Saturday, October 06, 2007

More Parallax

Still looking at that same Jonathan McCalmont post, I'm not entirely sure he recognizes or understands the significance of a studio system, in his discussion of artist's "apprentices." Jim Davis of Garfield fame also has a large staff of "assistants," for much the same reason as many manga-ka do: the assistants do much of the actual work, while the named creator acts as CEO of the operation. This system has been common in strip cartoons for a long time, and has been occasionally used in US comic books as well; it's something that emerges when the economic climate is right for it (and a work's creator is willing and able to expand his operation in those ways).

1 comment:

Jonathan M said...

I did understand but I was talking about something different. The book talks about some mangakas being one-man industries who do produce a lot of stuff on their own. In particular, he mentions the person who employed their mother as an assistant.

I'm familiar with "studios" but I was surprised to hear that apparently, Manga features other kinds of professional working relationships.

Admittedly in some ways they're more demeaning because the assistants evidently act as PAs but I thought it was quite a cute difference and more like a traditional apprenticeship than the studio system used, as you say, in the West.

Not that Jim Davidson's much of an advert for its efficiency.

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