Showing posts with label Sakura-con. Show all posts
Sakura-Con 2013 - Aoi Eir and Haruna Luna
This year's musical guests featured Aoi Eir and Haruna Luna, both having a role in the anime Sword Art Online singing its opening and ending themes.
Interview with Aoi Eir & Haruna Luna
SUTORAIKUanime joined several other media outlets in a press conference conducted at Sakura-Con 2013 with musical artists Aoi Eir and Haruna Luna. Part of the Sakura-Con 2013's "Sword Art Online Mega Pack" guest lineup, Aoi sang the anime's second opening, "INNOCENCE," and Haruna sang the third ending "Overfly." Find out what these two talented young individuals have to say!
Sakura-Con 2013 - Special Guests
Being the huge Sword Art Online fan I am, realizing that the creator of the entire SAO franchise would be featured as a guest at Sakura-Con 2013 made me absolutely ecstatic. Not only did we get a chance to interview Kawahara Reki at the convention, we also got to meet the artists who sung the second opening and third ending theme of the SAO anime, Aoi Eir and Haruna Luna, and exclusively record footage of their first concert in North America with high-definition multi-track recorded audio.
Sakura-Con 2013 - We're Back!
Every year for the past three years, we have ventured out of Vancouver, driving two hours south of the border to attend the oldest and most well attended anime convention in the Pacific Northwest. This year was an especially busy year for us at Sakura-Con, but definitely well worth it. We were very lucky this year to be graced by the presence Japanese guests such as highly acclaimed Sword Art Online and Accel World novelist Kawahara Reki, voice actor Fujimura Ayumi, BONES founder Kawamoto Toshihiro, Psycho-Pass producers and directors Motohiro Katsuyuki, Shiotani Naoyoshi, Wada Joji, and last but not least, artists Aoi Eir and Haruna Luna. Aside from meeting up with new and old comrades, we had a chance to interview Kawahara Reki, as well as interview both Aoi Eir and Haruna Luna. Regarding Aoi Eir and Haruna Luna, we are very excited to share footage from their first North American concert at Sakura-Con featuring SUTORAIKUanime exclusive high-definition multi-track recorded audio. This post serves as a brief summary of the events we attended at Sakura-Con 2013.
We're going to Sakura-Con 2013
From March 29-31, SUTORAIKUanime's akinari-kun will be present at Seattle's Sakura-Con covering the event. This year, we've managed to secure a new sponsor Kurohi Photography who will be accompanying us on our trip providing us with their photography and filming expertise. We'll be attending most of the major events at the con and making sure to take lots of pics so be on the lookout for us!
Sakura-Con to Host Sword Art Online Mega Pack Guest Line-Up
Being the huge SAO fans we are, we were absolutely ecstatically delighted and rather surprised to discover that Sakura-Con would be hosting several musical guests and voice actors from SAO, as well as the creator of SAO. It may not be April yet, but fans of SAO may want to begin stocking up on merchandise for autographs.
Interview with Urobuchi Gen, Iwakami Atsuhiro, and Ota Katsushi
SUTORAIKUanime is pleased to share our exclusive interview with Fate/Zero and Mahou Shoujo Madoka Magica writer Urobuchi Gen, along with producer Iwakami Atsuhiro and light novel publisher and president of Seikaisha Ota Katsushi at Sakura-Con 2012. Questions were asked, and answers were given. Ourselves, along with representatives from Radiant Dreamer, Within a Flash of Lightning, Japan-A-Radio, the O-Network Group and Sankaku Complex were present at this exclusive press conference.
How do you feel about cons here in North America, say, to the cons you've probably attended in Japan?
Urobuchi
I feel there is a fundamental difference and this is my first time at an American convention. I have a question in reverse to everyone; do American otaku not feel the need to be completely forthcoming about their hobbies, something that they can't be fully proud of?
And so, that leads to this. Most Japanese otaku have some degree of self-loathing, and that leads to loathing of similar kin. So when Japanese otaku get together, they don't necessarily like each other, they don't treat each other necessarily that well. And that's the kind of self-loathing that I feel does not exist at Sakura-Con and I feel this is one of the biggest differences between Japanese otaku and Sakura-Con here.
I think it is very rare to see an otaku convention in Japan where all the attendees are so friendly towards each other.
I have yet to smell fans here. It seems like everyone bathes.
Ota
If you go to NatsuComi, there are lots of concentrations of people in one place. They do call Fuyucomi a battlefield in Japan, but it does not smell like a battlefield (at Sakura-Con). There is a lot of courtesy shown towards one other.
Iwakami
I've been to Anime Boston and Otakon, so I've been to a few other conventions. American fans are more positive and forthcoming and you can see it at the Fate/Zero screening yesterday (at Sakura-Con). The audience reaction we get between the battle of Archer and Berserker, that's not the kind of audience reaction you can get in Japan.
The Japanese audience is just as forthcoming when it is on Nico Nico Douga, so they're okay when they have a keyboard in front of them, just not physically.
Ota
I've been to the New York Comic Con, and one thing I felt that was more, rather than Japanese and the US, was the difference between west coast and east coast fans. I think West Coast fans are much more open.
When you're working on a particular story, in your respective positions, what exactly are you looking for in terms of content, or genre, or even marketability, or ratings or sales, what exactly are you looking for when you're working on a particular story?
Urobuchi
One fundamental thing that I keep in mind and the priority that I have is that I have to have fun making my work, because if I'm not having fun working on it, I think it's something that the customer can tell, so that's not something that I'm willing to allow in my product to have.
Ota
As editor, what I do is to work with the writer, and having fun working with the writer is one of the priorities for me, and hopefully that will lead to something with good sales, but that's a separate question. And when it comes to ratings, if you mean by that maturity ratings, that's not something that's fully implemented in Japan, so perhaps that's not a top priority, perhaps that's a difference between Japan and the American market. Although if you mean ratings by numbers, the consequence of most shows comes in the sales of DVDs, so viewer ratings aren't exactly top priority either.
Iwakami
And for me, it's all about making an entertaining product, because as producer, I do have to think about business, but if the show is not entertaining it will not sell.
You mentioned in your Fate/Zero radio show, that your most ideal character would most likely survive your stories. What is your ideal character, or is there any character that you've written that is close to it?
Urobuchi
In the context of Fate/Zero, there are four characters, Saber, Kiritsugu, Gilgamesh and Kotomine Kirei who survives to the end and continue on to Fate/stay night, but Kiritsugu shows up in stay night in name only and does not have much of a role there, so it's really Saber and Kirei who are pillar in Fate/Zero. But Saber's role is much bigger in Fate/stay night. The character that has the most presence in Fate/Zero would be Kotomine, so it's Kirei that's the pillar in Fate/Zero.
Just to clarify in the last question, you said that only four survived, but I recall that Waver survives as well?
Urobuchi
Waver does survive, but he does not show up in stay night. So when you consider characters that are consistent throughout Fate/Zero and Fate/stay night, Waver is not counted.
There's a lot of merchandising with Fate/Zero and Madoka Magica, for example, there's new Saber doll coming out in September. I'm just curious what your opinion is on merchandising?
Urobuchi
Merchandising is not something that I've been conscious of, because if you look at the most orthodox form of magical girls show or Ultraman or Kamen Rider, these are merchandise centric shows. You come up with the merchandise first and you build a show around it to sell the merchandise. The creative endeavors that I've worked in have been the polar opposites of that; I've never had to think that way. But if I ever were, then I would adapt to the creative process
For example, if merchandising were a priority for the show, the toys need to be selling in the first week of broadcast, so it would be impossible for Madoka not to be transforming in the very first episode.
Iwakami
As for Madoka Magica, it's not the kind of show where we design the toys first and take it to Toys R Us and have it sold, but within the confines otaku culture, Madoka merchandise have been very successful, and those would be like Kyubey dolls that the otaku culture very strongly embraces. But none of these were prepared items, these were all licensees who loved the characters as merchandise potential and came to us asking us to license that so there was nothing that was prepared before the production of the show as targeted merchandise to go onto the market.
What would be your most memorable moments while producing Madoka Magica or Fate/Zero?
Urobuchi
There are too many moments to say, but for Madoka Magica, that would be anticipating the reaction to the broadcast of episode three, I was just sitting upright in front of the TV and it was like waiting for what the doctor would tell me about my diagnosis.
Specifically for the Fate/Zero anime, when I went to see the screening of episode one, I was very impressed with the density of the content, I knew this was made by the same staff as Garden of Sinners, so there was much to be expected, but they exceeded a whole lot of my expectations and that was very great.
Ota
For Fate/Zero and this is probably the statute of limitation is probably transpired so I can probably talk about doujinshi. I was very excited to hear that Nasu and Urobuchi was going to do Fate/Zero but initially this was a doujinshi so it's nothing something I could openly help with, but since it's a non-professional job, so I wasn't fully impressed with their editorial design, so I was actually able to secretly help them with that, without letting my employer know, that's one memorable moment.
Also for the anime version, I wasn't involved in it from the very beginning. I joined production midway, so that was something I was anxious about, so I was very happy when the others invited me to join production.
Iwakami
I'm very surprised that my moments of anticipation were very much the exact same as Urobuchi, episode three of Madoka and episode one of Fate/Zero.
The third episode of Madoka was broadcast first in Osaka before Tokyo got that. Director Shingo and I were out to dinner while that was being broadcast, and we looked at the internet reaction the next day, it was as though the world had completely changed. We were anticipating that there might be a lot of split reaction to the episode, but we were impressed that a lot of viewers were thrilled by episode three.
Episode one of Fate/Zero was a big challenge because it was a one hour episode, and also because it was an episode without a single battle in it. That was all the result of the efforts that director Aoki put in. And so, episode three of Madoka was a big challenge, and episode one of Fate/Zero was a big challenge, and all these challenges were rewarded.
In regards to your respective anime shows, Madoka and Fate/Zero, there are several different music artists that are featured for the opening and ending sequences. How closely as producers and screenplay writers do you work with the musical artists such as Kalafina, LiSa and ClariS? Is there like a selection process in which individual artists are selected? How do you choose and how closely do you work with these artists?
Iwakami
As producer, it's my job to select artists and the song, so when the song is written I take it to the director and Urobuchi and show them and ask for their input.
And it was Urobuchi's specific request that he wanted to have Kawajiura Yuki as the composer, and he considered that a long shot, but since we already had worked with her for Garden of Sinners, it's something we went about and made possible.
When it comes to song selection, ClariS, Kalafina, LiSa are all Sony Music Group artists so we go to the large pool of artists that Sony music group has and work with them.
When it comes to tie ups, there used to be instances where existing songs were used for opening and closing, but as the shows become more popular, original songs are written that would synchronize better to the story and the original novel, so there's a better match between the songs and the shows.
During the Madoka panel, you guys asked the audience, how many of you have seen all 13 episodes of Madoka, and just about everyone in the audience including myself raised my hand. You know that it's not released in America yet, nor is it released on Crunchyroll. Which basically means that the only reason all these people saw all 13 episodes is because of fansubs. How do you feel about fansubbing in general?
Iwakami
In the context of IP, that's not something we can fully appreciate, but what I can appreciate is the enthusiasm as fans for the love and work that's shown, if there's effort to see that right after broadcast in Japan. But I certainly wish everything could be watched through legitimate means.
Urobuchi
I almost wish there was a magical way to make revenue without relying on the IP mechanism.
Ota
The Japanese population is approximately 100 million, and the unfortunate thing is that this is enough of a market to sustain the endeavors of most creative people there, so that producers and creators do not really have a market overseas in mind, and that's probably the mentality that needs to change, because we've come here to Sakura-Con and there are fans in demand for what we make overseas. If there's demand there needs to be service to that, and that's probably the best way to resolve the IP dilemma
Iwakami
In the context of trying to come up with a more legitimate way to watch, Fate/Zero has a simul worldwide release on Nico Nico Douga and I think that's the first step of what we can do. I'm sure there are friends who have watched it through fansub means rather than Nico Nico, but it's a start.
Actually I'd like to ask in reverse, are there any shortcomings of Nico Nico Douga that prevents you from watching it, or some ways that would enhance the viewing experience on Nico Nico?
Spoilers in the comment list right beside the video. For some it's a convenience in terms of the simulcast, but others may want to watch all 12 episodes in one sitting, instead of one per week. Also, internet in North American is generally not on par with internet speeds in Japan, which makes streaming videos somewhat of a hassle for those with slower internet connection speeds.
Urobuchi
I thought Bill Gates had established the fastest broadband network!
Perhaps it would be best to be able to purchase a digital copy, or have an option on Nico Nico Douga which allows one to purchase a digital copy, much like how Netflix works.
Ota
Let's wait for Iwakami's promotion in Aniplex.
Within the story of Fate/Zero and Fate/stay night, the Holy Grail War is something that is recurring. What other historical or mythological characters would you like to put into that story, and the quick follow-up question to that would be, have you seen the Deadliest Warrior?
Urobuchi
As for deadliest warrior, I've heard this title for the first time, so it's not something I'm familiar with. For Fate/Zero I had free range to what I could do, so I'm pretty much happy with the heroes produced there. There are many creators in Japan who are being drawn into Kinoko Nasu's world and coming up with their own spinoffs to the Fate franchise, so they will be the ones to introduce new ideas of what kind of heroes to incorporate in the world.
In other version, other characters such as Jack the Ripper are even featured. One of my friends has written one.
This marks the end of the interview with Urobuchi-san, Iwakami-san and Ota-san.
How do you feel about cons here in North America, say, to the cons you've probably attended in Japan?
Urobuchi
I feel there is a fundamental difference and this is my first time at an American convention. I have a question in reverse to everyone; do American otaku not feel the need to be completely forthcoming about their hobbies, something that they can't be fully proud of?
And so, that leads to this. Most Japanese otaku have some degree of self-loathing, and that leads to loathing of similar kin. So when Japanese otaku get together, they don't necessarily like each other, they don't treat each other necessarily that well. And that's the kind of self-loathing that I feel does not exist at Sakura-Con and I feel this is one of the biggest differences between Japanese otaku and Sakura-Con here.
I think it is very rare to see an otaku convention in Japan where all the attendees are so friendly towards each other.
I have yet to smell fans here. It seems like everyone bathes.
Ota
If you go to NatsuComi, there are lots of concentrations of people in one place. They do call Fuyucomi a battlefield in Japan, but it does not smell like a battlefield (at Sakura-Con). There is a lot of courtesy shown towards one other.
Iwakami
I've been to Anime Boston and Otakon, so I've been to a few other conventions. American fans are more positive and forthcoming and you can see it at the Fate/Zero screening yesterday (at Sakura-Con). The audience reaction we get between the battle of Archer and Berserker, that's not the kind of audience reaction you can get in Japan.
The Japanese audience is just as forthcoming when it is on Nico Nico Douga, so they're okay when they have a keyboard in front of them, just not physically.
Ota
I've been to the New York Comic Con, and one thing I felt that was more, rather than Japanese and the US, was the difference between west coast and east coast fans. I think West Coast fans are much more open.
When you're working on a particular story, in your respective positions, what exactly are you looking for in terms of content, or genre, or even marketability, or ratings or sales, what exactly are you looking for when you're working on a particular story?
Urobuchi
One fundamental thing that I keep in mind and the priority that I have is that I have to have fun making my work, because if I'm not having fun working on it, I think it's something that the customer can tell, so that's not something that I'm willing to allow in my product to have.
Ota
As editor, what I do is to work with the writer, and having fun working with the writer is one of the priorities for me, and hopefully that will lead to something with good sales, but that's a separate question. And when it comes to ratings, if you mean by that maturity ratings, that's not something that's fully implemented in Japan, so perhaps that's not a top priority, perhaps that's a difference between Japan and the American market. Although if you mean ratings by numbers, the consequence of most shows comes in the sales of DVDs, so viewer ratings aren't exactly top priority either.
Iwakami
And for me, it's all about making an entertaining product, because as producer, I do have to think about business, but if the show is not entertaining it will not sell.
You mentioned in your Fate/Zero radio show, that your most ideal character would most likely survive your stories. What is your ideal character, or is there any character that you've written that is close to it?
Urobuchi
In the context of Fate/Zero, there are four characters, Saber, Kiritsugu, Gilgamesh and Kotomine Kirei who survives to the end and continue on to Fate/stay night, but Kiritsugu shows up in stay night in name only and does not have much of a role there, so it's really Saber and Kirei who are pillar in Fate/Zero. But Saber's role is much bigger in Fate/stay night. The character that has the most presence in Fate/Zero would be Kotomine, so it's Kirei that's the pillar in Fate/Zero.
Just to clarify in the last question, you said that only four survived, but I recall that Waver survives as well?
Urobuchi
Waver does survive, but he does not show up in stay night. So when you consider characters that are consistent throughout Fate/Zero and Fate/stay night, Waver is not counted.
There's a lot of merchandising with Fate/Zero and Madoka Magica, for example, there's new Saber doll coming out in September. I'm just curious what your opinion is on merchandising?
Urobuchi
Merchandising is not something that I've been conscious of, because if you look at the most orthodox form of magical girls show or Ultraman or Kamen Rider, these are merchandise centric shows. You come up with the merchandise first and you build a show around it to sell the merchandise. The creative endeavors that I've worked in have been the polar opposites of that; I've never had to think that way. But if I ever were, then I would adapt to the creative process
For example, if merchandising were a priority for the show, the toys need to be selling in the first week of broadcast, so it would be impossible for Madoka not to be transforming in the very first episode.
Iwakami
As for Madoka Magica, it's not the kind of show where we design the toys first and take it to Toys R Us and have it sold, but within the confines otaku culture, Madoka merchandise have been very successful, and those would be like Kyubey dolls that the otaku culture very strongly embraces. But none of these were prepared items, these were all licensees who loved the characters as merchandise potential and came to us asking us to license that so there was nothing that was prepared before the production of the show as targeted merchandise to go onto the market.
What would be your most memorable moments while producing Madoka Magica or Fate/Zero?
Urobuchi
There are too many moments to say, but for Madoka Magica, that would be anticipating the reaction to the broadcast of episode three, I was just sitting upright in front of the TV and it was like waiting for what the doctor would tell me about my diagnosis.
Specifically for the Fate/Zero anime, when I went to see the screening of episode one, I was very impressed with the density of the content, I knew this was made by the same staff as Garden of Sinners, so there was much to be expected, but they exceeded a whole lot of my expectations and that was very great.
Ota
For Fate/Zero and this is probably the statute of limitation is probably transpired so I can probably talk about doujinshi. I was very excited to hear that Nasu and Urobuchi was going to do Fate/Zero but initially this was a doujinshi so it's nothing something I could openly help with, but since it's a non-professional job, so I wasn't fully impressed with their editorial design, so I was actually able to secretly help them with that, without letting my employer know, that's one memorable moment.
Also for the anime version, I wasn't involved in it from the very beginning. I joined production midway, so that was something I was anxious about, so I was very happy when the others invited me to join production.
Iwakami
I'm very surprised that my moments of anticipation were very much the exact same as Urobuchi, episode three of Madoka and episode one of Fate/Zero.
The third episode of Madoka was broadcast first in Osaka before Tokyo got that. Director Shingo and I were out to dinner while that was being broadcast, and we looked at the internet reaction the next day, it was as though the world had completely changed. We were anticipating that there might be a lot of split reaction to the episode, but we were impressed that a lot of viewers were thrilled by episode three.
Episode one of Fate/Zero was a big challenge because it was a one hour episode, and also because it was an episode without a single battle in it. That was all the result of the efforts that director Aoki put in. And so, episode three of Madoka was a big challenge, and episode one of Fate/Zero was a big challenge, and all these challenges were rewarded.
In regards to your respective anime shows, Madoka and Fate/Zero, there are several different music artists that are featured for the opening and ending sequences. How closely as producers and screenplay writers do you work with the musical artists such as Kalafina, LiSa and ClariS? Is there like a selection process in which individual artists are selected? How do you choose and how closely do you work with these artists?
Iwakami
As producer, it's my job to select artists and the song, so when the song is written I take it to the director and Urobuchi and show them and ask for their input.
And it was Urobuchi's specific request that he wanted to have Kawajiura Yuki as the composer, and he considered that a long shot, but since we already had worked with her for Garden of Sinners, it's something we went about and made possible.
When it comes to song selection, ClariS, Kalafina, LiSa are all Sony Music Group artists so we go to the large pool of artists that Sony music group has and work with them.
When it comes to tie ups, there used to be instances where existing songs were used for opening and closing, but as the shows become more popular, original songs are written that would synchronize better to the story and the original novel, so there's a better match between the songs and the shows.
During the Madoka panel, you guys asked the audience, how many of you have seen all 13 episodes of Madoka, and just about everyone in the audience including myself raised my hand. You know that it's not released in America yet, nor is it released on Crunchyroll. Which basically means that the only reason all these people saw all 13 episodes is because of fansubs. How do you feel about fansubbing in general?
Iwakami
In the context of IP, that's not something we can fully appreciate, but what I can appreciate is the enthusiasm as fans for the love and work that's shown, if there's effort to see that right after broadcast in Japan. But I certainly wish everything could be watched through legitimate means.
Urobuchi
I almost wish there was a magical way to make revenue without relying on the IP mechanism.
Ota
The Japanese population is approximately 100 million, and the unfortunate thing is that this is enough of a market to sustain the endeavors of most creative people there, so that producers and creators do not really have a market overseas in mind, and that's probably the mentality that needs to change, because we've come here to Sakura-Con and there are fans in demand for what we make overseas. If there's demand there needs to be service to that, and that's probably the best way to resolve the IP dilemma
Iwakami
In the context of trying to come up with a more legitimate way to watch, Fate/Zero has a simul worldwide release on Nico Nico Douga and I think that's the first step of what we can do. I'm sure there are friends who have watched it through fansub means rather than Nico Nico, but it's a start.
Actually I'd like to ask in reverse, are there any shortcomings of Nico Nico Douga that prevents you from watching it, or some ways that would enhance the viewing experience on Nico Nico?
Spoilers in the comment list right beside the video. For some it's a convenience in terms of the simulcast, but others may want to watch all 12 episodes in one sitting, instead of one per week. Also, internet in North American is generally not on par with internet speeds in Japan, which makes streaming videos somewhat of a hassle for those with slower internet connection speeds.
Urobuchi
I thought Bill Gates had established the fastest broadband network!
Perhaps it would be best to be able to purchase a digital copy, or have an option on Nico Nico Douga which allows one to purchase a digital copy, much like how Netflix works.
Ota
Let's wait for Iwakami's promotion in Aniplex.
Just kidding.
Within the story of Fate/Zero and Fate/stay night, the Holy Grail War is something that is recurring. What other historical or mythological characters would you like to put into that story, and the quick follow-up question to that would be, have you seen the Deadliest Warrior?
Urobuchi
As for deadliest warrior, I've heard this title for the first time, so it's not something I'm familiar with. For Fate/Zero I had free range to what I could do, so I'm pretty much happy with the heroes produced there. There are many creators in Japan who are being drawn into Kinoko Nasu's world and coming up with their own spinoffs to the Fate franchise, so they will be the ones to introduce new ideas of what kind of heroes to incorporate in the world.
In other version, other characters such as Jack the Ripper are even featured. One of my friends has written one.
This marks the end of the interview with Urobuchi-san, Iwakami-san and Ota-san.
Sakura-Con 2012 - Stereopony
One of this year's musical guests at Sakura-Con was all-girl Jrock band Stereopony. Known for their song "Hitohara no Hanabira", the 17th ED theme of Bleach, as well as "Namida no Mukou", the second OP theme for the second season of Mobile Suit Gundam 00.
Sakura-Con 2012 - Special Guests
The guest list this year at Sakura-Con was nothing short of spectacular. The big three, Urobuchi Gen, Iwakami Atsuhiro, and Ota Katsushi, took the spotlight, along with musical guests Moi dix Mois, Wakeshima Kanon and Stereopony, which we received exclusive photography access to and will be covered in a separate post, as well as our exclusive interview with the big three. Other guests who were also present included Zekkyou, the ToraDora! manga artist, along with Morita Masakazu and several other influential individuals from the industry.
Sakura-Con 2012 - Cosplayers
One of the most enjoyable things to do during a con is to feast your eyes on the endless stream of cosplayers flooding in from all directions. It can be difficult to have the camera ready on time, and in most situations, less-than-ideal lighting conditions make the photo-taking process slightly more taxing. With that being said, it's definitely rewarding to see the final product, and I'm sure cosplayers love to see their hard work shared with the rest of the online anime community.
Sakura-Con 2012 - Merchandise
Right after the opening ceremony ended, I made my way towards the exhibitor's hall, where all the anime merchandise one could ever want is located. Even though I tend to keep my expenses to a minimum during cons, due to the fact that purchasing online makes more financial sense to me, I do appreciate and enjoy window shopping and seeing all the great merchandise and unique items the individual exhibitors carry.
Sakura-Con 2012 - We're Back!
We're finally back from Sakura-Con, feet and legs numb, and wallet empty. For those who are unfamiliar with Sakura-Con, it is the largest anime convention in northwest US, located in Seattle Washington. This year, Sakura-Con was host to a whole array of big shot guests, including Urobuchi Gen along with Iwakami Atsuhiro and Ota Katsushi, Zekkyou, and all-girl J-Rock band Stereopony just to name a few. Speaking of Urobuchi Gen and his Aniplex crew, we managed to secure an exclusive press conference interview with Urobuchi, Iwakami and Ota, which will be featured on SUTORAIKUanime exclusively. This post serves as a brief summary of the events we attended at Sakura-Con 2012.
We're going to Sakura-Con 2012
From April 6-8, SUTORAIKUanime's akinari-kun and SabishiiMiruku will be present at Seattle's Sakura-Con covering the event, joined by Radiant from Radiant Dreamer, Lightning Sabre from Within a Flash of Lightning, Kai, and ToastCrust from Transistor Glamor. We'll be walking around snapping shots of great cosplayers, so make sure to be on the lookout for us!
Sakura-Con 2011 - exist†trace
I've been putting this off for quite some time, mainly due to my laziness but also due to the amount of photos that I have to post. This is the exist†trace concert I attended during my visit to Sakura-Con 2011 in Seattle, Washington.
Before I attended Sakura-Con 2011, I've never heard of exist†trace, and when I first saw them, I was skeptical. But I proved myself wrong as I heard them on stage, because they absolutely blew my mind away.
Before I attended Sakura-Con 2011, I've never heard of exist†trace, and when I first saw them, I was skeptical. But I proved myself wrong as I heard them on stage, because they absolutely blew my mind away.
Sakura-Con 2011 - Special Guests
A whole array of famous individuals from Japan visited Sakura-Con this year, in addition to a large amount of voice actors and artists from across the world. I was lucky enough to be able to get photos of Kotono Mitsuishi and artists VOfan and Jo Chen. I also attended the Exist Trace concert, which will be covered in another post due to the amount of photos.
Sakura-Con 2011 - Cosplayers
Probably the most enjoyable and invigorating part about covering any anime convention is getting a chance to look at all the fantastic cosplayers, whether they're in a group or by themselves, it's always an absolute treat to admire their awesome costumes, some which are self-fabricated by the cosplayer themselves. This year, there were some remarkable cosplays, and a few that truly stood out as being flawlessly amazing.
Sakura-Con 2011 - Merchandise
One of my favourite things to do when attending a con is to wander through the merchandise area where all the anime goodies are located. Even though I prefer to purchase anime goods online, since it's cheaper to do so, I enjoy browsing through all the figurines so I can see what they actually look like, which is something you are not able to do online. This year, there were some really great merchandise available for purchase in the Exhibitor's Hall, including an Takumi's AE86 Initial D plushie which I absolutely would've done anything to get my hands on if it weren't overpriced. One absolutely hilarious thing I noticed with the male population in the Exhibitor's Hall, was that whenever they walked past a dakimakura, I would see their eyes wander over for a couple seconds...and continue walking as if nothing happened. Great stuff!
Sakura-Con 2011 - We're Back!
Ahoy there! After finally being able to feel my legs again after standing almost 12 hours on the first day of the con and about 5 hours on the second day, and getting enough sleep, I got my act together and started uploading the 580 or so photos I took at Sakura-Con 2011. It was a great experience for me, since this is my first year attending. I must say though, I made some very worthy investments, as all the merchandise I bought at the exhibition hall has been autographed! I was a little bummed however that there was not press priority at the majority of the events though, and the general organization of most of the autograph signing sessions was dismal, oh wells!
There are way too many photos to fit into this one single post, so there will be a series of Sakura-Con posts highlighting different aspects of the con, from cosplayers to concerts.
This post is just a brief outline of what to expect from the other posts that will be posted later on the in week once I'm finished organizing and uploading all the photos, so if anyone of you are wondering why there are so little photos present in this post, that is the reason.
Enough blabbering, on with the event!
I spent the night before Sakura-Con organizing my schedule the classic way, with printed off schedules laid out across the floor in my room. That took me about half an hour, until I slept at 12:34AM...
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