MY TOP 5 ILLUSTRATION ART STYLES
Written by: Chloe Natividad
STUDIO GHIBLI ART STYLE
Studio Ghibli films have been one of my favorite movies to watch whenever I want to relax and enjoy my day (although they do have tragedy films like Grave of the Fireflies which is an exemption) and what makes them so comfy to watch is their unique art style. The watercolor texture, refreshing landscapes, and soft tones of Ghibli films is what make their movies so comforting to watch giving this slice-of-life vibes. Even in their tearjerker films like The Wind Rises, The Tale of Princess Kaguya, and the mentioned Grave of the Fireflies, Studio Ghibli has not failed to incorporate this art style since it gives more melancholy feeling within the narrative.
This art style has been fed a lot on AI and you might notice that others just prompt it to make their pictures in Studio Ghibli style but in my opinion, it would never capture this “refreshing” feeling this art style have given to me.
“Do everything by hand, even when using the computer.” ― Hayao Miyazaki, co-founder of Studio Ghibli
KOREAN SIMPLE DRAWING STYLE
Honestly, I don’t really know the official name of this art style, and I am not sure if this is really a Korean thing, but I see this a lot in Korean stickers, textbooks, and some Korean illustrators (well, the majority of them are Korean and I noticed this is a common art style they have). I really like how simple they look, and they give the same “refreshing” feeling as Studio Ghibli. I love the pastel colors and pencil like line art making the illustration not so overwhelming and uncluttered.
Two Korean artists I know who apply this kind of art style are Puuung (퍼엉), who is known for her game “Love is… in small things”, a mobile game which can be played through IOS and Android and parkyouseung (박유승), who makes storyboards for K-pop music videos.
3. LOW POLY ART
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Inspired by Playstation1 and Nintendo64 graphics, I love the Y2K vibe of low poly art making the character models so cute and tiny to look at. This is also my recent favorite art style since I have 3D Modeling this semester and I experienced making my own low poly character through Blender. So yeah, you can say that I was kind of influenced and inspired by it.
2. SEMI REALISM
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One of my favorite things to do in illustration is to make portraits and the application of Semi-Realism is total eye-candy for me. For me, it gives the balance of being realistic and stylized (thank you Ms. obvious) but you have to understand that I really love unrealistic styles in art. Also, Semi-Realism makes the person more attractive in the portrait (please don’t misunderstand that a person is ugly in realism) because one thing I noticed in this kind of art style is that it is so colorful and the application of Color Theory is very evident.
I think this is one of the hardest art style to apply because you really have to know anatomy for you to stylized things and I really admire those people who have master the art of proportions in anatomy.
1. SHIBUYA PUNK
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Lastly is my all-time favorite and inspiration on my own art style which is Shibuya Punk. The high contrast saturated colors, messy elements, CEL-shaded graphics, and inky line art is what makes this art style so amazing since I really like the hip-hop and graffiti styles it incorporates. This art style have originated in Japanese street culture and video games making it one distinguishable art style in Japan.
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I was first introduced on this style from an action role playing-game by Square Enix called The World Ends With You (TWEWY)/すばらしきこのせかい (Subarashiki Kono Sekai). Tetsuya Nomura(野村 哲也) and Gen Kobayashi(小林 賢) where the character designers of this game and since then this has become my inspiration whenever I create my own illustrated characters.
Like my take in Semi-Realism, this is also an eye-candy for me and I really like the rebellious and comic vibe it gives. But, I am also honest that maybe I am kind of biased on this take since anime has been my childhood and I have been really exposed to Japanese culture ever since. Consequently, I really like it when a certain anime/manga does apply this style like Samurai Champloo, Soul Eater, Dandadan, and Gachiakuta.
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