One
of the hot anime series for costumers in the last couple of years has
been Trinity Blood, the tale of vampires with a gothic-military fashion
sense who always play out their adventures in intricately-designed
clothes. Veteran character designer Atsuko Nakajima created that
series' character designs from Shibamoto Thores' originals, and she was
fascinated to find Trinity Blood characters walking around in costume
at Anime Expo. "It's great," Nakajima said at an interview session.
"Even though it hasn't been released in the U.S., it's already being
cosplayed, and I thought `that's fast.'" The home video release of
Trinity Blood isn't planned until the autumn of 2006, but a version of
the series has been shown in some American movie theaters. Trinity
Blood also is the cover feature in the July 2007 issue of Newtype USA;
Nakajima and her assistant were fascinated to learn about the big
magazine story in America.
Nakajima
was a character designer and animator long before the newest generation
of American anime fans were introduced to her work. Her tenure goes all
the way back to Ranma 1/2, which was the starter series for the
previous fandom generation. "The company that was planing to do Ranma
1/2 contacted me, and I decided to take the job. I'm a fan of Rumiko
Takahashi, the person who did Ranma 1/2, and I was very happy to do
that." If American fans got started on Ranma, so did Nakajima's anime
career, and that series is still dear to her heart - along with the
female version of Ranma, which remains her favorite character. From
that, Nakajima has even had an endeavor into the gothic lolita world
with her designs for Princess Princess and Le Portrait de Petite
Cosette, for which she reworked the original designs of Hirofumi
Suzuki. Proportions and costumes seem important to anime fans, but
Nakajima says the most important part of a character is its face.
"Without the face of the character design, you won't be able to make
the character move," she said.
One
of the hot anime series for costumers in the last couple of years has
been Trinity Blood, the tale of vampires with a gothic-military fashion
sense who always play out their adventures in intricately-designed
clothes. Veteran character designer Atsuko Nakajima created that
series' character designs from Shibamoto Thores' originals, and she was
fascinated to find Trinity Blood characters walking around in costume
at Anime Expo. "It's great," Nakajima said at an interview session.
"Even though it hasn't been released in the U.S., it's already being
cosplayed, and I thought `that's fast.'" The home video release of
Trinity Blood isn't planned until the autumn of 2006, but a version of
the series has been shown in some American movie theaters. Trinity
Blood also is the cover feature in the July 2007 issue of Newtype USA;
Nakajima and her assistant were fascinated to learn about the big
magazine story in America.
