Once again, fans around the world rejoiced as Wacom put together another amazing summer event dedicated to the beautiful art form of manga and anime. In collaboration with Pixiv and Clip Studio Paint, Manga & Anime Days 2021 delivered three days of unique online presentations, workshops and career advice by some of the industry’s top creatives.
From learning how to put together a manga page, to getting your portfolio reviewed live by professionals, the success of the online event was due to the work of the wonderful speakers who took us on this creative journey. As well as learning from their experience, it’s impossible not to be inspired by their beautiful body of work. For this reason, I wanted to spend a little extra time getting to know the artists behind the event. So, without further ado, let’s take a deeper look into some of the talent who kindly shared their knowledge with us during Manga & Anime Days 2021.
Seiji Yoshida
Aside from his work as a freelance artist and illustrator, Seiji Yoshida has worked with game developers and other studio artists. He also draws book covers and is the author of the enchanting illustrated volume called Houses with a Story. This stunning collection of fantasy-like homes really showcases the artist’s incredible talent, as each page presents beautifully illustrated houses placed in all sorts of habitats, with detailed cross-sections and annotations on the side. Seiji Yoshida joined Wacom this year as part of Manga & Anime Days 2021 by sharing his insight on selected portfolios and giving a live review of the chosen audience member’s works.
Kenny Ruiz
Kenny Ruiz is a freelance comic book artist, illustrator, story boarder and script writer, and has been part of the industry for more than 20 years. He has experience working with bande dessinée, a more concentrated type of comic that is very popular in European countries. He has been a part of numerous series, such as Dos Espadas, inspired by the 17th century practices of fencing and duelling, as well as Telemaque, Magic7, Infinity: Outrage. Currently, Kenny Ruiz is making a manga called Team Phoenix, starring Osamu Tezuka characters. In case you missed his workshop, you can watch Kenny Ruiz’s History & Story of a Manga Page on YouTube, where he will go through his step by step process to create a scene from his manga Team Phoenix.
Jose Vega
Jose Vega was born and raised in Puerto Rico. From an early age he loved playing video games and quickly developed a passion for concept art and illustration, prompting him to join the industry as an adult. He is now one of the Sr. concept artists at Wizards of the Coast working for Magic the Gathering. He has previously worked as Lead background designer for the Netflix series Castlevania, as well as for many other companies in the video games and film industry. Jose Vega also enjoys teaching and sharing the knowledge that he has accumulated through the years, which he does on his YouTube channel Artof JoseVega. During Manga & Anime Days 2021, he shared his perspective by giving helpful tips on how to pursue a career creating Manga and Anime art and work in the arts industry. You can tune into his talk here.
ZeldaCW
ZeldaCW is a freelance illustrator, web-comic artist and creator of the graphic novel series MYth. She is also the creator of SPJA’s Anime Expo official mascots: Kisegi, Mahoko, Ai, and Xeno. Zelda joined Wacom’s 2021 online summer event by delivering an exciting session on Creating Manga art in a traditional style with Clip Studio Paint. During this workshop, she presented some of the favourite colouring methods that she uses to achieve traditional-looking art with digital mediums. Zelda is a proficient digital artist, but enjoys using traditional media from time to time as well, which you can easily spot in her many beautiful watercolour illustrations. She often lets her viewers in on her creative process by streaming on Twitch, accompanied by her pet rabbit Maru, but gave a particularly in depth view of her methods during Anime & Manga Days 2021.
Naoki Saito
Digital illustrator Naoki Saito is best known for his work as a Pokémon card artist, with a distinctive and vibrant style. Currently he is the main illustrator for the mobile game Dragalia Lost and a colourist for the manga series Baki. Born in 1982, he is a graduate of Tama Art University and has worked with numerous trading card franchises. Naoki Saito also runs a successful YouTube channel, where he shares techniques to improve your drawing skills. As someone who is no stranger to the camera, Naoki Saito delivered the same energy when discussing the best ways for artists to live as an artist using subscription services. If you missed his talk with the fan subscription service pixivFANBOX, you can watch it here.
Carles Dalmau
Carles Dalmau is a Spanish illustrator and comic artist. He is 24 years old and has only been actively drawing for 4 years, but boasts of a following of 489k on Instagram alone. His illustrations are colourful, dynamic and full of life, and are usually created using either Clip Studio Paint or Photoshop. For this reason, he teamed up with Wacom to demonstrate Cell shading colouring using Clip Studio Paint and how he applies these techniques to his characters. In his session, Carles also shows his viewers how to use this method with different light sources and gives a live teaching demo using his own illustrations.
Make sure you check out these talented artists and their work, and stay tuned for Wacom’s next big events in the world of manga and anime!
