Hello everyone, Kahotan here! (@gsc_kahotan)
We had a few seating changes in the offices which left me next to a different person! It was pointed out to me by my new neighbour that I mumble onomatopoeia a lot without realizing it… now I feel bad for all those that have sat next to me in the past! （´・ω・`）
In case any of you missed the announcement the other day, Kahotan Blog will be updated by three different members from this month onward! Today I’m going to be having a quick chat with the second person who will joining the Kahotan blog team – updating around two times per month: Chan-shuu!
To summarize how the blog will be updated from this month onward, I will be updating on most weekdays as usual with Suwabe taking over for one day each week! Chan-shuu will be updating on Sundays around 2 times each month as a little bonus blog! ♪
A New Age of Kahotan Blog!
You can find the introduction to Suwabe over here: A New Contributor to Kahotan Blog: Suwabe!, and you can also take a read through her first post on the blog which was put up yesterday! ⇒ Phat Company’s Rin Shibuya!
Anyway, today I’m going to be introducing everyone to Chan-shuu! A member of the Good Smile Company team for a good six years now! ★
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A senior in the planning team with a fresh personality and unknown age. His sparkling eyes are excellent at recreating the transformation scene of a certain Rider. He tends to make use of fairly old school phrases when talking but that didn’t come out much in this interview. Be sure to watch him during live broadcasts for the full experience!
* According to Kahotan
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(｀・ヵ・) “What kind of work do you do at Good Smile Company?”
(・ャ・) “My work is separated into two main areas! The first is my position on the Product Planning Team! I’ve been in the planning team ever since I joined Good Smile Company and have worked on various Nendoroids, Nendoroid Petites, scale figures and even goods!”
(｀・ヵ・)“If I’m not mistaken, the very first figure you planned was… ”
(・ャ・) “Nendoroid Menma! I still think she came out really cute to this day! But I also went a little overboard and ended up adding way too many arm parts… possibly the Nendoroid with the most arms ever!”
△ Nendoroid Menma
(｀・ヵ・) “Plus The fact that Menma’s outfit has such short sleeves means that each different hand part needed to switch out the entire arm to avoid seam marks!”
(・ャ・) “At the time I wasn’t thinking much about ease of playability… I just wanted to add as many parts as possible. Ever since then I’ve been keeping both in mind whenever working on new figures.”
(｀・ヵ・) “The items that you work on that stick on my mind the most are the ORANGE ROUGE items such as the Touken Ranbu -ONLINE- and Haikyuu series, but you also worked on lots of other series such as Girls und Panzer and Date A Live, correct?”
△ The recent Nendoroid Heshikiri Hasabe was the 10th Touken Ranbu Nendoroid!
(・ャ・) “That’s right! I’ve always loved figures even long before I joined GSC – from figures of cute girls to hero figures I always loved posing them and taking photos. ORANGE ROUGE reminds me a lot of when I used to take those photos as a hobby which makes it so much fun to work on!”
(・ャ・) “Chibi figures like Nendoroids were almost always female figures in my mind in the past, but nowadays male figures fit into the genre just as well! You have to try and keep the cute side as well as their cool side – something that I felt was done really nicely with Nendoroid Toru Oikawa!
(・ャ・) “The invigorating smile that seems to see right through his opponent, a fearless expression to capture his title of ‘Grand King’ and then an expression with his tongue sticking out for a bit more of the cuter side! Most Nendoroids come with three expressions, and this was one that I felt captured a nice range of the character’s personality!”
(｀・ヵ・) “Which other characters have you worked on that you felt worked very well in Nendoroid form?”
(・ャ・) “Recently I would have to say that Nendoroid Hotarumaru came out great! For female characters I would have to pick Yunocchi or Umaru-chan… but there really are so many options that it’s hard to choose!
(｀・ヵ・) “I’m sure you could speak on the topic for ages! But we still need to hear the second part of your work at GSC, so I’m going to have to cut you off here!”
(・ャ・) “Right! My second main job here at GSC is Release Photo Photography!”
(・ャ・) “The ‘Release Photos’ refer to the product photos of the prototype that are placed on the Good Smile Company official website! I’m involved with most of the photos that you see on the site in some way or another!”
(・ャ・) “I direct the angles ans posing of the figures, as well as discussing lighting and other details with the cameraman to ensure that each photo shows off the products as close to the real thing as possible! The above photo of Tsukki was taken many different times with various shadows over his face before we ended up with this one! Figure photography is so much fun!!”
△ Talking the cameraman through on where to focus!
(｀・ヵ・) “You started working on photography direction from around two years ago, right?”
(・ャ・) “Yep. I always have meetings with all the other planning team members where we discuss what poses and angles we should use for the photos… those meetings always get me so passionate for the product that by the time we are actually taking the photos I can’t wait to bring out each and every little charm about them!! I sometimes think I get a little too excited…”
(｀・ヵ・) “I know how you feel!!”
(・ャ・) “Seeing something I planned and helped create be transformed into images and shared around the world really makes me happy! GSC doesn’t release many robotic products so whenever the GSA products come around I always get excited when I finally get them into a certain pose that I was trying to achieve!”
△ GSA Series “New Arhan”
(｀・ヵ・) “I can understand you directing the photography for Nendoroids and action figures… but what happens with scale figures?”
(・ャ・) “If for example the figure was based on an illustration, we would set the lighting and angles to try and recreate the illustration as faithfully as possible. We try to limit the number of photos that we display for each product, so we need to carefully decide which angles and areas we want to show off the most!”
(｀・ヵ・) “Bring out as much of the figure’s charm as possible with a limited number of photos!”
(・ャ・) “In the first place it’s quite hard to determine everything about a figure just from photos, but we definitely try our best to try and recreate the feeling of seeing that figure in person when taking the photos. We really try to ensure that none of the character or figure’s charms are left out of the photos!”
(｀・ヵ・) “You can see Chan-shuu’s photos not only on the product pages, but also on event banners and special sites like the WONDERFUL HOBBY LIFE FOR YOU!! Exhibition Gallery! ♪ Anyway, what do you have to take your mind off of work sometime? Where is your ‘mental oasis’?”
(・ャ・) “At the moment, that would be my Nendoroid Mikazuki Munechika!
(・ャ・) “Every time I see this expression I can feel my stress levels decrease. When things get really busy I also dust him off a bit for an extra level of calm…”
(｀・ヵ・) “I see he is standing on the Nendoroid More Tatami Mat: Green!” ♪
(・ャ・) “Having the tatami mat there adds an extra special feeling to the display with hardly any extra work!”
What will Chan-shuu be writing on the blog?
(・ャ・) “I’ll be writing articles for the blog a few times a week, and most of the articles will most likely be reviews of ORANGE ROUGE items. I’ve always loved taking photos of figures and sharing them with everyone, so I’m looking forward to introducing lots of figures to everyone through the blog! I’m a little nervous, but I’m looking forward to sharing with everyone! See you all soon!!”
△ Yamatonokami Yasusada outdoor photo by Chan-shuu!
I’m sure everyone will love his blogs and that they will have a rather different feel to mine which should be a nice change once in awhile!! Those of you who are interested can also tune into the NicoNico live broadcasts where Chan-shuu often makes appearances to introduce various figures! ★
I hope everyone will come by and read his blogs when they are released on the weekends!
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Snow Miku Season is Here!
What will the 2017 Snow Miku design be?!
That will be decided by the fans! We will be having a special live broadcast next week and will be opening a special site to allow fans to vote for their favorite designs! The live broadcast will also feature a certain special guest from Hokkaido as well as various other Hatsune Miku information!
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Snow Miku Time
Date: 20th May 2016 from 19:00~ JST
URL: http://live.nicovideo.jp/gate/lv262567994
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＼ We hope to see you there!! ／
ヽ(*・ω・)人(・ω・*)ノ
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♥︎ Today’s Date ♥︎
I took this picture in a little room that I made for my nendoroids. I think these two Miku are very cute together!
What is ‘Today’s Date’?
Today’s date is a photo corner featuring figure photos sent in by fans with the theme ‘The Perfect Date’. See the bottom of this post for details on how to take part: Kahotan Post Office
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（ ・∀・） .｡oO（I hope you’re looking forward…)
oノ∧つ⊂）
(（ ・∀・） .｡oO（… to Chan-shuu’s first blog!)
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と_）_））
Planning Team / Kahotan / Twitter ID：@gsc_kahotan
English Updates: @gsc_kevin