User:Yuzhan Yuzhan/sandbox

The development and interaction between Chinese and Japanese Anime.

Japanese Anime

           By the early 2007, esports are not allowed for most of Chinese parents because they think video game are entertainment, and their children will be addicted on video game and give up their academic career and lead to low academic performance. Meanwhile, according to the development of video game, Chinese videogame market have an increasing amount of economic development during that period. Although in Chinese society, there are lots of reports that children will be addicted on video game and spend a large amount of money on game irrationally. However, obviously, esports and video game have two sides. It’s our obligation to teach children to have a correct understanding on video game. Lots of parents think video game will destroy our life. But some data from Chris Russell’s reports, lots of highest earning esports players are from China. Chris claim that the Chinese esports players are having high income. It contradicts the theories that obtained from Chinese parents’ ideas. Their minds are constraint by traditional ideology. They only can feel the negative effect from video game because they think young child can’t have self-discipline to control their daily lives, and it’s easy to get addicted on playing video games. Lots of them think that studying is the only way to get survival in this society, and don’t allow their children to touch computer game. However, playing video game can be one way to get income in nowadays society. The top game player can get high income. Rebekah Valentine writes that Chinese esports market have huge amount ratio all over the world only behind the North America, but a majority of people in China still don’t have correct understanding of esports and video game. The traditional mind restricts Chinese esports and video game industries economic developments. The population and the size of market is much more powerful if we can correct have a close understanding of video game for everyone in order to promote economic development. There is another popular entertainment that also is constraint by traditional thoughts.

           At the same time, the anime production is also constraint by Chinese traditional mind. Parents think anime is easy to addicted on and the unhealthy product. It’s normal for children to love watching anime. When I go to my parents’ friends’ house, it is normal for me to see small children sit on sofa and watch anime. In Chinese Tv program, lots of anime are produced for young children at the age from 3 to 16. Parents think only children will watch anime. When I invited my parents to watch anime in the movie theater, they directly reject my invitation and said that it’s too old for us to watch anime. The famous Chinese anime The Pleasant Goat and Big Wolf receive complaints that there are too many violent elements when the goats attack on the wolf, according to the Ramin Zahed’s article. This anime tv program is in big trouble. The complaint is talked about the violent elements in this tv program inspires audience to copycat the same behaviors. Chinese Anime fall behind. When we mention Anime, it’s natural for us to talk about Japanese anime. Japan is the famous anime country all over the world. The quality and technology of producing anime are in the lead. Japanese anime has long history. Although according the news reports from Gavin J. Blair, Japanese animation industries worth about 2.15 trillion Yen. It compares to Chinese animation. Chinese have smaller size of animation market. What’s the problems that why Chinese animation fall behind Japanese? It leaves for audience for several questions. What’s the advantage and disadvantages of Japanese anime? What’s the positive effect and negative effect when you are watching Japanese anime? What can we learn from Japanese anime and have a correction of its negative influence? It’s very similar situations compared with the esports. It’s better for us not to constraint by traditional thoughts to deny something. When we have a close understanding of Japanese anime, we can able to operate in a better way in animation industries. It’s reasonable for us to analysis Japanese animation for our own countries’ developments, if we can realize the light and dark sides in Japanese animation industries.

           Although Japanese anime have high quality and beautiful images, the work in Japanese Animation industries is difficult for survival. In Japan, painters are considered as ignoring his or her proper occupation. It is normal for us to think the reason why painter have low status in society. It contradicts the phenomenon that Japan is one of the biggest animation countries all over the world. It is common for people to think about if we can have a job in Japan, we can have a good career. It’s the similar reason why lots of Chinese study abroad in US. People wants the higher level of their major. Although it’s very difficult for painter to survive in Japan, it’s ridiculous that it has such situation. According to Eric Margolis’s article that “the talent shortage is a serious ongoing problem — with nearly 200 animated TV series alone made in Japan each year, there aren’t enough skilled animators to go around. Instead, studios rely on a large pool of essentially unpaid freelancers who are passionate about anime”, It can be seen that Japanese animation industries rely on low wage painters. It’s not much possible for painter to get higher wages. What’s the wage for most painters? Eric writes that “In-between animators earn around 200 yen per drawing — less than $2. That wouldn’t be so bad if each artist could crank out 200 drawings a day, but a single drawing can take more than an hour”. That wage means if you are a waitress in store in Japan, you can earn more. It’s ridiculous for people to spend almost two hours to earn 2 dollars. It’s natural that no one is willing to paint. If you are not interested in painting, it’s natural for us to get low wage jobs. Meanwhile, it’s much more difficult than normal work. It’s a large amount of work. It’s unreasonable for people to become a painter. He also writes that Working conditions are grim. Animators often fall asleep at their desks, and he has been hospitalized multiple times due to illness brought on by exhaustion. According to the report from his article “One studio, Madhouse, was recently accused of violating labor code: Employees were working nearly 400 hours per month and went 37 consecutive days without a single day off. A male animator’s 2014 suicide was classified as a work-related incident after investigators found he had worked more than 600 hours in the month leading up to his death”, the pressure of becoming a painter is too high. It means if you are working in on studio as a painter, you probably will get mental healthy problems. You can see the working conditions of Japanese Animation industries. According to the Japanese Animation Creators Association, an animator in Japan earns on average ¥1.1 million ($10,000 dollars) per year in their 20s, ¥2.1 million ($19,000 dollars) in their 30s, and a livable but still meager ¥3.5 million ($31,000 dollars) in their 40s and 50s. The poverty line is Japan is ¥2.2 million. According to the consumption level in Japan, it’s not possible for painter to raise your family member. Although Japan is super animation country, it is constructed by a large number of low-wage painters. This is one of the dark sides of Japanese Animation. There is also another dark side in Japanese Animation.

           Japanese Animation includes lots of unhealthy elements, such as violence and eroticism. In China, almost half of Japanese Animation are banned by National Radio and Television Administration because its violent and eroticism content. Because Japanese animation is for different ages, it’s natural for anime to add some adults contents. According to  Perry Hinton’s article “Western male colonialists’ own sexual desires and fantasies, which they projected onto the Orient as a place where these would be unconstrained by Western conventions” (Hinton 2014, 92), it compare to the British government restrict many representations of Japanese and products of Japanese culture because they think Japanese pop culture contains too much sexual violence and could have negative effect on British culture. Based on the above discussion, there are many similarities to sexual desire. From my observation, the Japanese lover of anime are almost called homeboy. I think it is a different kind of culture, compared to western culture. The stereotype of the western is that men display male charm to attract women. But for anime, the homeboys usually fantasy their sexual desire by anime. You may be affected that you prefer to stay at home and not have contact with others and society. Although it seems like lots of unhealthy element exist in Japanese anime culture, there are some merits for to learn.

           The Japanese anime involves different kinds of element, such as Japan history, culture, language and worldview. Serdar Yequlalp writes that “Not only that, fans of anime also get an intimate look into Japan's history, language and worldview, woven into a great deal of anime on many levels”. Compare to most of Chinese anime, one of the popular anime called Pleasant Goat in my childhood doesn’t include anything. The feeling I get from this anime is the way of funny method of attacking each other between goats and wolfs. However, when I watch Japanese anime movie called Your Name- The artistic results do not disappoint. The 2016 anime film Your Name, a charming body-swap romance that became anime’s biggest box office success, features a catalog of gorgeously rendered landscapes worthy of an art gallery, it totally gives a different feeling. The difference feels like the comparison between aircraft carrier and boat. Yequlalp writes that Some shows are takeoffs on Japanese history like "Sengoku Basara" or raid Japanese mythology for story ideas like "Hakkenden" or "Hell Girl." Even shows that are outwardly non-Japanese in their presentation like "Claymore" and "Monster" have tinges of a Japanese sensibility to them. Compared to Chinese anime, the most of anime are produced for fun for young children. It doesn’t include any emotion, culture, and worldview.  Yequlalp also writes that “Anime art styles range from the flamboyant and outlandish in shows like "Samurai Champloo" and " FLCL" to the simple and direct in shows like "Azumanga Daioh!." That said, even shows with more "basic" artwork can still be visually striking. Anime has this way of making everything look fresh and new”.  Japanese anime is full of different kinds of style. The creativity and fantasy of structure anime are merits.  These detailed are the reasons why Japanese anime become popular all over the world. There is another reason about its popularity.

           Japanese anime is much more profession than other countries. There are lots of famous companies, such as Bones Animation and Kyoto Animation. Kyoto Animation has all the stages of independent animation production, including performance, painting, finished work, background, photography, etc. They are professional enough to create anime by their own. Meanwhile, the voice actor is one of the profession parts in Japanese animation. It is easy to see voice actor in Japan, but it’s bare to see in other countries. There is special organization to educate voice actors. Every part in Japanese anime are much more professional than other countries. There is strict policy for anime about 25 minutes on each set. However, in other countries animation, there is no strict rules that regulate your time or contents. These details on profession can be learned by other countries in order to promote their own anime economic development.

           Japanese anime is suitable for every age group, no matter how old you are. Yequlalp writes that “Because anime's so broad-reaching in its subject matter, it's possible to find anime aimed at just about every age group. Some titles are specifically for younger viewers or are suitable for all ages like the animated series "Pokémon" or Studio Ghibli film "My Neighbor Totoro" while others are aimed at teenage audiences and older like "InuYasha"”. There are even some animes aimed at older teens like "Death Note" and some for mature audiences only like "Monster" and "Queens Blade." There are different kinds of styles for various age group. Watch anime is not patent only for young children. Unlike Chinese anime, most of Chinese animation are made for young children for entertainment. As you get older, you don’t have to concern about that there is no anime to watch.

           Japanese anime industries have more marketing methods. In China, lots of anime income are from audience rating. However, Japanese animation can get income from selling its figures and related products in order to get fund to produce next season anime. It promotes different kinds of industries. The figures and other related products belong to other regions. The figure production is professional. The workmanship of figures of animation is the best in world. The price is much more expensive. They also sell comics to attract audience. The ways of getting fund for next season are multiple.

            Although Japanese animation have lots of unhealthy information such as violence and eroticism, it involves different kinds of elements. It involves emotion, culture and worldview in their works. The Japanese market is full. There are lots of freelancers to support animation. Although they only can get low wage when they are painter, it feels like the painters are interested in anime and the sprite of dedication on anime. It’s good for us to understand why Japanese are so popular all over the world. The quality and professional procedure in animation are good example for anime industries for other countries. In China, the animation industries technology and methods fall behind Japan. Although recently Ne Zha animation movie is popular, and it gets high box office revenues in 2019, in my opinion, only the special effect is good enough to compare Japanese anime movie. It’s better for us to have a close understanding of Japanese animation about its merits and shortcomings. The countries which have low level of animation can learn and copycat the advanced technologies and methods for promotion. When we understand the negative effect, we should spend our effort on avoiding it to get faster development in animation industries. Chinese anime can put more emotions, culture and worldview to enhance the quality of works. The animation industries in China should produce some anime for the older and adults. The traditional thoughts of that watching anime are bad for academic career and that anime is only for young children should be changed. Every age group have rights to enjoy anime. The countries that anime industries fall behind should learn more from Japanese anime in order to get fast growth in anime development.