A Scotsman talks…

Just to extend on what I noted already regarding our recent lecture talk in Glasgow, me, Chie and Paul Gravett, involving pages from THE STORY OF LEE:

I enjoyed that talk – it was odd to have my VOICE only appear back in my home country, while my BODY remained in Japan! But why not… actually its an easy way to take part in such an event, dont have to travel or book any hotel, just switch on the computer and sign into skype! It’s the first time Ive talked in public in Scotland about my books, even though Ive done many lectures now, all over the world!

A lady from the Alumni association of my old university, Glasgow Caledonian University was present, and will write a report about it for their website. Plus they have decided to commission me to make a comic for their magazine about my time in the University – Nice!

Then it was also very nice, just before the talk to get a mail from ILYA, well known British comic book creator of almost 25 years activity. He is, in a way, the godfather of the Story of Lee book, as it first appeared in public in his anthology book ‘Best New Manga, vol 2′. Chie was also in that anthology. So the SOL book is one of the children of this Best New Manga book. Ilya was impressed by The Story of Lee, and told us: “It reads very well, so I wanted to congratulate you. Overall it is very good. Quite a gentle drama – manages to convey the everyday, but also to ring true,
and with plenty of cultural detail without overload.”

- Cheers Ilya!
Sean

Talk at Glasgow

I came back from Glasgow, where I attended Glasgow Film Festival and talked about manga in general and my work, of course including the Story of Lee,  with Paul Gravett and Sean (via Skype!), last night.

At the talk, I showed this image to the audience and explained my working process.

When I create stories by myself, I automatically know who the main characters are and how they act and react. But when I’m working with the writers, in this case Sean, I need to read the script again and again and again, then digest it until I feel familiar with the characters and understand why they act like as the writer wrote. This process is very very important to me and sometimes it takes me quite long time to go through some scripts.

Once I do this part deeply, the rest is easier. When I’m ready and feel like  I can see what the characters look like and how they move etc, I naturally start making memos and sketches.

At the stage of a page arrangement, one of the most important things for me is the position of speech bubbles. They will lead the eyes of the readers and make a flow of a page and the entire story. So I am very careful where I put them.

Well, I can explain how I do forever so I’ll stop here.

At Glasgow, the talk was successful and I really enjoyed my stay.

Oh if you are around the area, you can buy a copy of the Story of Lee from Centre for Contemporary Arts, Glasgow while the Film festival is on (and you should have lunch at the CCA cafe since they serve some wonderful meals!).

(Chie.K)

Back from Tokyo

Back from a week in Tokyo, and a successful week it was (with one surprising exception, that i wont gossip about!).

The manga great that i met there was none other than YOSHIRO TATSUMI, the originator of the mature manga GEKIGA style, way back in the mid 50′s. Myself, Asakawa-san and a couple of other lads conducted a taped conversation, discussing gekiga, manga in general, Tatsumi’s influences and intentions, my own books (including THE STORY OF LEE). It was a very illuminating chat, which will appear in AX Japan in April maybe. This photo is Tatsumi sketching for us – its a dark cafe as you can (not) see.

A real honour to be with Tatsumi-sensei.

And my other business in Tokyo was good too – a lecture in Lakeland college about mature manga,a magazine interview (all mentioning THE STORY OF LEE, of course) and a radio broadcast appearance at the ‘Whisky live’ event,where our 4 big manga pages showing how whisky is made where out on display for the public in Roppongi (art by Akiko Shimojima), and yesterday (barely one hour before i had to leave the catch the plane)  my new book with Kodansha International arrived at their offices – YAKUZA MOON, and it looks wonderful (art by Michiru Morikawa). Very happy to see that!

Sean Michael Wilson at Anime League

I have been invited to be a ‘creator in residence’ thing on a popular anime/manga website, called ANIME LEAGUE, which has about 20,000 members it seem. And it looks like all of them have posted some questions for me on their forum already!:

http://www.animeleague.net/forums/viewtopic.php?f=203&t=125581

So, I better going an answer some… including posting some pages and info about the type of conflict and relationship between the characters in THE STORY OF LEE.

South China Morning Post.

The Hong Kong based newspaper ‘The South China Morning Post’ will feature an interview with me (or someone who looks a lot like me anyway) s. I discuss The Story of Lee a lot in that. Of course, because the story is SET in HK! That is coming out the first week of 2011 i think.

I’m looking forward to seeing The Story of Lee book itself – its on the way to me now. This will be my 15th published book so far, but the joy of seeing the finished book is still with me – and hopefully always will be!

My other book ‘Ax:alternative manga’ continues to do really well. I was just listed as UK chain store Forbidden Planet’s best manga of 2010, and critic Deb Aoki noted that no less then TEN critics lists feature it – making it, by her count, the 4th most highly praised book of all manga published this
year!

nice…

Sean

Season’s greetings from Chie and a thing about The Stoty of Lee

Hi everyone. Let me introduce myself a bit first. I’m Chie and I’m the illustrator of The Story of Lee, forthcoming book about a meeting of a girl and a boy in lost in translation culture mixture.

I just wanted to say hi to you all and wishing a great holiday season and a new year, so I picked up today to post my first entry here.

Also, I’d like to show some pictures of an exhibition in London, which just finished. The Story of Lee was hugely included in this exhibition, That’s Novel! was on for a month at London Print Studio.

The exhibition was successful and the opening night was packed.

The image from the cover of the book and illustrated explanation of how I built up pages from the script by Sean Michael Wilson was printed in huge size and displayed like this.

Also, I had been asked to provide some full body images of the main characters and I did this (part of the full body image) …

Then the people at the studio made them into this!

This image was displayed the window of the gallery with the other artists’ characters.

Nice!!

At the PV, some people came up to me and told that they love what I exhibited. I hope they love book.. well I’m quite sure they’ll do!

Ok, enough of me. Nice to see (?) you all and hope I post before long!!

Meanwhile, have a happy happy new year!

*:..｡o○☆ *:..｡o○☆ *:..｡o○☆ *:..｡o○☆ *:.

P.S. I’m sorry in advance if my English is shaky! It’s not my mother tongue so please forgive me! Hope you understand me ok…

Sean – Best books!

Hi all,

Sean, of NBM book ‘The Story of Lee’ here, with a bit of good news came this week:

My ‘AX:alternative manga’ collection was picked as one of the ‘Best books of 2010′ by the big industry magazine Publisher Weekly:

http://www.publishersweekly.com/pw/by-topic/book-news/awards-and-prizes/article/45070-best-books-of-2010.html?page=3

Out of the 1000′s of comics published this year they pick only TEN as the ‘cream of the crop’. And my AX book  is one of them!

Very nice…
Seán

Another scene from THE STORY OF LEE

Here, guys and gals, is more from THE STORY OF LEE. This shows a scene in which Lee engages with some intimate, if silly, girls talk – while a spurned admirer stands outside alone, signing at young girls beauty just out of reach. Poor wee lad.

‘The Story of Lee’ is out in Diamond’s October Previews catalogue, (OCT101070, its on page 291)  - order it now please!

Sean, back from the US and A.

I was just in the USA again, at a convention held in Minneapolis College of Art and Design – a good little academic style con, with cosplay fun thrown in. I made a talk about ‘Ax and Gekiga: maturer style manga’, to a full house and a good reception – thank you all. and thanks to ‘Big Brain comics’ in Minneapolis, that hosted an after party for me on sunday night. and NICE! to the ‘Brit Bar’ there, who gave me a chance to eat ‘Flake’ and ‘Curly wurly’ chocolate bars from Britain! The ‘Ax: alternative manga’ book continues to get very positive critical and public reaction… plus my Kodansha book ‘Hagakure’ sold well among the manga fans at the con. But now I came back to Japan – my adopted home!

THE STORY OF LEE, my book with NBM is out now in diamond’s October PREVIEWS catalogu, so book your order now shops and people! Its an original story by myself, not an adaptation this time! Although its not a true story,  I use many autobiographical aspects in it, plus a lot of references to real places in Hong Kong, where the story is set. The focus of the story is on the female’s character’s point of view regarding her relationship with her western boyfriend and strict father. The book should appeal to late teenage and older females readers who dig the more sophisticated ‘shoujo’  style, or the mature  ‘Josei’ manga style.

Since the art is by a Japanese lady, Chie Kutsuwada, then I hope that manga purist’s will find it acceptable too – ongaishimasu! The above pages are a scene where Lee has a heart to heart with her dying grandmother.

Oh, a  neat little bit of coincidence – as I was writing this my friend was looking through “Erotic Comics vol 2′ from the UK publisher ILEX. As I went over i saw that they were reading a bit that describes such erotic comics by NBM!

Sean Michael here

Hi all,

Its Sean Michael Wilson, first time on NBM’s blog.

My book is out in October’s Previews Catalogue

THE STORY OF LEE

Written by my own wee brain, and illustrated by Japanese artist, Chie Kutsuwada. I am not sure if she has a wee brain or not, and it might be rude to ask!

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