Eiichiro Oda, the creator of the beloved One Piece franchise, advises promising young artists on how to create great manga.
Since its debut in July 1997, the One Piece manga has become the #1 best-selling manga series, with over 516.6 million copies sold worldwide. The series and its author have also won a number of awards and honors over the years, such as being selected as a finalist for the Tezuka Osamu Cultural Prize in the years 2000-2002. Oda has also served on the Tezuka Manga Awards Committee, which honors exceptionally talented manga artists and seeks to find future pioneers of the genre. Recently, a Reddit user named Ok-Cut-5743 shared a translation of Oda’s message to budding young artists he sent at the 105th Manga Tezuka Awards.
Oda’s advice for aspiring artists
“It’s great to have more promising young cartoonists from now on,” Oda said. “My general impression is that there are many series where they have a clear idea of what they want to write, which is a very positive aspect. However, I also believe it would help if they could focus on creating easy-to-understand illustrations and include the necessary explanations to engage readers. I want them to do their best without losing sight of what they want to draw.”
Oda has been famous in the past for his unique approach to comic creation. In recent years, Oda has criticized shounen manga for taking too seriously and believes that artists shouldn’t be afraid to include animated elements in their stories. “Since working as an assistant, I feel that the expressions that are so characteristic in manga have gradually disappeared. For example, putting a lightbulb on the character’s head… or making the character’s legs go in circles… I’ve always loved these iconic expressions, but they just keep disappearing. Fighting manga has to become more and more serious to keep up with readers’ expectations and I really hate that.”
Currently, Oda is using his unique creative philosophy to help Netflix create the upcoming live-action One Piece series. Last month, the company updated fans on the series’ progress by introducing images of Luffy’s iconic ship, the Going Merry, as well as Luffy’s straw hat and the famous flag. of the ship. Oda, who was closely involved in the production, assured fans that, after a rough start, all entities related to the series are now “working in sync”. The artist also stated that One Piece will not come out until he is satisfied.
The One Piece manga is available in English from VIZ. The popular anime series is now available to stream on Netflix, Hulu, and Crunchyroll.
Source: Reddit
