think I just aged myself).
Yeah me too. Finding the tucked away rental place in SF’s Japan Center that had them all (legit or not) was like a gold mine for me.
Liked Ghibli but was never a superfan. For me, that was stuff like Macross Plus. Still one of my favorite soundtracks to this day too, Yoko Kanno is absolutely one of my heroes.
Holy Crap! You are , like, the coolest person I’ve talked to today! Heck… probably in a while.
I LOVED Macross Plus. Awesome animation and yes, that soundtrack was the greatest. In fact, during my first trip to Japan in '97, I picked up the Macross Plus soundtrack.
So I feel bad about not being sad or crying.
