So I've been watching alot of anime past couple days, via the wonderful and often shady piece of awesome that is the internet as well as re-watching some of my own collection of dvds. I've been inspired to do some Anime-esc stuff. Specifically a new model of the 'Mecha' variety (think gundam, evangelion, robotech etc) and some character art.

Traditionally I have drawn alot of my 2d stuff with a 'nod' to anime but never really going entirely down that stylistic path. If you saw my shelves you probably wouldn't believe this next statement but I'm actually not fond of alot of trends in most anime so my collection is fairly modest by geek standards. I'm very picky when it comes to art styles I like and the types of shows I get into are few and far between these days. I cant say this without sounding like an old man but frankly I think anime was alot better in the 90s, when most of the stuff coming out of japan seemed to be very dark and very much designed for an adult audience. Ghost in the Shell, Ninja Scroll and Akira to name a few of the truly amazing(and still just as awesome even now) examples I am referring to.

Yep I was watching mature animation way earlier than I should have but damn am I glad I was exposed to it when I was because it made me develop a greater appreciation for truly good work. I find it odd that at the rate anime has gained popularity, the overall quality and consistency of it in general has dropped substantially. I mean every anime series or movie that I own is either A; relatively old or B; a remake of an older series/movie. Of course their have been a couple of exceptions, namely; Desert Punk, Ergo Proxy and Gantz. Three really good recently made series I cant recommend enough, very much designed and written for adults.

While I'm on the subject of freaking sweet animated series/films, here's some random western made stuff no animation enthusiast should be without:
Reboot, Beast Wars, Titan: After Earth, Treasure Planet(the sci-fi disney one, trust me its good), The Iron Giant, Ren and Stimpy, All the Pixar films, all the Blu-Sky films, Ferngully: The Last Rainforest, and of course almost anything disney did prior to the beginning of the 21st century.

Oh and since I believe they cross the boundaries between both western and eastern animation despite only being made in Japan, absolutely EVERYTHING made by studio Ghibli, I swear to god that studio can not make a bad movie, it is impossible for them to do such a thing.