"I met some senior editors in the elementary school hall, like the editors of InuYasha and Robot Cat, and they told me that there are a lot of cartoonists in China who draw very well but don't tell stories." On March 16, at the "Manga is everyone's Youth -"Death" Sharing Signing Party held at Sanlitun Page One, Yin Chuan talked about his trip to Tokyo after his work "Death" won the Japan International Manga Award.
Born in 1984 in Shanxi, Yin Chuan graduated from the Animation Academy of the Beijing Film Academy. In 2008, his manga Death won the Silver Medal at the Japan International Manga Awards, and he was also the first mainland manga artist to win the Japan International Manga Award. "Gone" tells the story of how a young man who has ambitions for music but gradually loses his enthusiasm and vitality in life begins to change under the impetus of a girl. In the preface to "Death" written by Takao Yaguchi, the author of "Fishing Fan Mihira", he said of the manga "Death": "The first time I came into contact with it as a jury member, I was deeply struck by his superb painting skills and the new plot with indescribable tiredness in the work. ...... Chinese comic works have reached such a high level, which still touches me deeply. ”
In 2018, Yin Chuan created a follow-up story for "Death", "Pick Up", which was included in the new version of "Death". "Pick Up" is about a chance reunion between the male and female protagonists in "Gone" ten years later. On March 16th, at the sharing meeting of the new version of "Gone", manga artist Yin Chuan and Yugu, who are both manga artists and manga editors, shared their experiences and thoughts with everyone on topics such as manga creation and the development of national comics in the past decade.
"Death" (author: Yin Chuan; version: new classic | Beijing United Publishing Company January 2019)
A good cartoonist, drawing only 30%
After "Death" won the award, Yin Chuan went to Tokyo to receive the award. In the manga editorial department of the elementary school, he met some senior manga editors, such as the editor of Inuyasha and the editor of Robot Cat, who said that many Chinese cartoonists draw well, but they can't tell stories. "If you want to be a good cartoonist, you only draw thirty percent, and thirty or forty percent is whether your script is well written or not, and the other important thing is whether you can tell a story." 」 Yin Chuan said.
In Yin Chuan's view, from writing the outline of the script to the completion of the comic creation, the four steps in the middle - storyboarding, drawing drafts, drawing lines and coloring - with the storyboard being the most critical and the most difficult. Because the storyboard determines how the narrative is narrated in terms of images. "I drew the storyboard of 'Passing' almost five or six times at that time, and I always kept overthrowing myself." Yin Chuan said.
Yin Chuan's storyboard drawing for "Death".
Yin Chuan suggested that comic book novices can start by writing scripts with split shots: writing split shot scripts for comics with no more than two characters and no more than eight pages in size. First write the story outline and world view, and then write the character biography in detail; in terms of personality, the costumes, props and scenes are planned, and then it is time to write a split-shot script by page. For example, the story is 8 pages, each page has 5 grids, then the 1st grid can be written, the character: A, the scene: the bedroom, and then write what the character A is doing; the 2nd box, the empty mirror, such as the door of Page One; the 3rd box, the character: B, the scene: the street, the character B drives by. In this way, after writing the content of each grid one by one, there is a scene design and a character design, and then it is just a painting.
"There are no shortcuts to drawing comics, the more you practice, the better, in addition to watching more movies." Yin Chuan said.
Slam Dunk Master teaches us to fail
Yin Chuan benefited from the Beijing Film Academy's approach to storytelling, he clarified from a wide range of movies the attitude and understanding of life he wanted to express in his works, or in his own words, "world view".
Yin Chuan confessed that he has been a pessimist since he was a child, and he likes things with gray tones. The experience of the film school has exposed him to many literary and artistic films provided by embassies and consulates - the film school itself has translated subtitles and shown them to students - French, Belgian, Russian, Iranian, etc., and the life atmosphere of these films is very attractive to him. In mainland films, his favorite works are the works of sixth-generation directors such as Wang Xiaoshuai and Jia Zhangke. He believes that these films are more real, and that real talents have power. "What I want is 'gray', and gray is the most profound. I want to throw out questions or capture the breath of life, rather than imposing a certain value on others. Yin Chuan said. This is also the origin of the "tired atmosphere" that "Passing" touched Takao Yaguchi.
The inner page of Yin Chuan's manga "Death".
In Yin Chuan's view, the youth-oriented comic "Death", like most youth-oriented comics, is not too "two-dimensional". The characters in the second dimension are too flat, and the worldview in the youth to the comic is closer to reality, which can be established in reality.
This quest to present real life is reflected even in the subtleties of "Passing". Some viewers asked why the characters in the work did not have names, and Yin Chuan said that because in real life, there are very few scenes in which the characters mention their own names, and he does not like the monologue-style opening of many comics, explaining their names, ages and occupations, "The name does not matter," he said.
"When I was creating 'Gone', one of the ideas I wanted to convey was that people have to lose something to get something, and people who want everything are naïve." Yin Chuan said, "What Slam Dunk Master teaches us is failure, so it is successful. ”
The spring of cartoonists has arrived,
But early spring was still a bit cold
Yin Chuan's 2008 award-winning "Death" and the new version of "Death" are separated by ten years, and when it comes to the development of national comics in the past decade or so, Yugu, who is both a manga artist and a comic editor, has a deep feeling.
In 2006, Yugu joined the industry as a leader in magazines such as Shonen Comics and Beijing Cartoons. Because the size of the magazine is limited, one can only publish seven or eight works at the same time, in order to publish, in addition to strength, but also need connections and luck, newcomers want to get ahead is very difficult.
In addition, at that time, all manga magazines were aimed at children, junior high school students, and at most high school students; few magazines were positioned to read to readers above high school students. Girls' comics and juvenile comics dominate the world, and the authors of youth comics have little living space. "When we introduce ourselves, we say that we are independent cartoonists who draw young people to comics, why are they independent? Because nobody wants it. Rain Valley teased herself. If the painting is particularly good, there is also a way out, that is, to contribute to the French side. The manuscript fee is about three thousand to four thousand per page, but because of the high requirements for the painter of the work, he can only paint a dozen pages a year.
Yugu was illustrated in the novel Poem of The Madman of Martial Arts.
Around 2011, two youth-oriented manga magazines appeared, "National Chronicles" and "Fenghua", which changed the situation of juvenile comics dominating the world. But because the market was not mature enough at that time, it was difficult to survive by selling magazines alone, and "Guorenzhi" only produced seven issues, while "Fenghua" only lasted for two years. But at that time, these two magazines gathered a group of good domestic players, such as Lu Ming, Zhang Xiaoyu, Huang Jiawei, and Yin Chuan, "now they are all god-level figures," Yugu said.
At the same time, webcomics began to appear, and you have demon qi and vertical comics are the two major platforms at that time. Each platform can simultaneously publish more than 30 works created by the platform to pay the fee, which has greatly changed the situation that the paper magazine era is limited to volume and it is difficult for newcomers to emerge. In addition to the works that the platform pays to fund the creation, cartoonists can also create freely, and the platform provides a space for display. But when comics are published on online platforms, the author's income is lower than that of magazines, about two-thirds.
However, the Internet age also has problems with the Internet age. Because Chinese readers have not been accustomed to paid reading, the operation of comic book websites is very difficult, and it is entirely dependent on capital investment to maintain. It wasn't until 2014 and 2015 that things changed. "100,000 Cold Jokes" serialized in the demon atmosphere has produced dramas, big movies, stage plays, and peripheral authorizations, opening up the entire industrial chain. "It's because of Stan Lee and Marvel," Rain Valley said. Film adaptations of Marvel's works have made the Chinese film industry realize that movies can not only be adapted from novels, but also comics can also be the source of adaptations.
"It was also from that year that the word IP appeared." Rain Valley said. At that time, the income of authors of webcomic platforms increased significantly, and some platforms would sign a contract of 1 million yuan with comic book authors - as long as the work was favored by film and television companies, the platform would prepay 1 million to comic book authors, in addition to subsequent shares. However, in the era of online platforms, the update frequency of authors is higher, generally 15 pages per week, and the minimum standard is also three times a month. In terms of income, in 2015, the monthly income of authors with 15 pages of weekly changes reached more than 10,000.
The IP boom has attracted a lot of capital into the comic book market, and various comic platforms and comic studios have emerged. Some platform editors don't even review the manuscript, as long as the author has a manuscript, they can get money. Because at that time, the platforms were doing the volume, and the data should be good to look at in order to further raise funds. It was also in the same period that comic platforms on mobile phones also appeared, the earliest being "quick look comics"; comics changed from page comics to strip comics.
Today is the era of de-platforming, and comic book authors can create freely without relying on any comic platform. A person can publish his own work on Douban, Weibo or public accounts and run himself. "Spring for comic book authors has arrived, but it's still a little cold in early spring." Rain Valley said.
Author: Kou Huaiyu, special correspondent of the Beijing News
Edit: Sissi
Proofreader: Xue Jingning