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Who do you like more, as a character designer?

Eh...to be honest, I prefer Nomura's designs myself. And I'll be blunt while I'm at it. I find most of Amano's drawings ugly. And pretty much every FF girl he's designed is the same- long blonde hair in a ponytail. The only exceptions to this are Rydia, Porom and Relm. Nomura on the other hand has a better art style IMO, and more difference between characters.

Anyways...I'm interested to see what people think about the two designers. Seeing as this is an FFVI forum, Amano will probably get more votes...but I stick to my opinion.

(Is this in the wrong section?)

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FFIVDS looks awesome, right? Especially the character scans. I mean, look at that CGI scan of Yang. You see it and you just think...badass. And then you look at his polka-dot pants, likely stolen from a Dr. Seuss book. And then you just...shiver.

though i do like most of amano's work, nomura gets my vote. he designed my favorite character, auron, and most of my other favorites as well. as already mentioned, amano has a little bit of an issue with girls... though most of his guys (FF6+FF4 especially) were well done.

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Oops...accidentally pressed the null vote .

I think both of them are really talented artists and I guess Nomura's done a fine job of updating FF's look but his style isn't as unique as Amano's. Given that and the fact that I generally prefer traditional art media, I'd personally have to go with Amano, but I'm not sure how well his art would go over/has gone over with more recent FF fans or how it would mesh with FF's recent more technologically based storylines. Could be that, nowadays, FF does need Nomura's slicker digital look.

Still, Amano

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I like Amano's character designs better, but I still like Nomura's designs as well.

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I like both, but I'll honestly ALWAYS associate FF with Amano first, while Nomura tends to make me think of Kingdom Hearts.

With Amano, I like the fact that his drawings are so surreal. I do agree that they tend to look alike (Nomura gets the same criticism), so that sometimes I'll see some of Amano's FF art and go... "Okay, which one is that from? Oh wait, that's from FF2? Or is that.... wait, that's Zidane and Dagger?!"

But he does have a very unique and "classical Japanese" style that I really love. I look at some of his concept art and would totally put it up in my house.

Nomura's, not so much. His is very modern and, like J-pop, always hits me as being trendy. Which I like, but not quite as much.

ive really, never liked amano's drawing style, they just look awful, while the characters i love, i just downright hate his drawings. they are really sloppy, and....ill stop here before my house burns down

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Aujourdhui a commence avec toi.

Quote (Samurai Bob @ 16th September 2007 14:51)

Who do you like more, as a character designer?

Eh...to be honest, I prefer Nomura's designs myself. And I'll be blunt while I'm at it. I find most of Amano's drawings ugly. And pretty much every FF girl he's designed is the same- long blonde hair in a ponytail. The only exceptions to this are Rydia, Porom and Relm. Nomura on the other hand has a better art style IMO, and more difference between characters.

Anyways...I'm interested to see what people think about the two designers. Seeing as this is an FFVI forum, Amano will probably get more votes...but I stick to my opinion.

(Is this in the wrong section?)

I think they are both very good artists and I don't really have a preference. I like Amano's art and recognize him as the "true" FF artist, but Nomura's art has a more Westerized

Here is a list of Amano girls that do not have long blonde hair in a ponytail:
Maria - FF2
Rydia - FF4
Porom - FF4
Reina - FFV
Terra - FFVI
Celes - FFVI
Relm - FFVI
Garnet - FFIX
Freya - FFIX
Eiko - FFIX

I like Amano's artwork 'cuz it's so surreal and somewhat medieval-ized. However, I Nomura was the character designer for my favorite FF games and I like his Americanized (for a lack of a better word) design skethces as opposed to Amano's. As for which one I prefer, it's really hard to say, but I think I'll vote for Nomura 'cuz of his work in the later games.

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We're having this same poll at my Wiki right now. What a coincidence!

Anyway, Amano's better.

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Amano, hands down. I like SOME of Nomura's chara-design (most notably Setzer.), but Amano takes the cake for me due to characters like Kain, Edge, Galuf, Locke, Cyan and Freya, not to mention his anime designs.

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I don't know if Amano designs the sprites, but i definately dislike his drawings... They seem to be drawn with a very loose hand, and doesn't resemble what i thought the characters would look like -mostly for the worse...

Im voting Nomura

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Anyone care to post examples?

Examples of their art? Here's a good list of official art for the FF series.

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As an artist, Amano would get my vote. As a character designer, Nomura is definitely better, IMO.

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Quote (Auragaea @ 18th September 2007 17:49)

As an artist, Amano would get my vote. As a character designer, Nomura is definitely better, IMO.

I concur. That's a perfect way of putting it.

Here's some examples. Amano's character designs are art, and wonderfully crafted examples of such, but some of them look evil, like Mindu, or some of them look identical, like Celes and Garnet. Also, the sprites tend to be radically different from his drawings, but since we play more with the sprites, we like them and then we see the drawings and hate them.

Nomura's characters are less artful but more westernized, so of course they're received better over here. When we see his drawing of Barret, we think big, tough guy with a gun-arm.

Quote (yelanates @ 18th September 2007 19:43)

Quote (Auragaea @ 18th September 2007 17:49)

As an artist, Amano would get my vote.  As a character designer, Nomura is definitely better, IMO.

I concur. That's a perfect way of putting it.

Here's some examples. Amano's character designs are art, and wonderfully crafted examples of such, but some of them look evil, like Mindu, or some of them look identical, like Celes and Garnet. Also, the sprites tend to be radically different from his drawings, but since we play more with the sprites, we like them and then we see the drawings and hate them.

Nomura's characters are less artful but more westernized, so of course they're received better over here. When we see his drawing of Barret, we think big, tough guy with a gun-arm.

The Celes / Garnet thing wasn't exactly Amano's fault. Garnet wasn't designed by him.

Anyway, as an old school gamer, I have to go with my genius of a hero, Yoshitaka Amano. Aside from all his women having blond hair, his art is incredibly expressive. Nomura may be a wonderful manga style artist, but he's still just that. A manga artist.

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I think the characters speak for themselves. Amano FTW. You'll have to excuse me if I don't like Jpop stars as my protagonist.

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Don't you be tarot-fied,
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I can't believe the two of them are tied.



When it comes to artistic ability, Amano blows Nomura out of the water. There's just no competition. But even if it's just a question of character design eccentricities, Amano is mannered while Nomura is just completely preposterous.

It's embarrassing at this point, the belts and zippers and Gackt-ness. The designs aren't clean and appropriate, like the FF7, FF8, and PE ones were; they're just plain ugly now, almost caricatures of themselves. Shameful that he's still allowed to design, IMO.

Below is all the proof I need, baby. Show me an Amano design that's worse than this and I'll concede.






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the day he is delivered.


Eternal Sleep, Track 1-1: The Blue Planet

Okay, yeah. He's got some sort of alien symbiote for hair (It tries to kill something at some point, I assume), appears to be wearing his pyjamas, a bionic/prosthetic leg, sunshades, a white lion mane shoulderpad, and of course, the belts.

That picture means I have nothing to really say that is not already written by that character. I think Amano would win even if he was a half-blind drunken quadrapalegic drawing his deisgns with his mouth in an earthquake.

Well, probably not, but there's no fun in not taking it too far.


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Quote (yelanates @ 16th September 2007 21:44)

Quote (Samurai Bob @ 16th September 2007 14:51)

Who do you like more, as a character designer?

Eh...to be honest, I prefer Nomura's designs myself. And I'll be blunt while I'm at it. I find most of Amano's drawings ugly. And pretty much every FF girl he's designed is the same- long blonde hair in a ponytail. The only exceptions to this are Rydia, Porom and Relm. Nomura on the other hand has a better art style IMO, and more difference between characters.

Anyways...I'm interested to see what people think about the two designers. Seeing as this is an FFVI forum, Amano will probably get more votes...but I stick to my opinion.

(Is this in the wrong section?)

I think they are both very good artists and I don't really have a preference. I like Amano's art and recognize him as the "true" FF artist, but Nomura's art has a more Westerized

Here is a list of Amano girls that do not have long blonde hair in a ponytail:
Maria - FF2
Rydia - FF4
Porom - FF4
Reina - FFV
Terra - FFVI
Celes - FFVI
Relm - FFVI
Garnet - FFIX
Freya - FFIX
Eiko - FFIX

I don't want to sound like a jerk, but I'm pretty sure Lenna, Terra and Celes have that hairstyle in Amano's concept art.

I like *some* of Amano's art. I dislike *some* of Nomura's designs. But I still like Nomura better, overall.

Oh yeah, about the sprite designer, I recall that Nomura was a Battle Designer for VI. I'm not sure what that means exactly, but it could mean he designed the in-battle graphics.

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FFIVDS looks awesome, right? Especially the character scans. I mean, look at that CGI scan of Yang. You see it and you just think...badass. And then you look at his polka-dot pants, likely stolen from a Dr. Seuss book. And then you just...shiver.

I originally voted for Nomura, since his work was easiest to come to mind, but I
followed the excellent link that Galsic put up and now I have to admit, I'm divided.
The artwork of Amano for VII, VIII, and IX really shine in my book, at least as much
(if not greater) as Nomura's recent works.

An exquisite poll, SamuraiBob. It was a pleasure to review the artworks!

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I can't stand looking at Amano's artwork. It's boring and weird-looking when he draws random questionable crap around characters. I don't care what other people say, but IMO Nomura's art has much more quality than Amano's.

Sure, anyone would agree that Nomura's male characters look very metrosexual, and that's the only flaw I have with Nomura.

But looking back at both artists, I *did* think Amano immediately reached at his peak when he contributed artwork for Final Fantasies 1, 2, and 3. I actually thought he put more work into those three than he did with FF4-7, 9, and 10. I think he also did the ones for FF8, but I don't think so.

I think Amano's worst Final Fantasy character sketches was from FF7. Goodness, those characters looked so butt-ugly.. It almost looked like a 4th grade science project "How would the future look like in thirty years".

And as for Nomura, I actually liked the fact that he contributed alot of artistic-looking monster battle graphics for FF4, FF5, and FF6.

So my vote goes to Nomura anyway.

after looking back at more of their works, amano is definately the better artist, but i like nomura's actual designs better. if that makes sense.

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The newest CoNcast is up! Have a listen!

Nomura, hands down. His pictures look like someone older than 3 drew them. And they look really good, too.

Now, as for Amano, I get embarassed looking at the box of FFIV in stores. When I think of Amano's art the first thing that comes to mind is the picture of Sabin where it looks like he has fungus growing on his chest. Why are all the girls blond and the guys all wear black lipstick?

Quote

I think Amano would win even if he was a half-blind drunken quadrapalegic drawing his deisgns with his mouth in an earthquake.

He probably did draw like that, and that's why his pictures are so terrible.

Phew, it feels good to get that off my chest.

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Its hard to give an edge in this one, but its likely to go to Amano in this one.

Looking over some of Amano's art, the backgrounds make me think of Dr. Seuss books.

I'm pretty surprised that Nomura is getting more votes- this poll's turned out pretty interesting.

As for Nomura, I like his older art style better. Like, the kind he used for VII. I dunno, I just find it looks more interesting. I guess it just looks more serious and dark.

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FFIVDS looks awesome, right? Especially the character scans. I mean, look at that CGI scan of Yang. You see it and you just think...badass. And then you look at his polka-dot pants, likely stolen from a Dr. Seuss book. And then you just...shiver.

I've nulled my vote.

Amano's character design is awesome. To me, that's what FF should be like. However, his artwork is craptastic. It just doesn't feel "solid" enough to me.

On the other hand, Nomura's character design is awful. Once or twice, yeah, I can put up with jpop stars as characters. But for every important character in the game to be wrapped in furs, belts, chains, and other assorted crap (hair dye included)? No thanks, I've had my fill a long time ago. His art, on the other hand, is great stuff.

So it's a tie. Make Amano come up with the characters and let Nomura draw 'em, says I!

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Quote (Silverlance @ 3rd October 2007 19:22)

So it's a tie. Make Amano come up with the characters and let Nomura draw 'em, says I!

I likes what yous says.

Quote

Below is all the proof I need, baby. Show me an Amano design that's worse than this and I'll concede.

Umm... look at ANY Amano. It's the kind of thing you'd expect to see in squigglevision. Honestly, I believe that Amano is probably the reason all the old FFs are taking so long to be remade. I was looking at the FFIV DS site, and made the comment in the FFIV thread that Rydia looks like a green haired Yuna, and when I got here, it dawned on me, Nomura is having to go back and make good versions of all the old characters before they can consider a CG map!

Yes, Nooj has a very "Fabulous" costume coordination controversy, but at least you can make out the belts, and the furs, and the metal leg. I could make an Amano-esque version with MS paint, and the touchpad on my laptop. It would be just as visually coherent anyway.

I will admit tho, Amano's artwork works great as just that. I could totally see hanging a large print of his rendition of Cloud and Red XIII as a wall hanging.

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When ever i look at a character sketch by Amano, it has this effect that theres more to the character than meets the eye. I dispise Nomura and his work, because he does what everyone else is doing when it comes to character and landscape illistrations. Oh sure, he does a good job, i just feel that Amano is more of an original. And being a person who has studied art for as long as i can remember, Amanos pieces are things that stick out in my mind. Amano is probably one of the only character artists that i actaully can call an original. When ever i see an Amano, i get the true essance of Final Fantasy, in all its mystery, in all its glory, Amano all the way

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Quote (?????_UknownTrainGhost @ 5th October 2007 23:02)

When ever i look at a character sketch by Amano, it has this effect that theres more to the character than meets the eye. I dispise Nomura and his work, because he does what everyone else is doing when it comes to character and landscape illistrations. Oh sure, he does a good job, i just feel that Amano is more of an original. And being a person who has studied art for as long as i can remember, Amanos pieces are things that stick out in my mind. Amano is probably one of the only character artists that i actaully can call an original. When ever i see an Amano, i get the true essance of Final Fantasy, in all its mystery, in all its glory, Amano all the way

Very well said.

I've always enjoyed how classic his art feels.

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If you've been mod-o-fied,
It's an illusion, and you're in-between.
Don't you be tarot-fied,
It's just alot of nothing, so what can it mean?
~Frank Zappa

Sins exist only for people who are on the Way or approaching the Way