Doujinshi Review: “The Contract” by Lavender-Ice

“The Contract” is another Madoka themed doujinshi, this time by Lavender-Ice and a group of other English speaking artists on deviant Art. I don’t normally purchase doujinshi through people on deviant art and it is usually because they sell out long before I even discover they’re available. In this case, I discovered “The Contract” during its pre-order period and was thus able to get myself a copy.

Book and Stickers

All pre-orders of “The Contract” came with the buyer’s choice of 3 stickers. I chose my favorite 3 characters from the series; Kyuubey, Mami and Homura.

Madoka & Mami

The majority of the illustrations in this book are by Lavender-Ice. She’s started the book off with a number of pages dedicated to each individual character.

Printing Close-Up

One of my main concerns with doujinshi printed outside of Asia is the quality of printing. I don’t expect it to be on par as self-publishing seems to be a much bigger deal in other countries. The printing in this book isn’t the greatest (something to consider should you choose to use the printing service that I will mention later) in that is has that “this was printed by an inkjet” look to it, with a bit of screening and fuzziness. I would say it’s about the same quality as if it were printed in a magazine.

Sayaka & Kyouko

The next pages feature Sayaka and Kyouko, followed by Homura and a gijinka version of Kyuubey which is quite adorable (not pictured).

Kyuubey and Homura

Then there’s another page of Kyuubey and Homura (I’m not sure why she drew these two twice; maybe they’re her favorites!); this time with Kyuubey in his normal form.

Twosomes

More pages feature Mami and Charlotte (not pictured) and then onto some illustrations of two characters together.

Guest Illust. by Minxy & KL-chan

The rest of the book features illustrations by a myriad of guest illustrators, all of which are very talented. These two are by Minxy and KL-chan.

Guest Illust. by Kurot & Hiromi

Also showcased are artworks by Hiromi (right) and the infamous Kurot (left).

There’s a lot of other great illustrations in “The Contract” and these are by no means the ones I chose to photograph as being the “best of the lot”. They are merely meant to be a sample of what’s contained therein. I felt that since this book is so accessible to English speakers, I would avoid showing off the whole thing. This is your call to support the artists.

It’s worth noting that “The Contract” appears to have been printed by Lulu.com. I only noticed this because I was browsing Lulu for artbooks and happened across it there even though I ordered my copy directly from Lavender-Ice. I paid the same price for the book as you’d pay if you ordered it from Lulu, which is $22. If you’d like to purchase a copy of your own, it is still available here.

Doujinshi Review: “if ~ to the world which is kind to all ~” by Yuugen

A c80 release from Yuugen (of the doujinshi circle Caslton), “if” is exclusively a Madoka Magica themed full-color illustration doujinshi of the utmost quality. My decision to purchase this book was based solely on the fact that it includes my absolute favorite piece of Madoka fanart thus far. To my delight, the rest of the content is on par with the beauty of this illustration.

"if" cover - Homura and Madoka

The cover image, which wraps around to the back, can also be viewed at Yuugen’s pixiv as a photoset. Clearly, Homura is giving Madoka a good talking to on the matter of whether or not she should become a magical girl.

Intro Page

Page 1 is a colorful collage which previews all of Yuugen’s artwork therein. I’m actually pretty impressed by the graphic design here.

Homura

We are greeted reluctantly by an angry Homura with guns. Of course she is presented in a way which allows easy pantsu viewing access.

Sayaka and Kyouko

Next is a sweeping image of Sayaka and Kyouko flying over the city. Notice that Kyouko can’t even put her Pocky down long enough to go into battle. I suppose it’s a good thing anime girls can’t get fat.

Pillow Talk

It seems as though Homura and Madoka are having a girl’s slumber party here. Oh, if only their lives were so quaint.

My personal favorite...

This is the illustration that drove me to purchase this doujinshi. The tears flying out of Madoka’s eyes as she reaches for Homura’s hand, Kyouko using Kyuubey as a hang-glider and Mami worrying about flashing her pantsu all contribute to an image that brings out the more adorable side of the series. (Of course, if this was all the show consisted of, it wouldn’t be the brilliant series that it is!) I strongly encourage you to check out the digital version of this illustration here, as my photo clearly does not do it the justice it deserves.

Cover Illustration

Once again we’re presented with the cover illustration; this time without any text. Make sure you check out the digital version of this one as well.

Sexy Mami

No Madoka doujinshi would be complete without some busty Mami fanservice. The illustration is actually done so that her foot in the foreground appears out of focus, so that’s not part of my camera trickery. Those blue popsicles that are so popular in Japan are actually flavored like ramune soda. They’ve become a Japanese trademark of scenes depicting hot summer days!

Guest Illustrations

There’s a filler page or two (not pictured) and then two guest illustrations. The bad-ass Homura is by Shirabi (digital version) and the bundle of chibi characters is by Noro (digital version). Shirabi’s Homura is probably my 2nd favorite illustration in the whole book!

4-Koma

Throw in a couple more filler pages and there’s a few more pages full of 4-Koma (4 panel comic strips) before the end of the book. I only photographed these pages for example. There’s more of ‘em!

Credits

There’s another collage type page where Yuugen mashed all of his drawings together into one image, and at last we’re presented with this credit page which I sort of feel obligated to photograph just because.

Once in awhile I spend a lot of money on a doujinshi that ends up being mediocre and I’m kicking myself for a long time afterwards. I like to think that by reviewing the books I buy that I can help others to avoid the same dilemma and also discover awesome new artists. This particular book is one I am so pleased with that it makes up for some of my lesser quality purchases and reminds me just why I buy doujinshi in the first place. If you love Madoka and are a doujin collector, I certainly consider “if” a must-get.

p.s. – The actual title on the book cover is “if ~ to a world whitch is kind to all ~”, but I’ve corrected the spelling error in my review title. If you’re doing a search for the book, it may be to your benefit to consider typing in the misspelling.

Magazine Review: Monthly Anime Style #1 with Taiga Petit Nendoroid

Monthly Anime Style is the reincarnation of “Anime Style” magazine. One of the things that makes the new “Monthly Anime Style” so exciting is the fact that each issue will come with a Petit Nendoroid of a character from the anime featured in that issue. I’ll admit the #1 reason I picked up this magazine was because I recently viewed and fell madly in love with Toradora and I had to have the Taiga Nendoroid. As it turns out, Monthly Anime Style is a pretty awesome magazine if you are curious about the inner-workings of the animation industry.

Cover featuring Toradora!

This particular issue’s main feature is “Toradora!”. Also included are articles on Heart Catch Pretty Cure, Panty and Stocking with Garterbelt and 放浪息子 (Hourou Musuko).

Taiga's Box

The box that the Nendoroid comes in is the same dimensions as the magazine. It seems unnecessarily large, but it keeps the magazine from getting bent when stacked. Anything that keeps the book in top condition is a good thing, if you ask me!

Taiga Puchi Nendoroid

While the lighting in my photo brings out some paint imperfections, the Nendoroid is just as lovely and high quality as I’ve come to expect from Good Smile Company. This is, of course, Taiga in her outfit from the final episode epilogue of Toradora. It is most certainly one of the most memorable scenes in anime! I’m beyond delighted to have such a cute and affordable little version of her.

Toradora!

The introduction to the extensive Toradora article features one of my personal favorite pieces of official Toradora artwork. There’s a fantastic cleaned-up, high-res version of this artwork available here on imouto.org, which I offer because my photograph didn’t turn out as well as I’d hoped.

Screenshots Galore!

There’s a few pages of text and screenshots to start out with, the first one featuring the many moods of Taiga. (Tsun tsun and dere dere!)

Colorful Production Artwork

I really love the pages of genga (original production drawings) in particular. Some people might not find these too interesting, but I think they’re fascinating. I am a big fan of animation and in the past I collected animation cels before they were phased out. One of the few types of production art not done on the computer nowadays are these beautiful hand-drawn genga.

The Famous Kiss Scene!

Here we have pencil drawings of Toradora’s precious kiss scene. Seeing production art like this makes you realize the effort and delicacy with which these extremely important scenes are constructed. These scenes are normally drawn by what’s known as the “key” animator, who sets the standard of how each character should be drawn and animated.

Makoto Shinkai!

I was pretty excited that this magazine also included a section on the animation of Makoto Shinkai.

Shinkai's Settings

Shinkai manages to bring out the magic hidden in normal everyday settings. He is a master in his usage of color and light. In addition to this 2-page spread of settings, there’s quite a few gorgeous screenshots from his newest work 星を追う子ども (Hoshi wo Ou Kodomo). Unfortunately, my photos couldn’t do them justice, so they are not included here.

Hourou Musuko

Hourou Musuko has a truly unique animation style that mimics the art of the manga. Presented in its relating article are examples of the animation before and after applying this watercolor-like effect.

Panty & Stocking Manga

The end of the magazine includes a section on the Panty & Stocking with Garterbelt animation. Screenshots are accompanied by character model sheets as well a handful of pages of manga. This manga has the heavily stylized drawing of the animation as well as its trademark usage of foul English interjections. The artist has introduction of the color pink along with black and white to pack extra punch and make the comic feel that much more zany.

Hoshi wo Ou Kodomo

I took a picture of the back of the magazine because it has a big advertisement for Hoshi wo Ou Kodomo and that’s awesome. You can also consider it my apology for not taking any good photographs of the Hoshi wo Ou Kodomo screenshots in the Makoto Shinkai article. If anything, consider that another incentive to pick this magazine up! (As if you needed one in addition to the Taiga Nendoroid.)

I found this magazine’s content to be a pleasant surprise. I’m pretty used to animation magazines such as Newtype covering all of the good artwork with words and generally being too text-heavy. While there’s a lot going on in the articles, you can still enjoy this magazine quite a bit while only looking at the images. And with every single issue planning to include a puchi Nendoroid, “Monthly Anime Style” is a potential must-get for animation fans and figure collectors.

You can still get this issue at J-List for a limited time!

(As a heads up, issue #2 will be coming with a positively adorable Nadia!)

Pixiv Becoming Alarmingly English-Friendly

For quite awhile I’ve wondered how the folks at pixiv feel about English users on their site. I’m sure I’m not the only one who feels a bit a bit nervous when attempting to blend in to a largely Japanese community. The good news is that we can now safely say English speakers are being welcomed to pixiv.

It started a few months back when pixiv gradually began to introduce an English-language interface for the website. As time goes on, there are more and more translations implemented which will make it much easier for an English speaker to use pixiv. There’s still quite a bit left untranslated, but the important things like the bookmark button and interface for submitting artwork are now available in English. Understandably, I think the top priority has been to make it easier for foreign artists to submit their works with ease. Pixiv has submissions from artists all around the world, but in the past the submissions have been limited by those who can utilize it’s Japanese-only interface.

The artwork submission section has the most complete translation thus far.

In addition to the implementation of a translated UI, many were happy to discover that Pixiv started up another Twitter account in English, which is located at pixiv_en. In addition to the usual ranking updates, it’s also the perfect place to get in touch with a pixiv staff member.

pixiv encyclopedia

Quite possibly the most interesting and fun of the new English pixiv community is the encyclopedia, which is essentially a wiki that aims to explain every possible term, meme and pop culture reference that influences the artwork which the denizens of pixiv upload. This can include anything from anime titles to bizarre phrases to infamous otaku terms like 絶対領域 (zettai ryouki). It’s a really outstanding way to figure out the meaning of seemingly nonsensical or obscure image tags and the fact that it aids you in your ability to understand the community lingo will make you feel a little more like you’re part of the “in” crowd.

I’ve gotta say I’m pleased as punch at these additions, especially the new Twitter account and the dictionary (I try to stick with a Japanese pixiv interface to aid me in immersion-based language learning) and I hope that they continue to add more. I don’t particularly want to see pixiv turn into another deviantART, but I’m not sure that is even possible because of the sheer amount of convoluted bloat that dA has accumulated. Pixiv is far more simplistic and streamlined and I have a feeling that, by design, it is going to stay that way regardless of any influence the English-speaking art world may have on it.

Thank you, pixiv, for welcoming us English speakers to your website. We promise to behave.

Magazine Review: Animedia Deluxe

Have you ever wished that there was a Megami Deluxe type of magazine aimed at a female audience, with great artworks of male characters? Well, your wish has sort of come true. Animedia Deluxe not only focuses on male characters, it’s also a magazine consisting of 100% full color artworks which are unhindered by text. It is worth noting that none of the illustrations span two-page spreads, thus making them crease free and suitable for framing if you wish to remove them. All of the landscape format illustrations are positioned sideways inside of the book. In addition too all of the ‘mini-posters’ that this magazine consists of, there’s also a double-sided B3 sized poster which is folded and included in the center of the magazine.

Cover Image from "Hakuoki"

The magazine is separated into 8 sections; each section features a different anime series with a varying amount of pages, which seems to be somewhat dependent on how popular that particular anime has been so far.

Image index for "Hakouki" section

The only pages in the book that are not full color illustrations are the index pages for each series. The index page contains page numbers and thumbnails for each illustration!

Hakouki Shinsengumi Kitan

The first section has 8 illustrations from Hakuouki Shinsengumi Kitan, which based on a very successful otome game series in Japan. I’m a big fan of the artwork of Kazuki Yone, who does the artwork for all of the Hakuouki games.

Hetalia

Section 2 is 9 pages of the wacky series Hetalia. This is a really popular show and one I’ve been meaning to watch for awhile now.

Fullmetal Alchemist

The newer Fullmetal Alchemist series (aka “Brotherhood”) gets royal treatment at 19 pages of illustrations!

Kuroshitsuji II

Like FMA, Kuroshitsuji (the second series, to be specific) gets another meaty section of the magazine at 18 pages.

Sengoku BASARA

I know virtually nothing about Sengoku BASARA, other than that it exists and it has some dudes in it. This series gets 10 pages of illustrations in the magazine.

Durarara!!

I was quite pleased that the incredible “Durarara!!” made it into the book, as it was one of my favorite series of the past year. I only wish it had more seasons because I’m dying to know what happens next. It is less represented at only 5 illustrations, however.

Tegami Bachi

Tegami Bachi (aka “Letter Bee”) is a unique show that I’ve seen just a bit of. It has a kind of fantasy mixed with Steampunk feel to it. The character designs are also really interesting. It gets another humble 5 images in the book.

Kaichou wa Maid sama!

The final section is a typical but cute looking shoujo series called “Kaichou wa Maid sama!” This series sort of skipped over my radar as I tend to be a sucker for high school romance shoujo but I might check it out sometime.

Back Cover

The back cover has some thumbnails that preview the contents, which was useful for me at least because the magazine came shrink-wrapped. This is probably to keep people from swiping the loose poster inside.

Hakouki (Side 1)

Fullmetal Alchemist (Side 2)

The double-sided B3 poster is quite lovely. The front features the Hakuouki illustration which is also on the front of the magazine, and the back is a Fullmetal Alchemist image with Ed and Al looking very much all-growed-up.

Magazine purchases can be a huge gamble as they cost a lot to import and the contents vary greatly. Animedia Deluxe turned out to be a stellar purchase that really delivered to what some would consider to be a ‘niche market’. It’s hard to find anime magazines aimed at women that aren’t strictly yaoi-centric, so this one was a great find that I highly recommend even if you don’t care for magazines.

The Earthquake in Japan; What Can I Do?

Japan has long been a country very dear to my heart, and now more than ever, I wish I was there to help and comfort the Japanese people in their time of need. As you know, the entire country has been in distress due to a large Earthquake and the aftermath that it brings. There are various ways to help, even if you can’t afford to give up a dollar.

Twitter has proven itself to be more useful than ever in helping people around the world keep in touch and stay up to date on current happenings. If you have an account, make sure you re-tweet this post from Bing, claiming they’ll donate a dollar towards Japan relief efforts for each time it’s RT’ed.

Headfone Dreamy by Yoko Furusho

If you prefer to donate in the form of an actual purchase, there are many artists out there selling artworks and giving the proceeds to disaster relief in Japan. Japanese illustrator Yoko Furusho is donating the money from sale of her lovely “Headfone Dreamy” print, so you can get a great piece of art and at the same time know you’re doing something to help out.

Bracelet design by Lady Gaga

Music superstar Lady Gaga designed a $5 “We Pray For Japan” bracelet that you can now purchase at her online merchandise store.

If you are skilled at translating Japanese, you can translate the latest Japanese news and post headlines or translations onto Twitter or a site like Reddit. There’s been a lot of criticizing aimed at CNN for the fact that their news just isn’t up-to-the-minute and accurate enough. The good news is, many English-speakers currently residing in Japan have been doing everything they can to keep the rest of the English-speaking world as informed as possible.

Those with a Pixiv account should see the scores of artworks tagged as 日本頑張って (Nihon Ganbatte) or “Good Luck, Japan”. There are thousands of hopes and prayers on Pixiv in the form of illustration submissions. If you’re an artist and you possess a Pixiv account, you can be a part of it by submitting your artwork and adding the 日本頑張って tag. While some insist that money donations are the way to go, the Japanese sincerely DO care about all of the well wishes that the world is sending their way, and this is just another little way that you can reach out to them.

To everyone in Japan, we are hoping for your safety! We will do what we can to help you recover from this disaster. You aren’t alone!

[Artist's Special] Kanzaki Hiro

かんざき ひろ (Kanzaki Hiro) is an artist you may safely consider a Jack of All Trades. In addition to being a professional animator & illustrator, he is also a doujin artist, Vocaloid music composer and professional trance music artist. Being a huge fan of all these fields, I felt he was an individual worth recognition.

Kanzaki may perhaps be best known most recently for his character design work on this past season’s anime series Ore no Imouto ga Konna ni Kawaii wake ga Nai! (aka – Oreimo).

Kousaka Kirino Character Designs

He also did the original illustrations for the OreImo light novels which the anime is based upon; this particular image being the most famous. It has now become a famous meme across the Japanese internet to re-draw this particular image with various characters from different series. (My personal favorite being this Harry Potter one.)

The Birth of a Meme...

Kanzaki’s doujin circle is called tabgraphics. His doujin work these days largely features Hatsune Miku with some other fanart thrown in. This comes as no surprise considering how much Miku he has to draw in order to animate his own Vocaloid videos! Of course, he also has a Pixiv account. You can check out scans of some of his doujinshi works at oreno.imouto.org, I recommend tabgraphics works summer100815 & tabgraphics works winter091231.

Plug Out

As producer of Vocaloid music, Kanzaki Hiro goes by 鼻そうめんP (HanaSoumenP) or HSP for short. He specializes in Miku Trance, which is my personal favorite genre of Vocaloid music. You can find his music videos on Nico Nico Douga and YouTube, and even purchase his “Incarnation” EP from the U.S. Amazon.com. His videos are highly worth a watch as they have really lovely animation done by the artist himself.

"Unfragment" Miku Designs

Kanzaki’s birthname, and the name he goes by as a trance music producer is 織田広之 (Oda Hiroyuki). His music has been recognized and published under trance legend Armin Van Buuren’s prestigious Armada music label and played on his A State of Trance radio show. Thanks to this recognition, there is a wealth of Oda’s trance MP3s available internationally on Amazon.

It’s worth mentioning that fellow blogger Polymetrica also has a fantastic and informative post on this artist that you can and should read here! Perhaps my post proves redundant, but I’ve been meaning to start featuring artists for awhile and I really wanted to give the multi-talented Kanzaki Hiro a mention.

All images used in this post are from oreno.imouto.org.

Doujinshi Review: “Colorful Sweets” by Ame Nochi Yuki

“Colorful Sweets” is a full-color K-on! fanbook by Ame Nochi Yuki, released at C78.

Asuza is the cover girl with her watermelon-on-a-stick. Or perhaps it is only ice cream that looks like a watermelon.

The back cover has  previews of the Mio and Mugi illustrations featured inside on little doily-shaped cut-outs.

The inside cover has colorful stripes, doilies, sweets and all the things you’d expect to see at a shop that sells cakes and candies.

Following the mandatory introduction is the first illustration; a “No, Thank You!” version of Mio.

The Azusa illustration used on the cover is next with a two page spread and inset doily. Notice, however, that on the cover she’s wearing a sundress and in the two-page spread she’s wearing her trademark pink swimsuit.

The Mugi waitress illustration might be my favorite in this particular book. To her left is Yui as a maid. For some reason, Yui in a maid outfit seems terribly uncharacteristic. I imagine she lazes around while her imouto does all the housework!

I love Yui x Azusa images, and this one is no exception. Again, Azu-nyan scores a two-page spread. So cute.

The rest few pages aren’t K-On! but rather various other girls (and traps). This page features Hideyoshi (from Baka to Test to Shoukanjuu) and Misaka Mikoto (from To Aru Kagaku no Railgun).

These are some work illustrations of a couple of girls in shimapan-inspired swimsuits.

At the end is this nice little “Making of” section for the Mio illustration on the very first page. As an artist I always enjoy these sections because it helps me to learn new digital coloring techniques!

For the sake of completion, the inside of the back cover.

This was a nice little book, albeit short, and a real treat for Azusa fans. The Azu-nyan and Mugi illustrations alone are definitely what made it for me. You can find some nice high quality CG versions of the cover illustration and the Yui x Azu illustration on Ame Nochi Yuki’s website. Rather than posting them here I’d prefer that you just go to the doujin site and get them yourself; they’re not terribly difficult to find.

Doujinshi Review: “Paint or Die” by SOLOIST (Riv)

Riv’s bold graphic style has become a favorite of mine and so I’ve made it a point to get any new doujinshi publications I can. I am happy, for once, to get a SOLOIST doujinshi that isn’t Touhou themed but is Riv’s original work. During Comic Market 78, a 44 page color & monochrome illustration book entitled “Paint or Die” was released. I’m glad to say that it’s a pretty nice little tome.

The cover features a shimapan-clad catgirl with an appetite for chocolate bars. I won’t lie, but female crotch bulge creeps me out a bit. Riv has the original CG version of this image here on Pixiv in a 1024×768 resolution.

The inside of the front cover, of course, treats you to shimapan zoom layer. Always a pleaser. I guess. *female apathy settling in*

The first illustration is a catgirl, with what appears to be meatbuns. Includes thigh-highs and gratuitous panty shot. The page to the right of this image includes an introductory paragraph by Riv in both Chinese and Japanese. According to the Pixiv description for this image, Riv drew it for a CG lecture in a magazine. The picture’s title そんな目で見ないでください (sonna me de minai de kudasai) could be translated as “Don’t look at me with those eyes.” or ” Please don’t look at me like that”. Cute, eh.

Some sort of maid girl character design. I wonder why they often have little heart badges near their waistline. Must be a maid cafe thing.

I am noticing a theme and that theme is shimapan. Also, you can see this book has a crease in the corner. It arrived at my doorstep that way and I’m not too happy about it. I have no idea if it was the doing of Toranoana or Shopping Mall Japan, but it really sucks when you pay 5x the original item cost in deputy fees to acquire it.  /endrant

A lovely little dog-eared girl.

A purple-haired elf or demon lady perhaps. I find the anatomy in this illustration particularly well done.

All of these characters are for an original doujin game cover. Riv claimed to be a little worn out after drawing this one. (View on Pixiv)

Another doujin game cover. (View on Pixiv) There’s another version of this image that only features and girl in the foreground, and it’s pretty darn awesome.

This is probably another doujin game. Ren ai, I bet. I was pretty excited to see a drawing of male characters for once.

Here are some typical moe style images that we know and love. The left illustration is also on Pixiv and its title ひまわり笑顔 (himawari egao) means “sunflower smile”.

These are characters illustrated for a Taiwanese novel. (View on Pixiv: The seeker 01 & Girl and Sword)  I find that Riv’s bold drawing style really suits strong fantasy female type characters. More so than gentler moe characters, anyway.

Well, it doesn’t get much more moe than two mikos in each other’s laps.

The rest of the book is in monochrome. All of the monochrome artwork is a pleasure to look at, however, I chose to only photograph a few pages as an example. This one features a variety of nekomimi characters.

I think Riv’s sketches are fantastic. I feel in some way like the style of sketching in these is similar to my own. It’s also interesting to see how much different the images feel without their signature coloring. Particularly the eyes. A graphic style is so different when you strip it of the CG.

These two images are just gorgeous. The girl with the leaf is undoubtedly one of my favorite Riv illustrations overall.

Overall, I’m fairly pleased with this book. Of course, I always want the books to be larger and to include more color illustrations, but the monochrome work in this book really is very nice. While not as impressive as Yumeiro Mangekyou in terms of presentation, “Paint or Die” is still a really lovely little compilation of Riv’s work.

Related Links:
Buy P.O.D. – Paint or Die at  Toranoana.jp
Riv on Pixiv
Riv on Twitter
SOLOIST

Pixiv Guide: Profile & Browsing Customization with Pixiv’s New Site Options

This year Pixiv rolled out a brand new look for their website along with a variety of new features to make your browsing experience more fun and personalized. Unfortunately, this change made some of the information in my older Site Preference and Bookmarking tutorial obsolete. Because so many new options and pages have been added, this tutorial will only cover the material located under the Site Options section of the main navigation menu. I’ll go over bookmarking, art submission and other stuff in a future tutorial, so keep an eye out.

Let’s get started!

User Info

Click on the far right text link on the main navigation menu. This will take you to the Site Options section. The first tab is for the User Info page.

Your nickname, username and email address are displayed, followed by a text field where you insert your email if you’re making changes. The next two fields are for typing in a new password and then re-typing it to confirm the change.

A dropdown menu exists for changing the display language of the Pixiv website. Currently, you are only able to choose between Japanese and Chinese.

The following section is where you can enable the display of adult content. You must first confirm that you are 18 years of age. The first radio button is “yes” and the second is “no”. After confirming this, you can choose whether or not you wish to view 2 levels of adult content while browsing. The first is R-18 (Adult Content), the second is R-18+G (Adult and Gore Content). The first radio button selection will enable that content and the second will disable it. In my sample image, R-18 is set to enabled and R-18+G is set to disabled.

The final page section has 15 blank text fields where you can insert the user IDs of any Pixiv members who you don’t want to be able to follow you or see any of your Pixiv contents. Chances are pretty good you won’t ever need to use this.

Profile Details

The second tab under site options is for setting up your profile. Under this tab are several subsections, the first of which is for your primary profile details. The first and most important text field is where you put in your desired nickname. This can be anything you want it to be and it’s the name by which people will know you on the website. It doesn’t have to be unique; only your username does. Your nickname can be up to 15 characters long. Under that, you can input the URL of your personal website, and then a list of personal tags (tags that you plan to use frequently) separated by spaces.

There’s a variety of information that you supply via checkboxes and drop-down menus. This includes your sex, blood type, country, birth year, birthday and occupation. Follow the image as a guide and take note that all of those pieces of information come with a customizable privacy setting to their right. On the image, I’ve set 3 pieces of information on 3 different settings so that you can see which setting is which.

If you’d like to supply contact information for Skype or an Instant Messenger of some sort, you can do that in the next section, but I opted to enter my Twitter info. Insert whatever you’re comfortable with, or nothing at all. The blue text link right underneath it will add another text field, so if you want, you may supply all of your different contact methods.

A large box at the bottom is meant for writing a short biography of yourself or an introduction. If you can, write a little bit about yourself in Japanese.

The last field is for inserting your circle.ms info. If you aren’t a member of a doujinshi circle, then you don’t need to worry about this.

Profile Image

The next subsection of profile editing is for your profile image. This is the avatar that represents you across the site. You can upload more than one and switch between them, but I only have one uploaded here in my sample screenshot. It’s fairly straight-forward; just be aware that you can’t use an animated gif as your avatar unless you have a Pixiv Premium account.

Work Environment

The Work Environment subsection is a fun way to let everyone know where and how you work on your art. Of course, if you aren’t an artist, some of this information won’t apply to you. If you are, great! You can put in information such as your type of computer, monitor, tablet, scanner, printer and more. There’s even a space to put in the music you like to listen to while working and what sort of knick-knacks you keep on top of your work desk.

Profile Design Options

Profile Design is one of Pixiv’s newly added features. It allows you to customize the look of your profile background with colors or a background image. It’s very basic, and if you choose not to use it, you can just leave this page alone, as it’s set not to display a background image by default. Once you’re done with this page, that’s it for the subsections of the profile tab, so click on the next site setting tab at the top.

Notification Email Settings

This small page is simply for specifying when you want Pixiv to send you notification emails. Currently, there are only two options. One is for notifying you when you get a private message and the other is for notifying you when a piece of your artwork makes it into one of the rankings. Unless you’re a very active Pixiv member, you’re probably not going to be getting any of these emails. Personally, I just leave them on.

stacc! Feed Options

The next tab is for another nice new feature on Pixiv called the stacc! feed. It’s basically an activity feed of what you and others do on Pixiv. It makes Pixiv more like a social network, so you can see when your friends bookmark an image, submit new work, add a new favorite artist, or anything else. This page is where you set up what activities you want your personal feed displaying and what you want to see while browsing other people’s activities. If you want to see when your friends add adult artwork to their favorites, you’ll have to set that up here, otherwise it’s turned off by default. [This is a separate setting from the overall ability to view adult artworks on the website; that setting can be modified in the first tab we discussed (User Info).] While logged in to Pixiv, the location of your stacc! feed is http://www.pixiv.net/stacc/.

Pixiv Widget

Finally, we come to the “blog parts” tab, which Japanglish for the Pixiv flash widget that you can embed on your blog or website. There’s different viewing options, like displaying your personal artworks or your bookmarked images, which you choose from and then copy/paste the code that shows up in the text box below. Be aware that if your blog host doesn’t approve of flash widgets or only lets you use pre-approved flash widgets, the code won’t work for you. If you host your own website though, it won’t be a problem.

Following the blog parts tab, there is a Pixiv Premium tab, but I’m not going to go over that. I don’t have a Premium account and I don’t plan on getting one in the near future, in part due to the difficulty of signing up for one while being overseas.

That’s it for modifying your Pixiv site options. I hope that everyone can enjoy the new and improved features that are available to you. In the future, I’ll write more about browsing the newly designed Pixiv and hopefully clear up any information that has been made obsolete in my older tutorials.