Harajuku Shades

I need to get out and take some new shots or I'll run out soon... Just a reminder that I lowered prices on prints at Gengallery.com (see link above). I also simplified (took out photos and combined galleries) to make the site easier to use.

Singer in Yoyogikoen

This is the lead singer for the Chocolate Chips. They're really a pretty good band. Too bad I can't put on a song to go with this.

Today I went to a nearby language school in Nishi Hachioji. It looks like I'll be able to pick up some more Japanese classes. I'm pretty happy about that. My Japanese has settled into a rut. I'm pretty smooth in Japanese as long as I stay inside the rut, but outside the rut I'm starting to hesitate and forget words/forms. Anyway, not to fear, I'm going to start learning again! Hopefully this next push will bring me slowly but surely up to solid conversational ability and 2 kyu level for whatever that matters.

Man on Train

Like the title says...


Today I volunteered at a local elementary school along with several other internationals (a couple from Ecuador, a woman from China, and a woman from Thailand). When we arrived we waited in the office and drank tea. I enjoyed meeting the other internationals and talking with some of the staff. Then we went to the gym where the fifth and sixth graders were all waiting. About seventy of them sat in neat rows. Every time I scanned their faces I saw several faces staring back at me with absolute wonder in their eyes. We introduced ourselves, and shortly after we were each escorted to separate classrooms (by little kids who were serious about their roles). I spent the next forty minutes answering questions like: What are the most famous places in America? What do they eat in America? I expanded my answers beyond the usual responses. It was fun. Then we joined the kids for lunch. In Japan students eat in their classrooms. The desks were grouped together, so I sat with a group of five students. We talked and ate; you know how that is. On a cue everyone stood and began pushing the desks toward the walls. Then they cleaned up the entire school starting with the classroom -- sweeping, mopping, dusting, etc. What a great idea! I'm sure those kids have a better appreciation for the school cleaning staff (and the school itself) than most of their American counterparts. When it was time to leave I was MOBBED by students asking for my autograph. I signed and signed bits of paper and notebooks like some kind of baseball star. Before leaving we returned to the conference room where they served us coffee and mints. It occurred to me that in the USA we would have shown up, did our thing, and exited more efficiently. We would have been in and out more quickly, but we would have missed getting to know each other and the school staff.

Meanwhile the girls had their big bicycle "race" today at preschool..... Isn't that funny? But seriously they rode for a solid hour, and the winner was the one who went the furthest. This year the winner was...Reia! She brought home a giant medal half the size of her face, and she's quite proud. I think she covered more than 10km (not sure exactly how far). Mari and Maika rode with training wheels and covered about 5km.

Rubbing Heads

A man rubs the heads of statues at a Buddhist temple. I'm not sure exactly why. A quick search on Google doesn't yield a clear explanation, but the purpose probably has to do with getting luck and/or wealth (or possibly physical healing). See the next post for more comments.

Feeding the Birds

A father and daughter feeding birds on Takao-san.

I'm going to start studying Japanese part-time at a language school. Today was my first day, but rather than regular classes they had a field trip to nearby Mount Takao. Mount Takao may be a small hill for the group of Nepalese students that I hiked with today, but for the people of Tokyo it's the highest hill in the city... Starting from the bottom it took over an hour to reach the top. Near the top of the mountain we found ourselves weaving past little restaurants and then a cluster of buildings constituting a temple. We ended up in front of several little restaurants, so I ordered a bowl of udon -- a nice way to finish a little mountain climbing adventure.

The language school is located in Nishi Hachioji. So far I really like the staff and teachers. It seems like a friendly place that emphasizes communication not just test scores. Every season they take trips together: climbing Takao, going skiing, visiting a local beer brewery, and climbing Mount Fuji. I'll write more about the language school now and then, but for anyone interested here's the website.

Japanese style Illustration

a boy’s dream illustration by Gez

In 2002 Gez Fry decided, that he wants to make a living out of Japanese style illustration - without being experienced in drawing. Locking himself up in his bedroom in London he studied big masters like Masamune Shirow and developed enough skill and an astonishing portfolio to jump into the big market - within only 2 years. Here are some of his comments about how he draws, develops characters and why the Japanese Manga market is so tough.

written by Uleshka

1. Gez, what made you want to be an illustrator in the first place? I heard you actually studied languages before?

My original plan was to be a diplomat - that is why i learned languages - but I realized that I then could only be living in Japan for four years. I really wanted to be in Japan with my future wife and thought that freelancing in art would allow me to live wherever I want.


Wow! So you threw away your life of being a diplomat out of love and decided to become an illustrator instead!?? I never hear that before. And you really have guts to try your luck in Japan: that is about the hardest country when it comes to competing with other very skilled illustrators!

Yes, I know… When I grew up, I really loved reading comics by Joe Madureira (X-Men) and Masamune Shirow (Ghost In The Shell) - and one of my big motivations for drawing was that I wanted to be able to draw like them one day. I started really late, though (smiles) and never went to art school, but my mom is an illustrator and I learnt a lot from her in those two years hiding in my bedroom. Then and agent picked me up and I was pretty lucky going from earning no money to being able to make a living out of it over night.

2. How do you survive in Japan? You call it artistic mecca, but don’t you get eaten alive in this competitive market?

Basically, I get a few jobs from Japan but most of my jobs come from the States and England. There are not that many people who can do animation style or Japanese style outside Japan and it’s quite hot right now. But what I really want to do is to break into Japan, but therefor I must work a lot harder…



3. Photoshop versus paper drawing

How do you draw? Do you need a lot of sketches or do you go straight to the computer?

I do pretty much everything in Photoshop.

Many people do, but I think that 99% of the Japanese illustrators still start on paper. If you have that ability to do a good drawing on paper, there is certainly a material satisfaction to it and it feels a lot nicer to have something solid. All I have is a paper print out - that is it. Doing everything in Photoshop has a lot of advantages, though and more and more people do the same.


Ghee - I can’t believe it is all Photoshop! How do you do it?

I design a rough in the computer (pretty small), then I blow it up and have a proper go at it. There are tons of advantages in using Photoshop when you draw: you can zoom in really close, you can flip the picture to get a new view on it and see if the composition still works, work in layers and move things around afterwards…. all that stuff is nearly impossible with a pencil drawing.

And the downsides of Photoshop?

Since I learned how to draw on the computer using the pallet - I feel really uncomfortable drawing without it, so I always have to take a laptop with me.

Another thing is, that you tend to get too trigger happy with the undo-button and can’t decide on anything. If you try to keep your hand away from that button - it usually turns out better.

These esthetics really look like a pen or a brush… Or some lines could almost be vectors… Is there nothing else you use?

If you work with high resolution, you can really get a pen or pencil look. I sometimes use Painter which emulates natural painting. You can get brush stroke marks and that kind of stuff - and then take it back into Photoshop. Sometimes it turns out really digital - so you have to just try it out.


4. How long does it usually take for you to finish a drawing?

Well that depends on the client, really. This one was for a Japanese car magazine called Hot Version - they write about drift cars and that kind of stuff. They knew exactly what they wanted: a girl standing on the left, cars… I put it all in the rough and they liked it right away. After that we went back and forth, because I couldn’t really get the colors right. From start to finish it took several weeks, but the actual drawing time probably took me two days: one to do the lines and another day to do the colors.

detail of a Manga-illustration series by Gez

5. What would it be like to draw a whole Manga?

I am trying to make a story where each of these will be a page, but it is not very structured and more of a visual thing.

Doesn’t it scare you as an illustrator to see, how Mangas are consumed here every day? Like flipping through a telephone book, reading in a glance and then: garbage! I suppose that must break an illustrator’s heart…

I think that there are big fans out there who buy the whole collection of a particular Manga artist, but the majority of the pieces don’t get collected, that’s true. But I think that this disposable mentality is one of the reasons why Japan’s comics market is so healthy!



Oh!? Why do you think it is better not to worship each drawing of a comic? Isn’t that what all illustrators wish to happen?

In America for example they treat comics like artwork. They keep it really clean and collect it, which sounds cool from an art point of view, but the whole industry is completely deteriorating because it takes too much time and effort to create the pics. They can’t ever get a long story like this and have to keep it really simple - therefor the reader’s finally lost interest! Compared to 20 years ago the American comics in the market are a small percentage of what they used to be.

On the one hand it’s a real shame to throw things away, but then you have to make a choice: art for the sake of collecting or art for the sake of the story - which makes the story more fun to read.

I see… so what do the Americans do wrong?

I don’t know what exactly it is that they do wrong, but there are a few things. First of, they have an assembly line to make the comic: 6 different people each in charge of different aspects of the comic, which then often feels a little disjointed. In Japan there is quite a hierarchic system: one boss having a vision and a style telling all his assistants exactly what to draw… which seems to work better for the story in the end.

So - could you picture yourself doing Manga instead of Manga-style illustration, after all?

No, I could never do Manga! First of all I wouldn’t want to be one of those assistants (big grin) and then, if I was to draw 100 pages I would treat each picture as an individual picture and take too long for it. I just wouldn’t be able to produce 4 pages a day - which is what the Japanese do! The Americans do about 1 page every 1-2 days.
6. Developing Anime characters

Gez, you developed lots of characters already. Some were an Anime-fication of a real persons, then your portfolio shows a lot of free fantasy figures, characters for games like Rebelstar for Namco USA, you developed things for Adobe, Evisu, Firetrap, Buena Vista International and the BBC… How do you develop those characters?

For the Rebelstar2 game for Namco USA for instance, my briefing was something like: a young guy with a scar on his face, a leader of some Luke Skywalker- type of character - and I wanted to give it a bit of originality.



Was that illustration enough to base a video game on it? How are those video-game characters usually invented?

It depends! Most companies have in-house concept artist developing the characters, but I think for this game they wanted a slightly Japanese style character, which would also be accessible for Americans, so that is why they came to ask me.

illustration as part of the astronauts series

Doing the character designs is the first step in the process and then they go and develop the 3D characters from that. I’m not really involved into Rebelstar2 anymore, but I don’t think they started with the 3D modeling yet. I did 20 characters for the series on the Gameboy Advance, for this later one, the Rebelstar2 I did 7 characters for the sequel on the PSP, which will be out in about a year and a half from now.

It’s not going to be huge or anything, but it was a lot of fun and I can’t wait to see my characters in 3D!

7. What will you do next?

So the main part of your work is character development, Japanese style animation for big companies, a little game-fantasy touch… but you also experiment with a mix with natural photography.



Yes, I think this is what I have been doing mainly so far. I made these drawings for my portfolio to get more games work. I really enjoyed doing it but it is not 100% me…

If you had all the freedom, what WOULD you draw?

I really like Takashi Murakami, actually: the superflat stuff! What I try out now at the moment is to get into Ukiyo-e combined with some of this stuff. Imagine some drawing elements, some Ukiyo-e style and some Takashi Murakami flatness. That is something I experiment with for myself at the moment. Let’s see, where that takes me.


recent experiments: a combination of illustration, Ukiyo-e and some Takashi Murakami flatness