BEWARE: Lengthy message. As some of you may be aware, I'm working on a storyboarding project and making an extremely amateur attempt to make a revamp of Gatchaman for a community college course I'm taking. For lack of better imagination, I'm calling this version "Gatchaman Neo". Eventhough the final piece will only be a 1-2 minutes sorta trailer/teaser-like thingy, as part of the excercise, I have to develop the characters even further than what will actually be shown. Although much of what I have so far remains largely unchanged from the original plot, I have taken a few characterization liberties/tweaks particularly with G5 Ryu and G4 Jinpei. Ryu is now a lesbian and Jinpei is a former refugee. My rationale for making these changes is to contemporize them and hopefully be more appealing/believable to todays audience (I think). Here's the catch. My instructor, being a leftist activist indie filmmaker, is concerned that I not perpetuate negative stereo-types. Actually, it also my intention to do the same while hopefully not sacrificing the the spirit of the original, including the cheese factor. I don't care what anybody thinks, my Gatchaman Neo team is still going to wear numbered T-shirts albeit longer sleeved versions in their civilian attire. Without further a do, here's a lengthy description, so far, of the new team's dynamics with each other (most of it is pretty repetitive of the old and not really new). Please let me know what you think. Gatchaman Neo General Character Dynamics: Generally speaking, the team, largely because of the perils and gravity of their secret occupation as well as the fact that they had spent a significant part of their childhood together in training to become Gatchaman, are a close bonded family. Whatever affects an individual team member also ultimately affects the team as a whole. With the exception of G5 Horned Owl - Ryu, most of the team having been orphaned in their childhoods only really know Gatchaman to be their existing family structure. While at times there are moments of tension between team members and individual selfish acts, if a member is injured, missing or captured, they will go to any lengths to rescue that member even if it means sacrificing themselves as a whole. Dr. Nambu, therefore, serves not only as a director for the team but also as a father figure of sorts. As with most child-parent/youth-elder relationships, the team members share a strong desire to meet Dr. Nambu's expectations and approval, yet they are sometimes at odds with them and his decisions, sometimes as a team and other times as individuals. Another factor in the close bonding of the team are a shared empathy of their sufferings. G1 Ken, the death of his mother at 8 years old and an estranged relationship with his father (who he thinks had already passed away and later learns is alive, only to lose him again at the hands of Galactor). G2 Joe, his witnessing the death of his parents by Galactor when he was 11. G3 Jun, being given up for adoption since birth and never having a true family until Gatchaman, being placed in various institutions up until being brought in by Dr. Nambu. G4 Jinpei, at 6 years old a refugee whom family was killed and country overran by the Galactor. G5 Ryu, having an ongoing tense relationship with her mother and an obligation to have a better role as an older sister to her younger brother, who's getting into gang-related activities. Conversely, as individuals, it is because of their own issues that at times threaten to tear the group apart, especially when they commit acts that conflict with the general interest of the group. Internal Relationships: For the most part, the Gatchaman Neo team members treat each other as brothers and sisters and are usually supportive and protective of one another. Ken and Joe are decently close buddies, as they are the same age and generally share a similar interest in sports and other hobbies. That is up to a point. Joe sometimes chooses to be a loner or is busy chasing tail. Ken is sometimes an introvert himself and when not test piloting or serving in the capacity of Gatchaman, spends his time studying military strategy and other boring occupation associated manuals to constantly improve his knowledge. Job related tensions usually arise over decision making between the two and there are displays of competitiveness at times. Ken being appointed captain of the team by Dr. Nambu sometimes comes off as being distant, cold and sometimes even self-righteous not only towards Joe, but the other team members as well. Joe being driven largely in his desire to avenge his parents, at times feels that Ken is being too uptight "by the book" or too cautious in pursuing Galactor, and on several occasions will act insubordinate to Ken, taking justice into his own hands. Generally these actions on Joe's part come to the dismay of most team members except Jinpei, who sometimes thinks likewise but is generally disciplined enough not to vocalize it in front of everybody. Jun and Jinpei share a close older sister -younger brother relationship. Jun had adopted Jinpei while on an early mission as part of her training in the ISO (International Science Organization). Jinpei also works for Jun at her cafe, "Snack J" when they are civilians and assists her in information gathering aboard the Phoenix (the ship they all ride in and that Ryu pilots). Jun and Jinpei sometimes have areas of light tension over handling of things. Jinpei having been a refugee, a survivor subsisting on little resources, often critiques Jun as well as the rest of the team members at times when he feels something is being wasted or excessive. Jun oftentimes steps in almost being maternal, chiding Joe and especially Jinpei when they smoke cigarettes together. Jun also lays down authority when there are disputes between members to squash them as well as voicing her own opinion which oftentimes is better articulated than the rest of the team members. Jinpei while sometimes differing in opinion from Jun, will ultimately respect and obey her as he sees in her the older sister/mother-figure he has been given. Ryu seeing the relationship between Jun and Jinpei often reflects and hopes to have a similar relationship with her own brother. Ryu and Jinpei also share an older sister-younger brother relationship though in a different capacity than with Jun. Ryu and Jinpei hang out together more so as buddies, playing video games, watching animes, reading comic books, drawing, etc.. Ryu is also a talented illustrator by the way. Ryu although the most philosophical in the group, sometimes feels alienated being the only lesbian on the team (although she sometimes internally suspects that Joe may be bisexual or having tendencies, him being overly macho yet a pretty-boy at the same time) and she is insecure with her weight. She once had a crush on Jun until it was confided that Jun secretly (or obviously) had a thing for Ken and ended up in "the friend-zone". Ryu and Jun are close in the respect that they confide in each other concerns, desires, and issues. Ryu, Jun, and Jinpei are the closest knit of the group than Ken and Joe. Although they all occasionally hang out at Snack J, rarely are they all together except on Gatchaman related activities or missions which have started to become more so lately as Galactor has been increasing its attacks. Finally, there is a suppressed love interest going on between Jun and Ken but both of them are too shy to admit it. It is apparently obvious to the rest of the team, and while occasionally insinuating remarks may come out of Joe and Jinpei, the team is generally respectful about it and it is left to the couple to make something of it. Each member at some point in the series will have some love interest subplot outside of the group. Sorry if I bored you guys to death. I'll look forward to any questions, input, or friskings you might have to offer. Thanks!

It's a very interesting set of ideas... Ryu is an unexpected choice of character to change the gender of. Personality wise, Ryu is far from an extreme of gender behaviour, but as the team's strongman, the changed character description immediately conjures the image of an eastern bloc hormonally treated female athlete to mind. Or to my mind, at least. From there, the addition of lesbianism to the character looks like a honking big negative stereotype. But I suppose it depends on how you present the character. Because I know the background, I'm having trouble seeing past what I know to what you're envisioning. There is a little bit of extra NTT canon, from the onsite adverts rather than the flashy clips. NTT Joe is not much good with computers. If it looks as if Joe is in danger of getting too cool in your description, a lack of computer literacy would bring him back down a bit.

Thanks for your initial thoughts Meridian. Yeah, I am a bit worried that I'm overstepping and setting up my Ryu to be a flagrant insult. Sort of what I have in mind so far, is that the new Ryu is definitely smarter than the original one. She is still big and physically strong but rather than relying on the brutish sumo-like force, she will use judo-aikido-jujitsu-taichi-bagua-like movements to redirect and throw her enemies around and into each other. Just like heavier weighted practitioners of those arts, their bulkiness hides their actual gracefulness and speed. I don't see her as some stereo-typical angry mean butch either. Personality-wise she is very even tempered and considers what people say before responding. Infact, I picture her as the most level-headed in the group, where on several occasions other team members will privately consult her for advice or vent to . As for her lesbianism, I guess it might seem stereo-typical to make her so, just because she is heavier set. My rationale is that I want to take a step towards diversifying the team. Since I wanted to keep the relationship brewing between Ken and Jun, I thought Ryu might be an interesting character to have a gender and sexual orientation change. Just as there are traditionally a disproportionate amount of straight male superheroes, I think it would be cool for gay, lesbian, and more than wafer thin youth to have superheroes too in the context of pop-culture. Of course, I realize I may be patronizing, but I hope not or at least it's not my intention. Eventhough much of the personality traits for the characters I've described most likely won't make it into the end product, it's still an exercise in character development I have to do. Who knows, maybe I'll attempt a fanfic one day. Anyhow, the main point is to make these characters believable. If my Ryu or any of the other characters (outside of the pre-existing ones) are too ridiculous, I'm totally open to revising them. Thanks for the tidbit on the NTT Joe. I may have to use it.

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I think the point is to avoid negative stereotypes, not stereotypes altogether. Because it's true, the Gatchaman team are basically stereotypes. I was going to say that the cultured strongman is a stereotype in itself, but then I realised the only examples I can think off of the top of my head is Beast from the X-men (and 2 bad guys from Jackie Chan and Xaolin Showdown, I don't watch enough telly), and I can't think of any female examples. One thing I would say is that the Neo Ken and Joe are quite stereotypical, in that they are very much fan views of the originals. Ken being all focussed on the disciplined mind (education, research etc) and Joe being all focussed on instinct (chasing pretty girls and revenge) are too much opposite sides of the coin. I think you need to blur the edges of these characters, which is why I previously suggested giving Joe a technical weakness to avoid making him too cool. Ken also needs something to make him more interesting, than duty, reading and memories. In the series he has a fiery temper, worse than Joe's.

Oops. Meant G5-"G3" crush thing! Don't want any lawsuits here.

True. Inevitably some stereo-types will be unnavoidable. You're right Meridian, I just don't want the ones that'll make everyone cringe. I really do like the computer/technical difficulties as a cool-checking device for Joe. How about Ken being something of a perfectionist and even a control freak? A sort of "Do it my way or take the highway" attitude that pisses everyone off. Maybe this psychology has to do with his father never being satisfied with his performance as a child?

What I think. Eeps. You do know that I'm only one person, maybe not even in your intended audience? And that I often disagree with the experts? And I see things differently when reading to analyze -- usually object to things that I'd accept and even enjoy in a normal piece. Oh, and I've done more work with BOTP than with Gatch. But, you asked for it. I'll do you the honour of assuming you want the straight goods. You said campy. I just don't see how to do campy and lesbian and not be derogatory. Gay men are recently famous for making fun of themselves -- to the point where some non-gay people can get away with it. But I don't see that yet for lesbians. Buffy's got a good point about just accepting it as a part of her personality rather than highlighting it. And I agree that the Jun/NeoRyu love bit is tricky -- it would be a big challenge for them to overcome. I'm still uncomfortable around the guys I've had crushes on, and I've been out of circulation for over a decade. Also, you said the girls confide in each other. Do they share anything besides the team? Contrary to popular opinion, women don't bond just because they are women. Sure, we share a lot more then men, but the real bonding has to be based on more. I agree with the minority thing. Most people feel like they're in the minority, at least part of the time, and you've shown that nicely, along with the fact that they really do belong. Ryu regaining confidence as the show progresses. In two minutes? Back to the campy thing: I don't see anything campy in the rest of your description. It's all rather serious. For all of the silly-science and the "kids more capable than adults" thing, Gatchaman dealt with some very serious themes. They snuck them in underneath the stuff that sucked us in, but it's the serious themes that keep drawing us back as adults. We wouldn't care so much about the characters without that depth. The name Ryu kept pulling me back to the old picture. And I'm pretty sure it translates as "Dragon". May I suggest you change it? You've got a lot of background here -- too much to put in a two-minute piece. I know it's just background, and the extra layer in the background will definitely help the finished product, but you'll have to pick and choose carefully which parts to actually show. Trailer / teasers often don't show the deeper issues -- they go for the stuff they think the audience wants, so the audience will pay to see the rest. And if you change it to a mini-adventure, there's only so much you can do in two minutes. I'd like to see you flesh all this out into a fic sometime. There's a lot of good stuff. Hope this helps, Cricket

Heh, Neo-Ryu being known as Ryu keeps confusing me too. Maybe Neo-Ryu could be named Ryuko or Ryoko?

Yeah, you folks are right. A Ryuko or Ryoko would be more appropriate. I really appreciate all of your inputs. They are all helping me to rethink the characterizations and over-generalizations in my own head. I'm starting to think the lesbian characterization may not be such a good idea after all. If it can't be pulled off in a believable or non-offensive way, I think it should be put by the way side.

I don't see anything campy in the rest of your description. It's all rather serious. For all of the silly-science and the "kids more capable than adults" thing, Gatchaman dealt with some very serious themes. They snuck them in underneath the stuff that sucked us in, but it's the serious themes that keep drawing us back as adults. We wouldn't care so much about the characters without that depth.

Cricket...actually, I have a similar agenda. I want the best of both worlds too between seriousness and campiness. I know it's a lot to try and tackle considering I've never written a story before and much less ever told a good one. One of the things that impresses me the most about Gatchaman is as you mention, the fact that it was able to sneak in all these serious issues yet still be an entertaining kids cartoon. Not that I'm aware of all the latest animes and cartoons currently available, but I can't think of any animation series that's dealt with such serious themes of late (i.e. the environment, militarism, teen relationships, etc.) at least in one series even in a goofy way -- well, maybe South Park. Okay, I thought I'd finally start putting out some imagery. Here's a first rough sketchings of G5 "Ryuko". Let me know what you folks think. I still have a long way to go. Thanks.

You've got a lot of background here -- too much to put in a two-minute piece. I know it's just background, and the extra layer in the background will definitely help the finished product, but you'll have to pick and choose carefully which parts to actually show. Trailer / teasers often don't show the deeper issues -- they go for the stuff they think the audience wants, so the audience will pay to see the rest. And if you change it to a mini-adventure, there's only so much you can do in two minutes.

Cricket, definitely most of these details won't even make it into the final piece. It is largely an exercise to figure out or justify why the characters act, react, and say things the way they do. Maybe it'll just show in their facial expressions when their doing all their flashy moves and when their hitting those model poses. Here's the cheesy clichŽ premise for this final project I'm toying with so far. I'm warning all of you, it's pretty awful at this point and you'll think I'm on crack. I want to illustrate (briefly in 2 minutes max!) that The Galactor (not me, unfortunately) is behind all this chaos in the world --politics, war, corruption, etc. and the timing is becoming ripe for the evil organization to start making open assaults on humanity. Why, if everything has been working as planned secretly? Because they want to finally show off their cool costumes and mecha, duh. Quick flashes of politicians declaring martial law, images of war, Viagra commercials, and people looking numb while staring at their t.v.'s all the while Galactor mechas are hovering over cities and then you see the evil grinning lips of Berge Katse. Next, Dr. Nambu while looking out of the glass window in the Coral Reef Base with his back facing (but you can see his frontside reflection on the glass) the Gatchaman Neo team assembled for their first real mission, starts giving this corny moral speech about how if things were his way there wouldn't be a need for a Gatchaman team. He's trying to keep their egos in check while at the same time ramping them up to go kick some Galactor butt. Go figure. While Nambu is giving his lecture you see flashes of standard Gatchaman fair of the team fighting the Galactor goons firing their machine guns, Ken's Birdrang goes flying, the team showing off their personal weaponry skills, the team doing their various formations including their trademark Whirlwind Fighter maneuver. Quick cameo appearances of the Red Impulse, Devil Stars, and Blackbirds. The God Phoenix battling mechas, turning into Firebird mode. Finally the "G" logo flashes with "Gatchaman Neo" underneath it as you see a silhouette of the team standing (kinda like the Justice League) with some advertisement saying the show begins airing at such and such time on such and such channel. Taaadaaa!!! Maybe I need to start watching my caffeine intake. If anybody would rather see something else or has any other suggestion that would improve on this, please donate your opinion! Thanks.

My next impression? I like where you're going with this. Definitely a teaser / promo rather than a mini-movie. Your image of NeoRyu is good. Plump, but not so much that she can't move when and how she needs to. I see you've already taken the best advice I was ever given -- take the line you love the most and delete it. That action repeats right up till final release. But the things that it makes room for are usually worth it. Many writers use a "bit bucket" approach. If they can't use something, they put it in the bit bucket for use on another project. Much easier than saying goodbye to it forever. I like the classic Nambu in front of the window shot and the conflicting goals of his speech. Remember that this is your piece, not ours. Don't let our limited imaginations prevent you from trying something. Often, we're trying the ideas on for size and deciding we couldn't pull it off, not that it can't be done. Enjoy! Cricket

You guys are the best! Really, I feel like I've hit a gold mine participating on this message board. I'm surprised you all aren't charging me for your literary consultations yet. :wink: Er...not that I could really afford it. *grin* I'm also surprised you're not all puking your guts out having to weed through all my indulgences. I dunno, seems to me like everyone who's contributed to this dialogue have thus far made good and useful points as well as doing a pretty good job of stating their reasonings. Hopefully the end product of all this effort will be something worthwhile and at least make for a decent grade. Cricket and Meridian will definitely get credit for "Ryuko" and Buffy for helping me consider the cultural context of things I don't feel at all like I'm being prevented from using creative license. Some boundaries are good as part of the refinement process. I definitely think it's a good bargain to let go of something that's really not working, than trying to force it to work and it still not work. At least I'm talking to you all that have an interest in this shared subject. I hope none of you are holding anything back. Honestly, if you think something is way too stupid or plain sucks, that's what I'm here for too. It's work but I'm having fun for sure.

Galactor, I really like your Ryuko sketches And I like your overview of what's going to happen in those 2 minutes. It'll be interesting to see how it all fits in... I really hope you're going to let us all see the storyboards after you're done with them. The attached pic here is of the NTT vehicles and weapons, brightened up to make them visible of course. I think that your Ken, with the addition of being a control freak and pissing everyone off, risks being unable to function as a leader. Because, all these guys are emotionally close and have a few years of working together, and if he is obnoxious then it doesn't matter how brilliant he is, they won't do what he says. Somebody who has that much of a stick up his own ass might be a tactician, but wouldn't be a leader. I think you need to give him some more positive qualities, things that will mean the others are willing to follow him and respect his judgement, rather than do what they're told and resent him for it.

Holy moley! Meridian, I think you've just given me a new purpose in life. I'm dropping everything I'm doing now so I can go to Japan, join a yakuza organization with clout, and perhaps in in a couple of decades move up in rank to become a boss (if I haven't been wacked yet) to where I can coerce Tatsunoko to make a new Gatchaman series. But most likely, I'll keep telling myself to play the lottery so that when I win the super big pay off, I'll hire the studio to make a Gatchaman movie. Forget all that other nonsense about owning a nice house, sending kids to college, early retirement, leaving behind an inheritance, donating to some humanitarian cause. What made me think those would be good ideas? I had no idea they went that far to develop mecha for the NTT. Thanks a gazillion. Do you know if the NTT anime was produced by Tatsunoko or was it jobbed out to another studio? I just visited the Tatsunoko site and they have a link to what appears to be a new anime www.thekaras.net , that makes me think by the looks of the character designs, perhaps the NTT anime ads were done by Tastunoko. Yes, I promise to share my storyboard illustrations with you all. It's the least I can do for all the help you folks have been giving me. The end product for this course is actually supposed to be an "animatic". Basically a storyboard synced up with sound. It's a process sometimes employed by animators before they go into full on production to see if their scenes and sounds are appropriate for each other. Since I can't afford voice actors I'll use English subtitles and some cheesy electronica music. I'll eventually have to find someplace to host a potentially 25Mb QuickTime file so you all can see it. Who knows, perhaps if time and motivation permits in the near future, a short film animation may be in the works. Then I can enter it into some indie film festivals and that may be another route to start building pressure for Tatsunoko make a new Gatchaman. Excuse me...I have to go pray to my Gatchaman shrine now. Good points on not making Ken too much of a prick. How about if he's a good cook? Maybe everyone can put with his shite because they know in the end they'll get a good meal out of it.

... without even consulting my other half, Bird Go will be pleased to host the QuickTime movie if you wish. we've got the space and bandwidth and Ninja-Sam will probably hire you on the spot to storyboard the concept for an entire feature length Gatchaman movie. we've got the thought to do a small movie ourselves, using dolls and cue cards (like the old 20's movies) but there are too many other projects on the boil right now to even think about planning that one. eventually, though, I am sure we'll get to it - Sam is remarkably long tracked. re/voice actors - who needs to hire? if you actually want voice overs i'm sure there are only about sixteen dozen slavering fans here and on other sites who'd be happy to give it their all to a microphone in the dead of night so their families won't find out what the hell they're doing. the only difficulty is see is the two male voices for Ken and Joe since the fanbase is predominantly female, but there might be somebody out there with a deep enough voice or the right set of chromosomes.... ask around.

Many of the slavering fans are married and have spouses who are sufficiently geeky enough or birdranged enough to lend their voices. And there ARE a few guys floating around.

Sugoi na! Arigato gozai-masu! Sounds good to me and I'd be honored if you post my project when it gets completed Lyon. Very generous. BTW, as if you don't already know, your Bird Go totally rocks! Ninja-Sam might want to hold off and see my final product before bringing me on board to do a feature length Gatchaman movie, although I do appreciate the gesture. I realize I was getting a bit ahead of myself in the last message. Call me a chicken, and sorry to dissappoint, but I think I'm going to hold off on the voice thing for this particular project, especially since it's my first time doing something of this nature. It'll be hard enough for me to sync up the cheesy electronica music track with the images. I do think it's a good idea however for a possible future project and if folks want to start coming up with dialogue and recording their voices that would be awesome. It could be like a Gatchaman/BoTP version of American Idol. Badumpbump!

Originally posted by the_galactor Sugoi na! Arigato gozai-masu! Sounds good to me and I'd be honored if you post my project when it gets completed Lyon. Very generous. BTW, as if you don't already know, your Bird Go totally rocks!

cough ...we pleases to aim? besides, its very easy to be free with Sam's server space! i am not the one paying the bills after all. grin. seriously though, this kind of creative effort needs all the encouragement we can muster - i applaud your vision, shake my head at your naive yet winsome enthusiasm and hope feverently that you actually COMPLETE this project of yours. am willing to settle for just the sketches, even! your Ryoko was/is very cool, i am happily waiting for the rest of the tidbits to be thrown.

Alright folks, here's my first rendition of Dr. Nambu. I "borrowed" heavily off of one character on that thekaras.net site.

First rendition of G4 Jinpei. NTT and Shinji from Neon-Genisis Evangelion combo, sorta. Still have some proportional issues to work out.

First rendition of G3. Hard to get away from the heavy NTT influence, but oh well... enjoy!

These pics are great. I have a hankering to see them in colour, but that's just because I like colour. And I want proof that Neo-Nambu isn't going to be wearing pink like OAV Nambu I know a guy with a deepish voice who could do a reasonable Joe if it wasn't for the strength of his welsh accent....

Thanks Meridian! Yeah, colour /color will make all the difference, I agree. Folks are more than welcome to toy around with these images, do what you like and have fun with them, colour them in, manipulate them, etc.. I would be more than happy to see what people come up with. Ultimately I will decide the on my own final execution of course.It's all fair community property as far as I'm concerned. I just wanna make something cool! Momentarily I'm just spewing (not nearly as quickly as I'd prefer) these sketches out but the following phase ideally would be to refine and develop more of a style consistency akin to an anime/manga than Top Cow's BoTP comic book style. Tall order for sure, and it'll remain to be seen how truthful/successful I can pull it off -- more so in the character designs than the mecha (I now really wish I had taken basic industrial design and mechanical drawing courses) Hopefully, once this is nailed down, I'll colour them in. The NTT version I feel was very successful in updating the original style while still retaining identifiable characteristics of the old version. Fashion-wise (aside from their numbered T-shirts) I'd like them too look more contemporary young hipsters from Tokyo but not necessarily over-the-top like in those FRUiTs magazines. I'm really struggling with developing Ken and even more so Joe. I'll probably post a couple designs especially of civilian Joe together and have folks vote/feedback on them. So far as Joe is concerned, I'm toying with the idea that he's part Brazilian too so I might try to work in some ethnic features. I've been looking at current Japanese boy band images and looking at the personalities featuring the "bad boy' look as a reference. Sorry if I'm tampering with peoples religion, I understand some people's attachments to the original Joe. I think it would be totally cool if your guy with the strong welsh accent did Joe, and even better if he tried to pull a Japanese accent on top of it ! Part of me truly relishes in absurdities and maybe more, the better.

Thing about original Joe is that he's italian, no japanese genetic heritage at all. I'm not sure my friend could manage an italian accent, let alone japanese though. Depends whether you want your Joe to be comic relief or not Whatever visual updates you come up with, I'm sure will be very interesting. Ken, I don't know. I get the feeling from the personality that you're drawing up for him that you don't feel much empathy with the character. I think that if you can get either his personality or his civillian appearance sorted out, it will help you with the other. Canonically, he is a good looking guy who seems to have no idea that he's attractive, maybe that's worth working with?

Once again Meridian, you are right on the money. For some reason I had it in my head that Joe was Italian and Japanese because of the "Asakura" name (unless that is also some provincial Italian name I'm unaware ). Thanks for correcting me. The part Brazilian thing popped into my head because the largest Japanese population outside of Japan is supposed to be in Brazil. Not that it necessarily makes sense at this point, but something to play with. You're right that I haven't developed enough of an empathy for Ken yet as I haven't spent enough time figuring out who he is. I agree with trying to make him a good looking guy and I am hoping by using a reverse process as you say, drawing him first and then come up with his story. Please correct my understanding, but isn't the whole part about his relationship with his father, Red Impulse, and his father's ensuing death the things that basically drive Ken's story? What is interesting about Ken before this tragedy? He seems to be a nice enough guy and Jinpei (the original version) refers to him as "older brother" and I love the part about Ken always being broke and owing Jun money for running up the tab at Snack J. Perhaps if I stick to the original story-line Ken is someone very warm and giving but then gets very distant after his father's death as he is dealing with all the issues associated with that and going nuts. His unconscious salvation therefore depends on him reconciling this and realizing that the team is his real family. Another guess on my part.

I think Joe has the name Asakura either because Nambu changed his name and there's a plothole in ep 81, or because Tatsunoko didn't do any research. You're right on the basic character development story for Ken. But that's not all of Ken. His father didn't die until halfway through the series - episode 52 out of 105. I think there are 4 episodes in total that deal directly with him finding his father and the aftermath of him dying (there's one in the 60s where Katse tries to use his memories of his father against him). Before that he'd meet up with Red Impulse on an irregular basis, I think maybe there are 5 or 6 episodes where he appears. Then there's a couple or so other episodes where he mentions his father and a couple more episodes after RI dies where he meets up with other members of the Red Impulse team, but there's nothing said about his father in those episodes. He's not relentlessly searching for the man. His relationship with his father is significant, but it doesn't completely define him, because he spends so much more of the time dealing with other things. He's at his weakest when dealing with his father because he's so distracted, and Red Impulse's personality is so overwhelmingly dominant and his fighting and tactical skills are so incredibly good, and it's unfair to base his whole character on that. Ken's not warm and giving either, really, come to that. Take a look here on Wendy Dinsmore's site - she goes into much better detail on Ken than I ever could. http://www.chronicsite.com/gatchaman/characters.html And here on Carolyn Kaufman's, in the Characters section. http://www.vacuform.com/Gatchaman/GatchMain.htm The problem with basing a character entirely on their backstory, is that they can come out very hollow and improbable. For example, Joe has been written in fanfic many, many times as a vengeful psychopath who's out to kill anything and everything and is constantly fighting with Ken and chasing women and drunk at every opportunity and generally being the most totally badass asshole imaginable. Look at the first few Top Cow comics for a bit of that one. But that character could never work as part of a team, it's Joe's backstory dominating the writer so much that what comes out is a character that cannot function. People ask for information on the backstories of Jun and Jinpei and Ryu and are staggered that there is so little - the fact that they don't have some kind of historical motivation doesn't stop them having engaging and distinct personalities. I'm terrible at character analysis, I know what feels wrong but I can't tell you what to do to make it right again. All I can really say is that Ken was the main hero in a show initially pitched to 6 year olds, and that Tatsunoko were really quite surprised that people started to form an attachment to Joe as well since he wasn't initially meant to take up any more viewer affection than Jun, Jinpei or Ryu. Ken is a great fighter, a remarkable lateral thinker, a risk taker, and 18 years old. His team follow him because they trust him, not because they'll get in trouble if they don't. He has charisma, but I just can't define why. I wish I could....

Ken only knows that Red Impulse is his father for about five minutes -- a hug and then a sucker-punch so Daddy can go off and die. The rest of the time, RI is just a really good pilot. I think (see the links Meridian gave to be sure, esp Carolyn's episode summary) that they meet RI for the first time during the series. As in, there's no prior relationship. (BOTP, the dialogue as to how long they've known RI is inconsistent. One episode, they meet. Another, it looks like they've been friends forever.) I agree with Meridian about not letting their history take over from the character. History influences character, but does not define it. I know some people who let one moment of misery define their whole lives, but others who keep getting tossed down and just jump up again. (Hmmmm, maybe it takes getting tossed a lot to realize you have to stand depite it? Or maybe it's only those who get up again that can be tossed again?) And, sometimes it doesn't matter why they're out there. What matters is the moment. When is this project gonna be done? I'm assuming before the end of the course.

Yep, the first time they meet Red Impulse, Ken leaves the team to follow him because he thinks RI is the enemy. He has no idea who the man is, although RI knows well enough that Ken is his son and goes a bit soppy at the end, once they're both safely in their separate planes and Ken can't see him. (Actually there is a little pic of RI in the NTT stuff too but the only real difference from the original is that he has a beard) RI has 3 plot functions, I think. 1) he and his team turns up to help Gatchaman save the day when required, and on other occasions turn up in the same place at the same time but can't finish things themselves. Their job is to fight Galactor too. 2) Red Impulse himself (Kentaro Washio) forces Ken to do the "right" thing in his position as leader of Gatchaman. Whether that's by putting Ken through tough training that gives him the answer to a problem (rather than telling him the answer himself, since Ken has to be able to think for himself through all kinds of crises), or beating his son to a pulp to make him stop wallowing in his own misery and take positive action. 3) to die and create an emotional crisis for Ken, which eventually allows Ken to grow past his need for an idealised father. Because that's what he misses when RI dies, he doesn't like RI at all although he has a grudging respect for him, and he barely remembers the man from his childhood (the only memory shown in the show is not a pleasant one). He misses the idea of what he thought his father would have been like. And he's probably quite angry that his real father was around all the time and nobody told him.

Once again thank you both for your insightful comments and also for the background on the Ken-RI relationship. I'll definitely have to read up on those links thoroughly soon enough. I think we are all on the same page about a character's history not being the sole component for defining who they are, at least we should hope not. Meridian, you've been doing a good job of pointing out the logical gaps in my underdeveloped Ken and Joe. I guess I've been saving these guys for almost last because they are harder for me to figure out. I haven't made them my personal buddies yet. As to when this project is due, December 17th is official date when I'm to present it to my class. All this character development stuff is primarily an exercise. As far as my assignment is concerned I don't necessarily have to explain a whole lot about each character, but it is a nice tidbit to offer in the event should anyone ask and also to show to some degree that I engaged a little bit in the thought process of character design. I'm assuming most of my classmates and my instructor are going to be more concerned about the visual execution, how well it communicates as a trailer-ish thing, and probably ask me about methods I used to put the whole thing together.

Given that I haven't provided enough information, which Neo Joe appeals to you most (or repulses you least)? Thanks!

B's face / expression, and the hair a mix of A and B -- longer, but not dread-locks. (hard to tell from the sketch, but I got a sense of dread-locks from B.)

Thanks Cricket. I'll give your suggestion a try. Here are the actual and better drawn anime headshot references I was using so you have a better idea. First scary looking guy starting from the left is from "Samurai Champloo"second from "Witch Hunter Robin", and third from "Licensed by Royal".

for me, it would be B. A looks like he got his hair styled by the simple expedient of sticking his finger in the nearest light socket, and as for C, there is NO way Joe in any incarnation would wear a headband. shades of Richard Simmons, anyone? i could see Neo-Joe with slightly shaggier hair than B, with the same length, and a chunk (not all) of it tied back in a queue. /waves hands in the air, describing. re: Ken's Plot Function - Mrrrridian and Cricket have pretty much covered the bases with the Red Impulse thing so I guess I have nothing of serious interest to add. my comment for you on the character of Ken is that he's a bit of a contradiction in terms ... he's aloof sometimes and disarmingly engaging at others. he's got an active sense of humor, a smile to break your heart but can turn around and slaughter an entire squadron of Galactor without apparent remorse or guilt. he expects those around him to toe the company line, but often breaks it himself to follow his own agenda. And he makes mistakes, sometimes serious ones. he'll throw himself in front of the bullet to save a stranger but he'll stand aside as well, if saving the stranger would mean sacrificing the greater goal. one episode, early on that really sold me on Ken was when a small child had something he needed and would only give it up if Ken promised to save his (the child's) father. And Ken said he would, when he already knew the kid's father was dead. that said a lot to me about what Ken was willing to do in order to win the war.

Cool. Thank goodness you folks are here to keep me from making to many hideous liberties. Good to have a fresh pair of eyes

That lie to the kid, though, wasn't something he wanted to do. And he came back and stood there while the kid tried to beat him up. Sort of penance for his lie. Knowing that his own father died while he was young -- definitely saw him sympathizing with the child. He was being an adult, knowing from personal experience that the kid needed to punch something. Very moving.

You guys are definitely making me more interested in Ken. Okay, here's the next round of Neo Joe. I tried combining the hairstyles but then it looked pretty glam-rock 80's and I was thinking the guy's face look too dead-pan expressionless, so I "borrowed" Spike's face from "Cowboy Bebop" and toned down the hair a bit. Please let me know your thoughts. Domo.

that looks close to Original Joe (in terms of hairstyle). i believe you'd have a winner with the Original Fans, but those of us that were holding out for more JRock influence are doomed to disappointment. grin.

Yeah, you're right Lyon. I was initially looking at J boy bands to try and find something edgier for Joe. He looks too "nice" right now. I keep thinking the actor Takeshi Takano with this round. Any JRock recommendations? Just as long as they look cooler than a J version of The Cure or Marilyn Manson.

Yep, I'm all for the hair. This neo-Joe looks a bit, sort of, innocuous, kinda like Ross from Friends? I think Joe needs to look rougher, scarier, but not in a Cure or Marilyn Manson way because Joe doesn't need the clothes or accessories to look mean. I think he'd have a practical look, since he's probably not averse to getting under his car whatever he's wearing. I have long thought that this guy, Dennis Waterman, would be a good real life match for Joe if he was younger. Unfortunately I can't find any younger pictures of Mr Waterman. Looks like he'd happily hit whoever dared to spill his coffee but he's still attractive. He'd need 20 years taken off him though...

No offense but , I dunno, looks like Berge Katse would have his way with this fella even 20 years younger... except perhaps if you knocked his coffee as you say. I do get your point of looking like he isn't affraid to get his hands dirty though (Neo Joe that is).

Okay, Neo Joe round 4. I have a feeling it's more in the facial features, the eyes in particular that I'm reaching for than the hair issue now. Stylistically, I'd like to steer away from the traditional Joe's broader nose, cheekbone, and jaw line structure. I know it's pretty much a given that you can't please everyone especially when it comes to Joe, but oh well...here we go... This time I referenced Takehiko Inoue's manga "Vagabond".

Here's Inoue's Miyamoto Musashi "Vagabond" examples...

oooh, I like the version 4 of Joe.

Yikes, I recommended an OXO man? I never knew he did that. Anyway, yes, I reckon version 4 of Joe is good. A guy who, when you look at him, you don't know if he's good or bad. Yes, I like Joe 4.

/raises her hand with the crowd.

G1-Ken!!!

Ooh, yes. Any chance of a close up of his face?

Neo Ken's head is a combination of characters Kiba and Tsume from an anime series called "Wolf's Rain". As you can see, I'm definitely not above "appropriating" for my own purposes. I'm still a Galactor after all.

Looks good. I don't know which of those guys is which, but the top one has an intense stare that I think is very much Ken.

I agree. I like the intensity of the character Kiba's (on top) eyes. I exchanged the face with the Tsume (below) character mostly because I felt perhaps the Kiba character looks maybe 5 years younger (bigger eyes and fuller face) than the Version 4 Joe. The picture I have in my mind is that both Ken and Joe are at least 19 to early 20's. Here's some links to Wolf's Rain images: About the show Images Japanese Bandai site If the general concensus is that a Kiba face would be better than a combo Kiba-Tsume face, I can easily adapt. Thanks.

Almost color time. Here's the team together. Still have to make Katse and a host of other supporting characters.

All good stuff I'm so tempted to also have a go at colouring (colouring is my hobby! ) but that would only confuse things, and I never know how my time is going to work out... For this storyboard, how many separate pictures are you going to have to do?

Yes! Colour your hearts content! I'd love to see what people come up with. At your leisure of course. Hard for me to say at this point how many individual pictures for the storyboard...maybe somewhere in the neighborhood of 25 to 30? We'll see...

Originally posted by the_galactor Yes! Colour your hearts content! I'd love to see what people come up with.

god, don't tempt me! i have enough things on my plate already but i have to admit i'm itching to take a stab at it myself, particularily those cool uniform designs. grin. a lyon's work is never done. c'mon meridian, it'll be fun!

coloring when i should have been doing so many other things...

Very nice... gold and blue. I like the ripped jeans.

Oooh, nice color combos Lyon! What a world of difference. I really like what you did with subtle line definitions using the analogous coloring.

Lyon said: coloring when i should have been doing so many other things

More! More!

Okay, finally...a new version of Katse-sama. Aside from other work/study/life obligations, I've been jumping around a bit downloading and screen-capturing pre-existing Gatchaman material and printing them out as storyboard boxes to help give me better direction on my own project. Anyway, something new to color...

I like this a lot. He looks like some kind of emperor of bondage. Ole' Kinky indeed I can imagine all those buckles and straps are going to get to be a bit of an effort to draw after a while... Far more attractive than the NTT version though and definitely a big improvement.

Thanks Meridian. Yeah, I'm thinking of generally giving the Galactor an S&M/bondage theme (minus any nipple and genitalia exposure) but keep it rated "PG". So how does Katse change so quickly in and out of guises in a flash of the cape?......velcro underneath! Plus she/he can always order some goon to assist.

clothes changes are the magic of anime rather than RL. I found his face not quite sinister enough, and the ears / glasses almost comical. Won't take much to make them sinister, though. Maybe shrink the ears a tad and change the expression. (Says the person who has trouble drawing stick figures.) Loved the rest of it. Definitely not a guy I'd bring home to dinner.

Hmm....I'm not sure if more sinister is what I'm looking for. I don't necessarily mind if the Galactor characters are a bit laughable and ridiculous as that's sorta the point too. I also want to avoid Katse looking too akin to Batman or Wolverine. Character-wise, I tend to envision Katse as an article from an anime magazine (Protoculture Addicts, issue 67) describes as, "Arrogant to a fault, Katse is partly tragic, mostly vicious and cruel, with hints of class and at times extremely humourous.". Here's some more evil renditions...

grin .. i'd give him droopy ears, myself.

Call him Batboy then Lyon? Buffy eyeballs the choices for her own vote. Ooh ooh Pick " D ", Pick " D " (You know.... D for doberman)

Yeah, I like D too. But I still like A best, he's so glam. Thing about the original is, that his mask isn't menacing either except for not being able to see the eyes. And OAV Katse, there was a lot more faffing about in the design but not menace. The NTT Katse was just too grotesque, but that was managed through the addition of really bad teeth more than anything else. So A not being menacing doesn't worry me at all. I think Katse is menacing through actions, tone of voice (it wasn't a menacing voice either) and body language, not basic appearance. Although I'm sure my homophobic neighbour would be scared by his constant wearing of lipstick. I wonder if the lack of menace was something Tatsunoko originally did to stop the character from being too frightening for its target audience? He does frightening stuff, all that destroying cities and their entire populations and so on, but they obviously planned in the lighter stuff right from the start. If they had wanted Katse to look menacing they'd have done it, mechs like the mummy and Galactor outfits like Katse's rotting skull look (from the biplane mech episode) show they could have done it if that's what they wanted. On the other hand, now is not then. So I just don't know, maybe more menace and less comedy would be more appropriate given the atrocities that Katse engineers. But I still like A best, followed by D then C (C still has he comedic value, I can't picture D being funny). The only other comment I have is that all the heads look a bit small? It's hard to tell without the body, but maybe they need a bit more width before the collar starts?

Add the lines for shoulders, arms and chest -- right now, it looks like the shoulders are as wide as the collar, which throws the perspective. Also, the neck seems long to me, but I'm no artist.

Whoa, and I thought Joe's character was going to be the toughest to design. Point taken on the perspective/proportions being off, particularly concerning the shoulders. The neck is intentionally exaggeratedly elongated and the head a bit smallish because I had in mind (which I'm unfortunately not going to put in the effort to illustrate at this point as 1) it won't be seen in my final project and 2) I have to keep working on what will be shown) that Katse without the costume will look like a stretched out fashion model. I do have to admit that I have more of an attachment/bias towards A and I do remember your suggestion of tossing out or putting aside certain favoritisms that may be obstacles to particular goals. Here, however, I feel that A (also with Meridian's convincing argument ) comes closer to the criteria described in that magazine article I quoted earlier. As for the issue of an increased menacing look maybe being more appropriate for nowadays, I could be wrong and illogical, but I think for an arch villain there's something more cruel and twisted about being laid waste by somebody in a clownish outfit than a typical demonic one. I've decided I'm going to move ahead and replace A's ears with C's. Again, thank you all for your continued inputs. Really, I'm not trying to shut anyone up here and if you think my choices suck or are going down a wrong path, feel free to say so. I'm so happy to have everyones ongoing active participation.

Oh, don't worry about us being upset that you don't use our ideas. I'm more worried that you'll feel obligated to use them, and lose ownership of your own work. Or try to keep everyone happy -- which is futile. Looking at your work and figuring out what works and doesn't work for me is as much an exercise for me as help for you. Seeing how others view the same things is also good. So, feel free to "use, abuse, or ignore" any of what we say.

Been juggling a bunch of stuff. I've finally given into some temptation and did a quick coloring of a Galactor Goon and Katse.

Very nice Only real comment is that with so much of Katse's outfit being so dark, that I think a lot of detail has got lost in it. Maybe there could be some mid-purple to pick out details and show outlines, things like the edges of that massive collar and so on?

Thanks. Yes, I absolutely agree some highlights on Katse outfit details will be better. I'd also like to play with some accents to give the costume a vinyl or PVC-like appearance.

Devil Star!

One after my own heart! She's so shiny

LOVE IT!!

Thanks. That's sorta the shiny effect I want with Katse when I circle around to it. Hey, I'm going to need all you folk's help with Nambu's semi-short dialogue. The corny speech I mentioned several pages ago where he's giving a humbling yet encouraging message to the team members. I want Nambu to start off saying something like, "If the world were at peace and it were truly up to me, there would never be a need for a Science Ninja Team. But here we are..." I like this guy's, Mark Moore's (BoTP yahoo group member), signature quote from a DC comic but I don't want to steal it word for word. The concise-ness of the quote seems just about right too. "We don't do it for the glory. We don't do it for the recognition. We do it because it needs to be done. Because if we don't, no one else will. And we do it even if no one knows what we've done. Even if no one knows we exist. Even if no one remembers we ever existed." - Kara Zor-El, "Should Auld Acquaintance Be Forgot", Christmas With The Super-Heroes #2, 1989 Thanks for the continued input.

hmmm .... "I could wish that we didn't have to be here. I could wish that I didn't know your names, your faces, anything about you. I could wish that I could pass you on the street and never even look up to know who you are. But we're here because we have to be. Because the world needs us to be. And because each of you has walked through the fire to stand here and give yourself to those who will pass you on the street .. and never know your names. If I have to be here, then I could wish for no better company than yours. You can do this. You will do this. Because it needs to be done and because you can do it. Whatever comes, I believe." .... blah blah blah insert jingo reference here! grin.

Lyon, you're scaring me. You sound like our Commander-in-Chief down here in the U.S..

Okay, Devil Star is a hard act to follow here on out. Darn, I should've saved her for last! Here's everybody's favorite daddy. Hope atleast he paid some child support.

Blackbird I know they're suppposed to be plural, Blackbirds, but work with me here.

damn, this is all very cool! i'm impressed as hell. i'm going to have you bronzed at the end.

BWWAAAADDDD!!

Very nice On RI, the holster on his leg (it is a holster, right? or is he just really pleased to have been drawn?) looks a little bit odd to me.

Your Katse resembles a too fancy Siamese who looks like its been fashioned out of sticks and string. Katse has a bit of bulk, s/he is not a beanpole. Otherwise ok.

Maybe this works better? Thanks.

Ronin said: Your Katse resembles a too fancy Siamese who looks like its been fashioned out of sticks and string. Katse has a bit of bulk, s/he is not a beanpole. Otherwise ok.

Thanks for your input, but MY Siamese Katse is what I'm going for. The original and NTT Katse have more bulk for sure. This Gatchaman Neo Katse I envision to be a bit of an anorexic stretched out and very vain creature. Perhaps the issue you're having with him/her is the menacing factor, but that's already been discussed in this thread. Sorta like I feel I could probably pimp slap George W. Bush or Osama Bin Laden just on their unthreatening physicality but their command of power is what's scary.

Your quite right, just because a siamese is scrawny doesnt mean it will be any less vocal/aggressive/hypersexed/blue eyed or any of the other virtues siamese are prized for. But `can` you give your Katse the command of power? if not, you might be better off with a bit more bulk. (like a Bantok street moggie) PS. What mech are we having today? an old fave or a new design?

Katse could be running things in this version by a cult of personality helped along by a bit of supermodel-ness. Original Katse must have had an awful lot of support from X to stay in power, given that there wasn't a great deal of personality shown that would function as a mighty leader. Since this is a reworking, this Katse can have a leader persona, with X filling in the menace and enforcing loyalty roles, which he probably did in the original to a certan degree anyway. Which reminds me, will there be a reworked Sosai X?

What I mean by command of power is the ability to order a city vaporized, to start a war, to order an army of Galactor Goons to kill, a Galactor commander to commit suicide, etc.. All of which hardly need physical bulk if you're in a position of power like head of an organization, a dictator, a CEO. Anyway, I don't expect to please everybody, completely. I'll be lucky if I can come close to doing so for myself. I'm currently working on the Phoenix but not sure if I'll get it done today.

Sorry, couldn't help myself. I'll get cracking on a new version.

Not even a nice, nasty siamese?? (My Fathers wife hates the things. I find them rather charming, provided they are not too skinny) We need an X that will strike terror into his subordinates...This `includes` Berg Katse

Well then we (as in you, Ronin) need to produce some drawings, if there is actually a need. Show us all an X that strikes terror as I'm having a little trouble visualizing your words. I'll happily co-opt anything worthwhile.

i think the Hello Kitty is plenty terrifying enough.

Kitty X scares me too Does anyone other than me remember the episode of Dexter's Lab where Dexter and his sister Dee Dee get coded instructions on how to join the fan clubs of their favourite tv series, but each gets the other's instructions? So the Action Hank people are quite understanding when Dexter turns up in a tutu with fresh flowers and cookies, but the cute and sweet Ponypuff Princesses are about to turture Dee Dee to death in boiling cookie dough and caramel because she turned up in fatigues with a tattoo. Well, I think Kitty would be eeevil cute like that.

I cannot visualise an `X` worse than the original, it was tried in the OAVs, but that one left the fans all sniggering worse than catching Joe with a British Kitcar... Kitty X is pretty nasty and no doubt would be able to keep the erring gallactor in line, but I can just see Katse joyous smirk, and an `X` who impresses everybody but Katse is no use. What do alien energy beings look like anyway? Pretty much whatever they damn well please. (and I have no doubt in their `real` form they are invisible to human senses.) One way I would have improved `X` would be to give him a bit more movement and expression, so we `know` when he is angry with poor Katse...again.

BTW, why is the Blackbird wearing blue lipstick? Or is it because he flew too high to avoid Kitty X and is now suffering from lack of oxygen? The overall look is right, Im my BOTP fics I tend to make my Devil Stars and Blackbirds techno-barberians, (think of like Mad Max or modernday motorbiking mongolians) no one else will give up their comfortable urban lives to serve the Spirit in that way. If you are a barberian it doesnt matter, your going to die young, probably in battle so it makes sense to join a group where you will be given the best tech (probably at the cost of your humanity) to do so. I would have lived a little more colour contrast. (like in the OAVs, but no poncey pink underwings) same goes for the Devil stars. and a raptors beak (even, if you like, a serrated or even toothed beak)

Hey, fantastic techno-barbarian imagery! Such an improvement. Oh wait, I still don't see anything from you. Maybe something stopping you from performing colour contrast?

Thank you. Not all of can draw you know. But I can visualise...and describe.

Ronin, that's fine but neither are all of us strictly literal people. Showing is usually better than telling. Post a link, share a gif or jpeg might help. For sure, I've got my ego-pride vested in my labor and sometimes stubbornly unwavering but I openly welcome criticism and although I may be irked by some of your comments especially after explaining myself (which is totally fine and a natural part of the process), I do appreciate your participation and enthusiasm. On the other hand, if you're objective is simply to ruffle my feathers and pump up your own ego, you ought to have something to show for, otherwise your comments don't mean a crock. I promise not to piss on anything you show that's badass or is perhaps a better solution, but I will definitely let you know if I think something sucks-ass as well. Of course, most if not all of this is a matter of personal taste.

Your doing fine, I havent had much to say, largley let others say it for me. For instance, when you did all those radical things to Ryu, I thought, `uh?` but when you elabourated I kind of got to like the idea. I will write a small cameo for the elite...bear in mind that this will be BOTP rather than Gatch based, though.

Good stuff Ronin. I'll look forward to reading more of your fanfics. Blackbirds and Devil Stars are totally cool as spin-off series. I like how you envision the Blackbirds because their elite status in Spectra, get away with taking certain liberties. I can also imagine in your version a competitiveness and rivalry between them and the Devil Stars. I kinda imagine my Blackbirds to be relatively unstable drug dependent and genetically enhanced killers, and which might explain for the blue lips and pale skin, that have to be kept locked up when not in use. I drew my version standing upright, but actually I think it might be cool sometime in the future to make them more croaching and perched as mentally they think and act as deranged birds of prey.

Kitty X -- ROTFL The blackbird, on this monitor (yeah, oldish), I couldn't see where one piece of black stopped and the next started, so I couldn't get the entire image, but I loved what I did see. The rough texture of the cape and the ragged edge is a nice touch -- esp in contrast to the smooth capes and feathered edges of the BirdKids. Croaching and perching, like Gollum, but better leaping? That could be very, very sinister. You see it, then it leaps into the shadows -- any shadow, even ones in the rafters -- and waits with earie stillness, eyes following the motion, head turning only as necessary. Explosive movement, totally accurate, but with no warning. Moves so fast it almost seems to teleport. Hmmm, the religious guy in Xmen-2? Whatever you decide, you've made some good decisions already, and I know you'll put together something awesome! Definitely want to see the finished product!

Mental health and birds of prey, do not go together. BRR! Nasty little sods! I have flown falcons. Some are friendly, but most would take your hand off as soon as look at you. When I started writing I first of thought `Hashishim` but I dont think the Gallactor Elite are one shot missiles (unless they meet our friends) I do think, that like the Hashishim they have had their minds seriously fucked with. (above and beyond anything like normal indoctrination...drugs, cybernetics, you name it) I write mostly BOTP canon, which means I can push the boundaries a bit more. My Blackbirds `do` spend a lot of time locked up (mostly to stick in extra metal bits and run bizzare training programmes on them) but they are also allowed to wander around in the wild country, lets them exercise and practice their skills better. Also saves on feeding! the Devil Stars I envisage as more urban based. (though obviously both types of elite can do the others work) on Spectra that means ruined cities. (I know a guy who goes to Afghanistan, he says there are entire ancient cities in the mountains, just a few archaeologists...you can wander all day in a city that has been abandoned for a thousand years and not see a soul.)

.......as a reward, the Mighty One transformed them into predatory birds, the better that they might serve him..... The Second Book of the Searing Eye of Enlightenment, Chapter Thirty Seven, Paragraph Eight. --------------- After the great cosmic disaster when a nearby star went supernova, the formery populous and prosperous planet known to later generations as Spectra was severely depopulated. Many had died frfom the radiation, and still others joined the great diaspora that was to be the foundation of the Empire. A few, however, refused to leave their homeland, they did not want to abandon their God, the Luminous One. Whearas formerly Spectra had been a highly developed world, with very few wild spots left, now the farmland and great cities were left to go back to nature. Formerly rare animals, thrived, others were introduced from neigbouring planets, still others were recreated from ancient genetic material. Spectra became a laboritory for scientists studying biological systems. It also harboured many techno barberians. Either those who had always been hunter gatherers, or jaded city dwellers wishing to return to a suddenly abundant nature. Spectra offered an easy living. No need to actually manufacture anything, the abandoned cities were full of technology for the taking and adapting. Foodstuffs were found in the wilds, or grown by robots. Suddenly the inhabitants found themselves living an utopian life of ease for everybody, as envisaged by the more starry eyed SF writer. But into that serendipitous garden there crept a most insidous enermy. Now they had everything, the Spectrans no longer needed to create anything new. Everything from cars to art were supplied by the old cities. There was no need for any scientific development, except of the most theoretical variety. The only solace that the spectrans had was religion. The Luminous one had come to Spectra several centuries before the Supernova which turned a promising offshoot of the galaxy into a disaster zone, he had lived quietly, attended upon by his Astrobiologists. It had been him who had devised the global neutron force field that protected the planet from all but the main shockwave of the explosion. Now the Great Spirit was a god and his scientific attendants were his priesthood. The formerly modest alien became an egomanic, now was his chance to take over the galaxy. ------- A certain branch of his followers were hunter-gatherers. No one knew where they had originated These techno barberians lived by hunting the most fearsome beasts they could find, often in hand to hand combat. They wore the skulls and furs of their conquests. also an important item of trade to settled peoples. They also salvaged items from the more remote ruined cities. Having an imperfect knowlege of history and such skills as reading and writing they were always first in the fight and were never afraid of anything, these primitives were often involved into conquering other planets For the greater glory of Spectra. After one of these conquests the Great Spirit was well pleased with his servants, he invited one of the leaders, one Kengar by name into his sacred chamber to name his reward. Kengar was not at all daunted by his first sight of the god he had pledged his life to, as many had been. indeed he was quite dissapointed that the deity was not an anthromorphic one. (though except in the most debased tales of the less advanced corners of the empire he had never been portayed as such) the luminous one praised him for his work in spreading both faith and civilisation "it is my duty...did you expect anything less of me?" replied Kengar simply. "AND WHAT WILL YOUR REWARD BE?" asked his blue flamed master. Kengar was not a thoughtful soul and tended to take the things he had learnt in childhood literally, he believed that the Great One was capable of all things. "I would like the wings of an eagle," "YES" " to have the strength of an auroch," "YES." "and to be able to run faster and further than a normal man," "IS THAT ALL?" "just about" Kengar knew better than to ask for more, he knew he had gone too far as it was. "THIS MIGHT PROVE DIFFICULT...I WILL REFER YOU TO MY CYBERNETICS ENGINEERS." as an afterthought he had Kengar whipped for his presumption. It took several generations to develop the most primitive (or mk 1) flight suit, as the Hawkstyle was called in those early days Kengar himself never lived to see it. Kengars followers were brave, even fey men and women, they thought nothing of such feats as killing a woolly rhino with their bows, or swimming in icy pools, they lived to fight, and when not activley working for the Mighty One or hunting for their meat engaged in the martial arts. they dearly wished to fight and hunt better, now all this was possible. none of them were daunted at all by the implants, the cybernetics and the risk but the way was long and hard many died or went mad the succesful devoted their lives to the service of their nightmarish master. The BlackHawks were feared al over Spectra and the Empire, and their name was used to scare naughty children into better behaivior. .......all they wanted was to serve their diabolical master, if not as humans as monsters and monsters they became......... .

yes, thats it, definatley

Hmm....Kitty X is really starting to grow on me.

OMG, Kitty X brought to you by Starbucks. Galactor with sponsorship by another (evil) organisation. Perhaps that's how they get their recruits? Mind control drugs in the coffee? Microsoft Kitty X.... Microsoft already had its try at taking over the world... I like the Phoenix too. I wasn't too sure at first about the wide nose, but it's growing on me.

Have mercy!

I've barely found out that a 'terrapin' is actually a turtle. So, this rendition is trying to capture some of that and less dragon-like from the original and OAV. Of course, to me it looks like a Loch-Ness monster or some hybrid reptillian chicken.

I like it, I like it a lot. Wouldnt it be better to use anothr mech though? That poor terrapins been so overused everyones got one in the garage!

This is a great update. I love the way that you have a scale pic of the Phoenix looking really tiny next to it, and that in the standing up picture it looks like some fashion victim kid in oversized clothes - I almost expect it to start rapping and doing that "thing" with its flippers Bearing in mind that the target audience for this won't have a clue about Gatchaman, it's hardly going to be overused. And it's different enough from the original that it doesn't matter anyway. I think this is a great mech.

Thanks folks. Yeah, that would be insane if the Terrapin started doing some hip-hop moves. Gatchaman and Galactor could breakdance battle against each other to resolve their issues. You guys have me thinking, along with Kitty X, it would be cool to work on a more spoofy, demented, black-comedy version of Gatchaman in the near future.

Wouldn't worry too much about having to call it a Terrapin. I'm not sure what the Gatch translation is for that episode, but a lot of them, the mech is only vaguely related to the BOTP title. Like the octopus -- only six arms per unit, and no head bag. Or the thing that was called a snake but had legs on each and every section. I like using the animal theme in my work -- it's fun -- but many, many of the mechs didn't resemble an animal at all -- like the waterspout thing and the roller thing. (Don't'cha just love it when your "advisors" don't do their research.) Cheers!

I wonder if the mecha designers used something like those children's books where the top and bottom halfs are divided so you can for instance match the head of a pig with a body of a rooster, to figure out the crazy mecha-of-the-week. Or prolonged exposure to markers might've helped too. But then as you have a point, maybe it was the lack of imagination on the part of the folks who had to come up with the titles. Pehaps they should've referred to the children's book as well to come up with something like "Attack of The Pigooster" (pig+rooster).

Yes, thats a good one. (and a good medieval novelty dish too. How about Turducken? A mecha within a mecha within a mecha...

Thing with the names is that they make a lot more sense in Gatchaman than in BOTP. Fair enough, the first one is a Gatch Turtle to a BOTP Terrapin, which isn't a fat lot of difference, but some of the BOTP titles are a long way from what the mech resembles. Maybe none of the BOTP writers had much interest in animals? Maybe titles with the right animals weren't "snappy" enough? Although I prefer the word mantis to grasshopper myself... but perhaps the word "anteater" is more menacing than "pangolin"? Maybe somebody who didn't know what a pangolin is might think it was actually a kind of hat or musical instrument or something? Anyway, getting back to whatever the point I was going to make might have been, I think the turtle is supposed to be a significant creature in Japanese folklore. But I could very easily be wrong there, because now I'm googling for it the only thing I can find is something about long life...

Coming around in colour now...

yup, thats them both..... I see Dr Nambus discovered dress sense....(just in time for the latest 70s revival an all)

Very impressive The orange specs give Nambu a whole new character twist, make him look more the unpredictable genius than the guy who spends all his time in the lab. And Ken is still very much attached to the original, but the darker colours definitely bring him up to date a bit. Is this chin covered by his helmet?

And I like the extra pouches on his belt. I always worried where these kids kept things...

Meridianday said: And Ken is still very much attached to the original, but the darker colours definitely bring him up to date a bit. Is this chin covered by his helmet?

Yeah, I was a bit apprehensive about giving Ken a drastically different overhaul. One of the things I'm hoping to achieve in these costume designs is not only a reference to the original but also something modern Tengu/ninja-like (i.e. tabi footwear), to perhaps incorporate stylized Japanese motifs somehow. I tend to prefer Gatchaman as ninjas with updated equipment rather than cyborg commandos. BTW, Ken's chin does have some chin-guard either similar to the OAV or NTT. I'm supposing it might actually be part of the suit rather than the helmet, looking like a scuba-wet suit thingy. I still have to flesh-out Joe and Ryuko's bird outfits along with all the team member's individual weapons. Fortunately or unfortunately I'm not going to show their individual vehicles for this project. I'll probably work on them as an afterthought. I've found on the web several interesting concept vehicles for references. Toyota for instance has a concept race car that I think would be cool if it were tweeked a bit to look like Joe's: Toyota MTRC Concept So much more to do, so little time...

Yes, I thnk that is it, but make it heavier with more room for a tasteful phallic gatling. http://www.jbskyline.net/V35/GTR/ Now availible worldwide so theres no excuse not to have one.

BTW, if you want proper `Tengu`info. Im the one who knows, None of it is online so ask me and I will trawl though my scrolls.

Kewl. Actually, I'd be more interested in seeing images that I can't find googling under "images" rather than information. Right now the ones with the beaks (Garuda-like) and not the Pinnochio nose versions are more useful. Thanks.

a Kusari gama eh? (thing with many variants...and names) a favorite ninja weapon. (and also we assume, tengu. They did not just have swords you know. many weapons would have been used. Some were magical -or simply magic-indistinguishable-from-technology, such as the gun that never misses) in one (aborted) fic I gave G1 a very tengu weapon, the iron fan. (a folding tessen as opposed to rigid gunsen) as modeled by my old pal Yoshitsune here...

... LEKKA... SHIEN! /waves a tessen around until nearly decapitates someone. ah .. that felt good.

Be careful Lyon! Your not a tengu... (where is Tengu of late? Hiding in shame at those old banger pics I put up?) a kusari gama is a good weapon for a girl; like a naginata (bit awkward for a ninja but historicaly some `did` carry polearms) its a great way to best an opponent who will inevitably be armed with a sword and shuck them out of their armour. japanese women are often depicted with such weapons, (as opposed to in eyewitness accounts in which they are armed with swords like everyone else. There was nothing unusual or wrong for a woman to be expert with a sword and found her own school.) As for the tessen. owning one means you are a wannabe tengu, have fallen on the tengudo, were trained by one (like Yoshitsune)....or.... (checks Lyon for feathers.) got to go, I have more to say later

Ronin said: in one (aborted) fic I gave G1 a very tengu weapon, the iron fan. (a folding tessen as opposed to rigid gunsen)

BTW, nice Yoshitune pic. Not so much a tessen, but G2 could conceivablly form a fan with his feathered shuriken if they have some functionality where they can interlock. Joe could then use this feathered fan formation as a distraction device to deliver a punch with his other hand behind it, amongst other uses. Dr. Nambu or Berg Katse might be good candidates for wielding tessen or at least doing a flick of the wrist to open them as they are in authoritative positions.

http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&category=36281&item=7115846869&rd=1 mine is similar but red. Check out this guys other items, theres more stuff than you could shake a bo at. Speaking of Tengu. Really more a Blackbird thing than the KNT. Nasty amoral creatures, (I mean some tengu are ok, some are not, but you have to watch them `all`) much given to dark dealings on mountains and taking drugs. Much given to abducting small boys and messing with their minds throughly (probably whilst lecturing on the evils of hanging round with `that` sort of abbot...) is this how the Blackbirds get their students? or like the tengu, do they get volenteers? (who have no idea what they are letting themselves in for; like Koji I presume)

"speak of the devil, and they do appear!" (now whos this putting about rumours about my car?)

Unfortunately I've lent/lost my "Crouching Tiger Hidden Dragon" DVD, but from what I recall there was a scene, perhaps in the tavern where there was an opponent to Jen's character, who had a nice iron fan. I'm sorry and I know I sound a bit of a snob, but I'm not very fond of many of the mass produced commercial martial arts weaponry available. Not only are they generally built flimsy but they are extremely gaudy aesthetically and too flashy IMHO. No iron fan, but this quick googling found this site ( you have to scroll to the bottom ) showing some historical weaponry as a contrast to the "Mortal Kombat" looking trash out there.

Gomen! gomen! All I meant was to show you a RL iron fan. I bought mine many years ago on a whim in chinatown. and I have seen (and carefully handled, due to the pegs being out of the blade, and wasnt he relieved at my care?) some real decent antiques. Bearing in mind that the average samaurais sword was a tacky mass produced item......

His hair should be a little darker. The stare is just about right, should be fiercer (but not morosely cynical, as some have tried to portray G2 as) this condor seems a little too gentle looking. as for his birdstyle you `must` jazz it up a bit if he is going to fight Blackbirds. (I was always worried about OAV Joe over this; perhaps they have a recognition system in the helmets we cant see?)

Yeah I agree this Joe does look a bit too nice a guy. Perhaps I'll put a slight scar over his right eyebrow and eye as a tell tale mark from his childhood encounter with a Devil Star rose. Sorry the rest stays, hair, birdsuit, etc.. I think what you're looking for is the NTT Joe, who I also like but I'm not going that route of a winged Judge Dread style. The grunge look is so over. Don't you know everything is supposed to look like or go with an iPod nowadays? j/k! Don't worry, he'll be able to kill Blackbirds no less than any of the other team members. Why does Joe have to look anymore fierce than the rest? If you're worried about my Joe being distinguishable from the Blackbirds, it should be obvious in the shape, style and color of the helmets if you compare them. Plus Joe and the team just have to be on top of their game to avoid friendly fire. Definitely an occupational hazard being a KTN.

Well, perhaps a scar makes a pretty face look like it's been through a few scraps. The hair color may be an issue for some, but then you ought to bring it up with the Tokyo boys fashion sensibilities I based it off of.

NTT Joe is psycotic in birdstyle, and merely grim without Joe has very fierce eyes, even if the rest of his demeanor is gentle. it was the first thing I noticed about him in `78 What is an iPod and what has it got to do with Joe??? Im sure he can kill Blackbirds, its the friendly fire accidents I am worried about

Good point about his costume having similar colours to BlackBirds'. Hard to tell from just one pic, but it would be terrible if his teammates got confused, even for a second. Like the diagonal stripes on his leggings. Cricket

BTW, Gallactor, you `are` going to share your fellow students reactions with us or else we will put Blackbirds in your pies and Devil stars in your rose border... (I wont ask for Fic...yet)

Tengu or is it Ronin? Which self-appointed tengu-ninja BOTP expert am I talking to this time? Sure, I'll share my classmates reactions with you if you like but I don't know what relevance that has to do with this message board or your ego for that matter. You can keep asking me for a fic as long as I can ask you to post up a personal drawing of your own. In anycase I'm pressuming either one will suck or be mildly good at best. I know mine will suck for sure. Feel better now? My iPod joke was obviously ill-fated. Perhaps it's more of a regional thing but basically it's an MP3 player made by Apple that is outselling other players in several countries and in several instances design in fashion, technology, etc. seem to be mimicing or catering to it currently. But yeah, sorry, inappropriate reference. Concerning the similarity of my Joe and Blackbirds coloring, I've already stated my case. I'm not sure how to satsify the audience here unless they start providing color samples.

Im Tengu, the evil one with the Fan....Ronin is the good one with the Car.... (slight confusion over Usernames there.) Now I know what an iPod is (cant ever say that I am at all conversant with technology.) and the meme design reference. I, too, do not believe in adereing to cliches I wont ask you for fic, if you are too busy/dont feel that you can do it. But I do believe that you `could` do a good job. And Joes going to be at risk whatever incarnation he is. They `must` have some other identification other than visual, thats what I assume.

The b&w Joe had bags under his eyes, didn't he? But I suppose that might not look so good in colour. The scar is a good addition. I also think that it would be better if Joe didn't look so much like a blackbird. Sure his teammates will have a way of telling him apart, but I've always thought the differences are to stop the watching audience from getting confused. I'm on the wrong PC to do anything with colour, but how about changing his breastplate/boots from grey to dark blue or grey-brown? Dark blue would probably look better because it would coordinate with his cape.

Or go back to the old dried blood red. Youve been pretty conservative with colour so far.

Meridian's got a good point about the audience. I hate it when two male leads have the same hair colour! Hubby has no problems. Galactor, you will *never* get all of us to agree with each other, let alone with you. Everything we say is an opinion -- one person's opinion. We sometimes say "I agree" because we do -- two people's opinion. Still tons of folks out there who might have other opinions. You may have to shrink your intended audience. So be it. I hated the action scenes in Bourne Supremacy; Hubby loved them -- for the very reasons I hated them. The moving camera made me dizzy; it made the action seem real to him. Really looking forward to seeing the final result! Cricket

Okay, that line didn't come out right. It's not that each of us is unlikely to agree with you in particular, it's that each is unlikely to agree with anyone on everything. Ge-had, that sounds mangled.

Thanks everyone! I appreciate the constructive criticism. I think being more specific generally helps. Sorta like if someone writes a fic and I simply say "Your story needs more umpf" without better explaining what I mean by 'umpf' and why, where or how it might be applied. While I don't expect people to give me exact coordinates like "Make it lighter by 37.5% and use Web Safe Color #993300" as I know it's just as much a challenge for anybody as it is for me to pre-visualize, much less communicate, I do find it more helpful to use nouns than just adjectives. Actually, I should clarify myself further. It is possible 'solutions' that are the most helpful (and of course harder to provide). Easy enough to identify a problem area but without providing even a probable answer to it, it sounds like whining (which I'm equally guilty of). Anyway I'm running at the mouth errr keyboard. You all are doing a fantastic job helping me and overall are right on the money. Just a critique on the critiques. With that said, here's the latest round...

Here's a rendition of G3. Yes, I purposely made her skin black to add some diversity, but she's no token for sure.

Yup, the colours just right on G2! And a black swan...is that a joke? (bearing in mind what Aristotle said concerning black swans...) It `is` the ISO, of course but the character design is fine. (except I would expect her to have more physically probable feet...saying that, hers are no more impossible than a girls I saw at work today... but the design is very modern 70s.

Yes, G2 colouring looks spot on to me too. Black swan? She looks good too. (I'll miss the green hair but that's just me...) I like the completely different pinks used in each of her styles, enough to tie them together but so different that it's hard to spot why for a moment.

you know, i couldn't tell you why, but i just keep expecting the inside of Joe's cape to be black. its looking great so far, Galactor! don't let Tengu / Ronin rattle your cage.

Hmm...original Joe has either white or grey inside cape, OAV has an aqua color, and NTT has a reddish one. Black might be cool but then I'd have to figure out a contrasting color in the thigh area.

Lyon said:its looking great so far, Galactor! don't let Tengu / Ronin rattle your cage.

True, true. Sorry for getting on bit of a generalized soapbox there folks.

Meridian said concerning G4:...(I'll miss the green hair but that's just me...)

Maybe I need to bump it up a little brighter, but I did make her hair green. Things like that I'm nostalgic for too.

Now I've looked again, I can see G3's hair's green - of course, I'm on a different PC again at the moment so it must be the brightness/contrast on the monitor (ahem, or maybe I should put the lights on in the room where my susual PC is so that the brightness/contrast stands more of a chance). On the inside of Joe's cape, I think that the black and dark red combo looks too good to change. Maybe the inside of the cape could be a darker blue than the outside instead? Or a lighter blue for more contrast? I dunno, I just really *really* like that bodysuit the way it is.

Original Joes got light sky blue underwings. Your Joes a little darker, but OK, dont tweak him any more. And Jun `has` got green hair on second looks. At least it doesnt look like shes undergoing a punk revival... Dont use two many main colours on the suits. 3 (as in interior design) is enough.

Holy Kaleidescopic Neo-Gatch Batman!! I cant believe what Ive just read and seen throughout the entire eight pages of this thread !! Yep, jawdropping to say the least! The plot, the characters and those incredible sketches. Kudos galactor on your potrayal and version of Gatch..or Neo Gatch. Beats the '94 OAV anyday! I look forward to the finished product and have been throughly enjoying the "work in progress" esp the sketches and colouring process. I like the way you accept advice, admiration, critique and any constructive criticism with humility and congeniality. You coudlnt have fallen on better contemporaires that also share your talent of writing, drawing and colouring, in seeking opinions and honest evaluations on your take of Gatchaman. Heck Im in awe with what professional advice and opinions have already been given..let alone what a mindblowing perspective on colour schemes, and character sketches youve come up with! Remember , in the end it all comes down to how YOU want it. Thankyou thankyou for sharing your talents so far. I dont know what Im going to enjoy more, seeing the various stages of your work in progress, or the actual finished product! Way Cool.

Thanks for your encouraging words and nice to finally meet you Imi. Jinpei up next, naturally. I'm not sure how detailed a job I'll be able to complete for the final animatic as these coloured character illustrations, at least for the school deadline. I know I've already set a pretty high bar for myself. In any case I'm sure we'll all have fun with this.

Your doing just fine so far, be sure of it.

Roll call.

Perfect!

Yes, perfect.

Very nice. But all seen together, Ryuko looks a bit out of the theme to me. Could her cape/breastplate be made richer and darker shades of green? At the moment she's quite pastel and muted compared to the rest of them. And because my daughter is here insisting that I put some smilies in....

Hmm...I sorta see your point. I guess my original colour choices for Ryuko were made to avoid making her look stereo-typically butch, that I felt might occur if she simply took on the original Ryu's darker green scheme. I'm also trying to avoid using primary greens as I think for her it would be a bit tacky (but that's just me). Maybe I should put it this way....If you were Ryuko, which of these suits would you prefer to be stuck in? Or might you suggest another colour scheme? Thanks and I think your daughter is cool for demanding smilies. Well, only if it doesn't bother mum too much that is.

I think she'd go for B because the bodysuit colours make her look so much less bulky than A C is a tricky one, it's easier to see the details than on B, and it will fit in with the rest of the team better than A, but I just don't like that caramel colour (nothing to do with the design or scheme, I just don't like that colour anywhere, a personal dislike that exists for no logical reason). Yet again, I'm on the wrong PC to play with colour, but I will have a go later.

I think a compromise between B and C That is, if shes a `real` G5...Notice how the colour schemes reflect the characters personality? If shes the Owl, she will need earthy, natural shades. (without being dull) No smilies, puh-lease!

Okay, I am too lazy and incompetent to replace the colours properly, and unfortunately loads of detail has got lost while I've been botching about with this, but how about something along these lines?

Reversing the greens and brown? Yes, I think that would do. Tiny; "A hula girl? Just as muscular as me?...What do you mean? Shes..." Now all we need is some rocket fuel for the Phoenix, lipstick for Berg Katse, and plutonium for Sosai, and we are in business!

None of the other uniforms are "natural bird colours", so I wouldn't worry about that. The other characters have fairly saturated colours, less muddy. I think saturated is the term. I like Meridian's scheme. You might also try kelly green or emerald or hunter green. I can see hunter green for the lining or around her hips. Cricket

Wow. Thanks for taking the time to render those colours Meridian. I appreciate the effort. Nice job! I like the helmet and outer cape brown, however I'm not quite taking to the bright green insides as complimenting the top for my own weird sensibilities. Something about it clashes a bit eventhough it somehow it works in the original Ryu with the top green and inside brown. I'll try posting some more possibilities with green variations. Tricky this business of colour and monitor display, alongside individual perceptions and tastes. Part of me wonders how the colours will also look totally different when I finally present it to my classmates through the projector display. Oh well, I suppose I can come up with excuses.

If they havent seen the original they wont know any better. Anything that looks `right` will do

Okay, I'm on a green streak now and not going back to browns. I think I could possibly live with any of these options.

i REALLY like E - its striking without being neon and i think the costume detailing really stands out well.

Oh nooooo! You'll never get anyone to agree now Galactor. You see, my favourite would be F, with D second. I think all of them fit in with the rest of the team better with the stronger colours though.

It wont matter, its not like her girlfriend(s) know shes the Owl...

"H" she is then for "Horned Owl". I think this is a decent compromise. Maybe her suit has chameleon capabilities that can adapt according to the environment the team has to crash (i.e. a Galactor mecha that looks like a night club, shopping center, or Starbucks ).

Hmmm, three of them have red phoenix symbols, one has white on red/brown, and one has green. Just an observation. The red happens to work well on those three, so it might be an individual costume decision rather than a pattern. Overall, I really like it. Now to see them in action, against the rest of the colour scheme.

Yes, you're right, that is rather inconsistent bird branding going on with G2 and G5. I believe the design rule is either make them all the same or all different, otherwise I agree, it does look a bit odd. I think I'll opt for different colours for each team member because on Joe, red will virtually disappear ontop of his reddish brown suit. Thanks for catching that.

But the original Joe had red upon brown...

Yeah but Neo Joe is a brighter red-er brown. The current red won't work. I could make a darker browner red logo but then we'd be back to square one with the inconsistency issue where his is darker than the rest. The other resolution could be to make Neo Joe's like the old version which would of course cause a contrast issue with his inner cape for being too dark. One solution inevitably causes another problem. I'll try the differen't color option first.

I've no objection whatsoever to that. The important thing is that they all have the symbol, and this way means that it matches their costumes better.

Now that looks sharp! And how many days do you have left to actually draw these guys hundreds of times for the movie? Cricket

Yikes! 17 days. Being a single person production house and seeing how long it's taken to develop the characters there's no way I can add the same amount of detail to every shot. Right now I'm working on rough quick sketches that I'll have to refine on the computer afterwards. In my preliminary storyboarding where I primarily used jpegs off the web and screencaptures from DVDs (to get a sense of story flow, shots, etc.), I've counted 80 shots. I'll reduce this number for sure. I'll also repurpose what I've done so far where I can (just like the original used to - where you see a million of the same people running from a million of the same explosions). Some of the overall style consistency may go out the window as well as I'll be using found imagery where I have no time to sufficiently render them (i.e. backgrounds, location settings, etc.). The reason for putting so much time into character development is mostly so I'd have something to refer to (and repurpose if possible). Unfortunately because of timing I didn't get around to making different angles (i.e. backsides) and multiple headshots as you'd see in traditional studio character dev. Thank you all for helping me with what has been accomplished so far. Ideally if there were more time, I'd do alot of things differently. One of which would be to post the storyboard to see if it makes any sense, as much a sense can be gleaned from a trailer type of thing and make adjustments with peoples feedback. That'll have to occur after I've made my presentation. I'm sure all of you will understand that I most likely won't be posting anything until sometime after I've presented the project to my class as I'll probably be in the midst of pulling out my hair, cursing at my computer, and drinking way too much coffee to meet the deadline. Lyon, I'll have to consult with you at some point about your offer or Ninja Sam's (if it's still available) to host my QuickTime on Birdgo. Hopefully you all will get to see the as-finished product before the holidays, but if not, I wish you all A Happy Holiday Season! Thanks for all your encouragement and feedback!

You may be glad that you don't have time to run everything past us first - at the moment it's tight on timing but with us throwing our respective oars and crabs and so on in, you'd never get it done I'd still love to see it when it's done though.

I will be good for once and keep my mouth shut.

Hi everyone! HAPPY NEW YEAR!!! Sorry its taken so long. I'm posting a extremely sloppy and scaled down .PNG file of the key frames from my final project that I presented to my class in a QuickTime movie format. As you can see, I wasn't able to fully complete coloring every frame in time for my presentation but it still was a success for the most part. I know much of the detail here is difficult to see because of its scale. I'm hoping Lyon is still offering to host my QuickTime rendering so you can see it as its meant be along with the cheesy music track. I'm still working on completing the unfinished frames so I'm not sure how big a file size it'll end up being. It came out to be nearly 3 minutes long! I've made a number of satirical political and pop culture references (i.e. reality tv shows) in the first half that I'm not sure will make sense to folks unaware of such silly antics occurring in the U.S.. I was primarily catering my project to my classmates who would get the puns intended. Without further ado, enjoy!

Faux News? Viagro? This all really deserves to be seen in more detail, because these thumbnails are beyond my terrible eyesight's capacity. What I can make out of the details looks very good

Sorry. Yes, I know this example is horribly small and the resolution is terrible on top of it as I was trying to keep under the 512kb maximum file size. Until I can somehow post the QuickTime file (which last came out to 140 Mb), this is more of a sneak peak.

It looks absolutly terrific!!

Oh, it looks great. Looking forward to seeing the QuickTime version!

This is a sweet storyboard! I love your sense of layout and timing. The kids channel surfing. The parodies of liscensed names! Your dramatic flair is awesome as are your sense of humor and subtle attention to detai....holy crap. Is that MR. MAGOO running for his life from the godphoenix in firebird?? Bahahahahahaa! Brilliant stuff here man!

Thank you all! Everyone who has participated in this dialogue concerning this project has helped me tremendously from character development, reference material, feedback, and encouragement. I really believe you folks along with my classmates helped to make this both a better product and experience than had it not been so. Kudos to you too! I recently watched the extended DVD version of "Lord of The Rings: Return of The King" and in the final appendices disc, the documentary part, there's a favorite quote of mine from one of the animation directors that goes something like...."No animals were hurt during this film, but several animators were." I'm still experimenting with getting the QT file under 30MB with some success. I do have one site I can post it after completing the uncolored frames, but only temporarily. Perhaps I'll zip it so you can download it. I'll post a link when I'm done (hopefully in a few more days). And yes, that is a cameo appearance from MR. MAGOO!

But you did not tell us your classmates reactions! Tengu the Nag.

My peers and their guests cheered and clapped loudly, so I'm hoping the beers helped a little. If anyone was bothered by any of it, it didn't come to my attention. Some even asked for copies but being incomplete I was a little hesitant. Given the time constraints and level of experience (or lack thereof) I'm generally pleased with the outcome as an exercise. In another round I'd do things a bit differently. One of which would be attempting more bold character design and style. Part of me thinks I was a bit too conservative to strike enough of a distinction between the old and new, especially between OAV and NTT. With more time and experimentation I think I could push the envelope so-to-speak a bit. I'll keep drawing! I've just ordered a Japanese illustration book, "Masked Rider Agito Art Works" on one of the popular live-action super-hero shows that aired over there a couple years ago that has these amazing character designs, particularly for the villains. I can't seem to find online any of the images, but I'll scan it when it arrives, one that would make a perfect reference for an updated Blackbird.

eeek! .. see what happens when i forget to stumble through the doors here, looking for whatever passes for cheap entertainment! bravo, galactor-man, bravo! like Buffy, i totally double-stared at the dreaded Mr Magoo and about lost something vital in the resulting fit of laughter. god yes, birdgo will host your monstrosity of a movie in its glorious, uncompleted technicolor and we'll even throw in the cheesy popcorn for the repeat fans. i'm dying to see the full thing in action!

Arigato gozaimasu! Thank you, thank you Lyon! I will PM and email you once I'm done to figure out the best way to get the file to you.

If you need a space to put the file we got plenty o'room.

Cool Cep! What's the best way to do it?