The worst pun ever! But I figured these two drawings can drive a point nonetheless:

Some years ago, I never considered myself a good teacher when someone comes to me and asks for help, but now I realize that I just never really wanted to be a teacher who didactically teaches people how to draw something. Unfortunately, that was all I knew back then. But the truth is that I'd much rather share what I've learned to give context to what people already know, and in doing that, try to remove the unnecessary absoluteness of any one art style... which just makes sense for me, and I guess for many other people who can appreciate the intricacies of animation and comicbook genres. Of course, they all share many characteristics, just as all rabbits have long ears... but each specie, and even each individual rabbit has little differences that needs a patient eye to notice. Absoluteness is not for the form of manga art... or any art.

It's Fuu from Samurai Champloo. It's weird 'cause I caught a few glimpses of this anime some years ago... but I never really got to appreciate it in its context. Not many people also realize the facts of my lifestyle right now, for the most part of the past four years, I have been without (convenient) access to a TV. And a few years before that, as far as I can remember, I kind of lost the feel of watching TV, probably joining a few million others from proximal generations who grew up in front of a monitor. But that's that.

Just a month ago, my brother told me about the show, The Boondocks... whose art supervisor is apparently none other than LeSean Thomas, who has his own DA account and who I've been watching for quite a few months already. You guys probably know more about the show than I do, but I can't help but make that comparison in art and theme between Cartoon Network's nasty, irreverent American comedy anime, and Dai Sato's anime about a girl, two dudes with swords and lots of decapitation.

The Boondocks seems suspiciously inspired by the latter. First of all, the hiphop music is a dead giveaway for a comparison. The jagged art style is also something to look out for, especially the eyebrows. Man. Those eyebrows. I mean, that's also typical of Dai Sato's work, as you may also know some of his works like Ergo Proxy and Witch Hunter Robin.

And while it's kind of clear that Japanese can never pull off hiphop in the same way real African Americans can, I just really have to say that whoever conceptualized and directed Samurai Champloo were a bunch of insane people who made a show that's so weird that it's actually awesome.

Of course, these two are trying to do two different things. I think The Boondocks is trying to spit on the face of common notions of propriety, and I think that's cool. Samurai Champloo just tries to be really weird and badass... which is kinda normal for Japanese titles but doesn't really get old for me... I mean... so far, it doesn't. (No, I don't think Naruto and Dragonball count as weird and badass.)

But here's the thing: I'm talking about a spirit of art style here, and there's something abuot Dai Sato's work that exemplifies a point that I made to a friend who was asking me for drawing advice. I looked at this person's art and it was obvious that discipline and patience were there. And those are two undoubtedly important values to have as an artist, but those values belong to one of at least two larger traits to balance.

Discipline and Patience belong to a category. These are needed so the artist can concentrate and control his/her lines and strokes. These are also necessary for an artist to be able to notice the little differences between styles and the proportions in the human figure.

But another category, usually overlooked by beginners for on reason or another, is a crazy and out-of-this-world aspect that allows artists to generate ideas of weird poses, angles and exaggerated perspectives. It allows artists to visualize weird designs, thought-provoking concepts and typically "let loose" forms, and that's exactly something that Samurai Champloo, more than Ergo Proxy and Witch Hunter Robin or most other anime titles I've seen, have shown... I could probably also mention Gurren Lagann which also excels in this category in art and concept (in as far as it tries to take an old genre and twist it around in a classic but also fresh kind of way).

With that, I drew this face... it's a face of some weird dude, not exemplary, but that reminds me that I need to loosen up a bit more. I've been trying to do so slowly, but apparently, it also needs a firm grasp of discipline in a way that, when you lean towards craziness, you're still connected to your discipline with chewing gum and paperclips, and it still looks fantastic.