A few words about ZUN's art style

[CountVonNumenor]

[SIZE=12pt]Ever since I joined the fandom, one of the things that caught my attention is the unique artstyle adopted by ZUN for his characters. Thinking of that, I have recently decided to start using more his original art as point of reference whenever I want to draw any of the Touhou girls.[/SIZE]

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[SIZE=12pt]Ø  [/SIZE][SIZE=12pt]DISCLAIMER: I absolutely do not hate the original ZUN style. I think it is very unique, and it has evolved and improved quite a lot over the years. Plus, it is quite to be appreciated that he can also drawing, given that the main games are basically done by a one-man army.[/SIZE]

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[SIZE=12pt]However, I have also noticed a bit of a problem, which might be one in general with Touhou art. Everything looks so ambiguous, while I also do know that ZUN has his kind of "no fanservice" policy. Which, as I was talking about in the past, has led to people judging us, the Touhou fans, as pedophiles or "loli lovers" in the most extreme of cases, while people generally wondering why our characters look so much like children, even when we come with the arguments like "she is (supposed to be) x hundreds/thousands of years old". In a way, I was concerned that Touhou might have also given birth to the "thousand year old loli trope", which just made things worse. It is interesting how fans tried to "fix" his art (be it by drawing safe things or not), even if the fan art going at times more towards the fan-service area. We even have a meme about how fanart is much better than the original art - it is good, but the original needs credit too, since the fan-art would not exist had there not been an original to start from[/SIZE]

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[SIZE=12pt]I know that drawing the characters as more mature or outright adults is also an option in your own style, while also implementing some of the design choices ZUN came up with, one that I actually like a lot and try to use more. Only problem I have noticed until now is that reactions from those you will show then the images tend to be mixed, from people appreciating them to making the whole upper-mentioned statement about Touhou fans even more than before, saying that we are so desperate to legitimize our liking for a child-looking-like character by making them look closer to their supposed ages.[/SIZE]

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[SIZE=12pt]In a way, up to this point I have ended up picking characters for drawing that are either canonically adults by this points (ex Akyuu who is known to be born in 1994) or someone who could work well in a more adult and mature form (ex Eiki Shiki and Iku Nagae). However, I am wondering how I will do with other characters, even if some like Yuuka, Junko and Hecatia will actually work rather well with that vision set in mind.[/SIZE]

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[SIZE=12pt]Anyway, back to the point. Besides the "no fanservice" rule, why do the ZUN characters look the way they do? I find it interesting how much of a difference there is between the main games and spin-offs art, and how much of a contrast there is between his original style and the closer to anime vibe given by, for example, the fighter games.[/SIZE]

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[SIZE=12pt]But what do you think on the topic? Which is your favorite art style among all Touhou games, what is your experience with it, and what clarifications, corrections or opinions would you bring in relation to the original problem stated?[/SIZE]

 

[Gensokian Loser]

I'm so used to ZUN's art, and I'm still conflicted as to my opinions on it. I think I'm not a fan, but I'm trying not to realise that, haha. However, I do respect that he doesn't sexualise every character. No issue with people drawing characters like that, but I'm kinda sick of how so many anime girl are made to be sexualised more than they are made as actual characters, it's quite degrading. Anyway, off tangent!

Touhou generally has a lot of ambiguity in it, with the character lore and relationships, too. I think ZUN realises the fandom love having their own headcannons, that's why the fandom has so much fan work!
The ambiguity of age I think is like that too, but unintentionally. I think ZUN just doesn't know how to draw characters of different ages differently, so many of them are up to interpretation. 

But yes, even if a character is a 100 years old, if you draw them child-like, I do not want to see lewd art of them. But otherwise, what's wrong with drawing child-like characters? As long as you're not lewding them, there's really no issue.

 

[CountVonNumenor]

But otherwise, what's wrong with drawing child-like characters? As long as you're not lewding them, there's really no issue.

There is not too much of a problem with it. To be fair, it coud also be a bit of cultural shock on my side too. I still find it odd to see an extremely old character that looks like a 10-year-old, when usually in my culture such characters are usually portrayed like very old hags. Plus, sometimes people end up looking up weirdly at you if you like a character that looks that young, especially when you are a 20 years old guy who is supposed to have got a gf by now. 

Otherwise, not too much of a problem. Personally. I just think I got to appreciate more mature characters recently. I guess it is more of a matter of personal taste. And since, just as you said, Touhou is quite vague and allows for fan interpretation/fanon, I like drawing some of the characters looking closer to adults/older. Hope I don't have to face people who'd argue why I am depicting them as more mature though, since that would be rather stupid.

 

[jssf1992]

Hmm, only a couple of things I think I could say here.

First, drawing is hard, especially drawing humans (humanoid in this case), and getting good enough to get the less obvious signs of age down well enough to utilize it is extreme.  ZUN seems to prefer building the games on his own, and so this is part of the deal.  That said . . .

ZUN is actually pretty good on the design.  Characters have distinguishing features and gimmicks, and if you're interested Touhou, it's actually surprising how quick you can learn to recognize the characters.  Also, in my experience at least, an overwhelming majority of the fanart keeps the characters in there cannon outfits, and are usually instantly recognizable (to the Touhou fans of course), which I think indicates that ZUN is actually pretty good at coming up with the ideas, even his portraits aren't good.

 

[CountVonNumenor]

Hmm, only a couple of things I think I could say here.

First, drawing is hard, especially drawing humans (humanoid in this case), and getting good enough to get the less obvious signs of age down well enough to utilize it is extreme.  ZUN seems to prefer building the games on his own, and so this is part of the deal.  That said . . .

ZUN is actually pretty good on the design.  Characters have distinguishing features and gimmicks, and if you're interested Touhou, it's actually surprising how quick you can learn to recognize the characters.  Also, in my experience at least, an overwhelming majority of the fanart keeps the characters in there cannon outfits, and are usually instantly recognizable (to the Touhou fans of course), which I think indicates that ZUN is actually pretty good at coming up with the ideas, even his portraits aren't good.

I will not deny. It is impressive how consistent ZUN has stayed with his style, and with the newer games it only got better (I really like the style in Touhou 18, and fanart of old characters of his redrawn in the style of UM actually look very good). Drawing is indeed difficult (something that gives me nightmares at times when trying to do something), but ZUN has managed to not only constantly draw in a unique style, but also do that while basically doing everything in creating the games. 

The only thing, most likely due to proportions, is that the characters look younger than they are supposed to be. Sometimes it is hard to draw a woman (I have the same problem), and even with a certain meme related to "how to ZUN art", his stuff is not so bad. Only that anime and Japanese media in general is filled to the brim with kids and underanged-looking characters doing things they are too young for (both things adults would normally do and...you know what). And due to the artistic proportions used by ZUN, it is not hard to put his characters on the same category, from where a multitude of more offensive jokes towards Touhou fans. And the fans perpetuating this by drawing the 2hus as even younger, engaged in lewd activities does not help at all (speaking of which, where did this sort of practice in drawing even come from anyway? Is it a Japanese thing?)

Also funny thing. I don't know if it is just me, but Remilia's stage battle sprite in EOSD makes me feel she is taller than she looks. She might indeed not be very tall, just like in the cutscene sprite, but her battle sprite seems to have closer proportions to that of a real woman. Or maybe I'm just hallucinating, and trying to justify the idea not all 2hus are little girls. Plus, I am perfectly aware characters like Seiga, Junko and the Watatsuki sisters were/are married and have/had children, so I can imagine them as fully fledged women (unless tradition shenanigans and marrying someone while still being very young). Suwako is also implied to have had descendants, since Sanae comes from her bloodline if I remember correctly. 

 

[CountVonNumenor]

I think we can connect this thread to the one related with ages. Especially since I think the specific ZUN style does not help convey too well any intended age, or whatever he wanted to say through it. Not that the rest of official non-ZUN art (anything done by other artists who have collaborated with ZUN for supplementary official works) helps making justice on that matter most of the time

 

[CountVonNumenor]

Without trying to be mean, whenever I think of ZUN's art stile, there's a chance this meme comes to my mind. Quite an old image, but a mirror into how the fans though about the art process many years ago. 

 

[Gou the frog]

I've never really understood Zun's style for a whole year. But as time pass, drawing is not his strong suit yet makes recognizable portraits and characters. He is the master of handling the lore and designs, of course, we can't leave his music out of this either.

Like you said he improved with his style but there seems to be "proportions" that seems to make the characters looks young. Hence, the run of the mill meme of how Zun draw his characters.

I'm really fond Zun's style. To be frank, I can't draw a young looking lady without adding a couple of digits to her age. So, I kinda went into Parsee mode every once in a while. His Pc-98 ones aren't bad. They even look cartoony in my eyes at least. A lot of over customized character designs don't really stand out. Sure, this can very on people preferences and the appeal is there I suppose. But Zun has the charm and it's well executed.

Without trying to be mean, whenever I think of ZUN's art stile, there's a chance this meme comes to my mind. Quite an old image, but a mirror into how the fans though about the art process many years ago. 

This one genuinely make me laugh. 

 

[Tayaya]

But what do you think on the topic? Which is your favorite art style among all Touhou games, what is your experience with it, and what clarifications, corrections or opinions would you bring in relation to the original problem stated?

I prefer the art style in the fighting games (mainly AoCF). As for the abundance of "loli but actually 500 years old" characters, there's no fanservice in the games so it's completely aesthetic and is not like the only place where kids are used for this. Take the twins in the Shining for example. They are only 10 and nobody is after Stephen for adding them so the same should go for characters like Remilia and Youmu where they just happen use child-like as a characteristic. The only problem for this is when (pedo)fans make inappropriate fanart of them and they should be ridiculed instead of Zun or the fandom as a whole.

 

[CountVonNumenor]

there's no fanservice in the games so it's completely aesthetic and is not like the only place where kids are used for this.

This is actually an interesting point, which I tried to prove in another topic, or, if possible, find breaches in it. Not out of pettiness, but from a bit of a thought process to see if the idea applies flawlessly or not (spoiler, it doesn't, especially with the official stuff not done by ZUN himself). The aesthetic used by our lovely game programmer & beer enjoyer ZUN makes for an interesting canvas from where people to create their own interpretations of the characters if they seek so. Because to me, his characters really do tend to look more or less like dolls, be it intentional or not. 
 

I've never really understood Zun's style for a whole year. But as time pass, drawing is not his strong suit yet makes recognizable portraits and characters.

Probably I have had the same problem as you did. But if there is one thing ZUN really knows how to do well, that would be creating recognizable characters. Even if there are moments like this one (expressed through a meme)...

Welcome to the red-white-purple club!

 

Like you said he improved with his style but there seems to be "proportions" that seems to make the characters looks young.

He really did improve over time. It is not for nothing we have gone from this...

(oh, EoSD Sakuya, you sure are a special kind of creature)

... to this (now with rainbow knives)
 

The only problem for this is when (pedo)fans make inappropriate fanart of them and they should be ridiculed instead of Zun or the fandom as a whole.

That one seems to be a way larger problem than we think of, once coming from cultural differences and shock when going from western to east-Asian values. I mean, Japanese artist draw inappropriate art of the child forms of the 2hus like it is any other casual subject. And again, like I said in the fanservice thread, same act of drawing the 2hus like that would be a capital offence, punished by the penal code in both the US and my country for example. But I guess it is like that saying: "sex sells", and so you can do nothing about it. It's interesting though how Touhou has become though one of the series receiving most "fanservice" online, even if the official art is very much the polar opposite of it. I guess the logic would be "if official art can draw the 2hus in swimsuits (thank you, Silent Sinner in Blue), why should we not take it a step further and go full nude?". But more on that in the actual thread...

 

[CountVonNumenor]

To be frank, I can't draw a young looking lady without adding a couple of digits to her age.

Honestly, I suffer the same problem, just the opposite way. For me, my design end up looking much younger than I wanted. 

In a way, up to this point I have ended up picking characters for drawing that are either canonically adults by this points (ex Akyuu who is known to be born in 1994) or someone who could work well in a more adult and mature form (ex Eiki Shiki and Iku Nagae). However, I am wondering how I will do with other characters, even if some like Yuuka, Junko and Hecatia will actually work rather well with that vision set in mind.

Which ended up in this little paragraph, but about which I said my 2hus look a bit too young for my original vision on what I want to draw. But back to ZUN, shall we?

 

[CountVonNumenor]

In the fashion of my previous few replies, I will just bring up some discussions I have found similar to my question, and whatever people tried using in order to defend their arguments and reasoning. 

Keep in mind, the whole argument between these smooth brains started due to a joke: "I mean "your search history has a lot of Touhou hentai in it" kinda applies to all of them pretty sure". However, i will only get to the relavant stuff

Spoiler

Reply 1: I mean this argument is pretty old and inconsequential by now, so if you don't care that's reasonable, but I felt like contributing anyway I don't know. I don't really agree with the points of other person you were arguing with either to be clear, but I thought some things were a little confusing.

Aren't these characters just... drawings in the end? like while I agree that some characters can and do behave and look like children, and were written to be children, I think with a lot of characters its more ambiguous. Body proportions, bone structure, etc. can vary a lot based on the artist drawing them. I imagine every individual artist draws the characters differently according to their own headcanon of their age and the details of their appearance. In addition, ZUN's somewhat simplified artstyle (and tons of other artstyles in general) makes it difficult to get any real sense of age from the original illustrations, because they're not exactly photorealistic and can have exaggerated features or details left out. (e.g., pretty much all anime-style art has exaggerated eyes, which could be considered a child-like feature. However, I don't think people could argue that all anime-style characters - including ones that otherwise seem like adults - are children based solely on that exaggerated feature, as ultimately it's a stylistic choice and not a realistic depiction). In other words, it seems really weird to me that you'd be able to pin down a specific age from the appearance of a stylized drawing, or even from their body types considering how much body types can vary among adults.

Additionally, in terms of mental age, it's even more ambiguous and unclear. Levels of maturity can vary widely among adults (I'm pretty sure the heated arguments in this very comment section should be evidence enough for that) [*Based - editor's note], even adults of the same age can act pretty differently, so it's kind of weird to look at how a character acts and say, "oh yeah, that character is definitely fifteen". There's nothing to say they aren't a completely different age, just like with their physical appearance, it's impossible to pinpoint whatsoever. (This really only applies to characters like Sakuya though, I do think there is a point where it's pretty clear a character is a child and has the mind of a child, but don't think you can say with any certainty for most of them). If you think of the characters as being that age, that's fine honestly -- I don't mind, it's your personal perspective and its valid. It's just odd to state it like an objective truth (e.g., "most are mentally and physically children"), instead of a subjective perception that you have of them. I think the best part though was claiming that the characters had the physical chemicals of children/teens. How would you get that idea? Do you have blood samples of all the Touhou characters or something? Do you know the chemical compositions of their bodies? How on earth would you prove that? If you do know the chemical compositions of their bodies though somehow, please go contact your nearest nuclear research lab, I'm sure they would love to know what chemical process allows Utsuho to perform fusion on such a compact level, it would be a massive breakthrough.

Reply 2: First of all, drawings affect people. Art affects society. Art and it's motives are influential. Second of all, there's something called an age range with Touhou characters. The protagonists are most likely in their teens, ranging from 13-17 or something like that. Its quite obvious by their body type and attitude that they are somewhere around that age. While I agreed adults and kids can have different levels of maturity, when it comes to characters its usually just stuck to a specific age group. ZUN can draw breasts but he only does it with the older characters but this depends on the sprite as well. Sakuya's age is debatable but I'm arguing she's a teen because that's her age range. In the wiki it states she's between 10-20 physically and mentally, but the wiki isn't always a reliable source, it makes sense considering Reimu is theorized to be 10 at the time of EOSD as well, but Sakuya also uses time manipulation to keep her at a young age, so it's a little difficult to know the EXACT age. I'm not saying the exact age either, I'm just estimating. I wish I could get blood samples of Utsuho, that would be risky but cool. The characters such as the fairies, Chen, Nitori, Flandre, Remilia, etc. Are clearly children. The way they act and word things as well as their body structure and height clearly indicates they are children, that was 100% intentional in their design. How about you go touch grass instead of crushing on little girls? Art influences people, especially if the media romanticizes such things, including loli. There are multiple studies and laws proving it is harmful and disgusting, including Japanese Psychologist Akioshi Saito who claims his patients who are offenders consume loli on the daily, proving that they would rather fuel their desires than create an "outlet".

 

[CountVonNumenor]

There has been a video which caught my attention recently. It is not about the 2hus we are all so familiar with, but the miscellaneous drawings ZUN has done over time. They are all available on the wiki, and I might cover each in a different thread. Until then though, I would like to focus on a specific one, and the description ZUN wrote for it:

"Zun008.JPG" (2001/05/20)

Translated Name: Blonde Shrine Maiden From a Future Era

I wanted to draw a "poster shrine maiden."
My original concept was to truly draw a sultry, adult-looking shrine maiden for once.
No, really. (^^;
But it turned out to be a young girl. (lol)
It's just that since I was drawing a poster girl, I wanted something that would grab and entice
with vivid colors and a subtle expression on the girl.
But I guess it's a pointless picture. (^^;

I honestly find it funny that ZUN actually tried drawing an adult, but still ended up with a child. Or how someone put it into a joke (paraphrasing now), "even when ZUN wants to draw an adult, he still ends up with a loli" ("legal loli"/woman with small breast size or small in stature or not, this is left to be interpreted by the viewer). Even if I said I will only cover a single one, there is one more I would like to point out the text for:

"Zun006.JPG"

Translated Name: Training on Mt. Haku

This time I drew a shrine maiden in the middle of training.
Even though mountains are usually off-limits to females.
So she's training to ease the desire to go there as a last resort.
Or just training in general, like a shrine maiden does.
Hmmm, I'm starting to draw more properly. But anyway, I don't really like
doing anime-style coloring so I used a more hand-drawn method.

When I saw that, I initially thought he was referring to overall drawing in anime-style, but I see it is not more about coloring and I guess shading. Still a little bit of an insight about the way ZUN decided to draw his characters.

Anyway, for anyone interested, the video is here. I might create a separate thread at some point to bring here all the images that also have a description, as they depict quite an interesting part of the evolution in artstyle (especially since many of these predate EoSD and might be called an evolution towards what would end up in the official games we all know and love). 

 

[CountVonNumenor]

The only problem for this is when (pedo)fans make inappropriate fanart of them and they should be ridiculed instead of Zun or the fandom as a whole.

Unfortunately, most of the time, maybe due to ignorance, it ends up ridiculing everyone from that fandom for such behavior, and not just the individuals who caused the problem. Therefore, the reputation Touhou can get every now and then due to high contrast between the way ZUN draws his stuff and the way fans represent it afterwards. 

Again, like I said in the miscellaneous ZUN illustrations reply just above, it was funny that he said he tried to draw an adult, but still ended up with a child. I am not making this up, it's from the notes for illustration "Zun008.JPG".

 

[CountVonNumenor]

I mean if we complain about ZUN's art style, I think it would be just as fair to talk about the rest of the official art as well. This time, I will not go for low-hanging fruit like The Grimoire of Marisa and its infamous art style, and will instead just focus on inconsistencies, with a clear example found in this wide shot from Silent Sinner in Blue. The comments have been added by another user long ago, to whom all the credit goes:

It's almost as if the artist was not very bothered about the use of perspective. By now, I really should not be complaining, but actually have a little bit of fun with stuff like the giant fairies or fanon's favorite "tiny Eiki, tall Komachi" getting reversed. As for "Yuuka is a giant", more of that please.  I find this image funny overall. 

 

[Nekoko]

I mean if we complain about ZUN's art style, I think it would be just as fair to talk about the rest of the official art as well. This time, I will not go for low-hanging fruit like The Grimoire of Marisa and its infamous art style, and will instead just focus on inconsistencies, with a clear example found in this wide shot from Silent Sinner in Blue. The comments have been added by another user long ago, to whom all the credit goes:



It's almost as if the artist was not very bothered about the use of perspective. By now, I really should not be complaining, but actually have a little bit of fun with stuff like the giant fairies or fanon's favorite "tiny Eiki, tall Komachi" getting reversed. As for "Yuuka is a giant", more of that please.  I find this image funny overall. 

This example is really funny but I guess the artist who draw that didn’t have time to draw the perspective sketches and draw the scene directly without paying much attention.

We can see that the characters have been drawn in a simplified way, which implies that the artist didn’t want it to be perfect 

 

[EberryCookie]

[SIZE=12pt]Ever since I joined the fandom, one of the things that caught my attention is the unique artstyle adopted by ZUN for his characters. Thinking of that, I have recently decided to start using more his original art as point of reference whenever I want to draw any of the Touhou girls.



Ø [/SIZE][SIZE=12pt]DISCLAIMER: I absolutely do not hate the original ZUN style. I think it is very unique, and it has evolved and improved quite a lot over the years. Plus, it is quite to be appreciated that he can also drawing, given that the main games are basically done by a one-man army.[/SIZE]

[SIZE=12pt]

However, I have also noticed a bit of a problem, which might be one in general with Touhou art. Everything looks so ambiguous, while I also do know that ZUN has his kind of "no fanservice" policy. Which, as I was talking about in the past, has led to people judging us, the Touhou fans, as pedophiles or "loli lovers" in the most extreme of cases, while people generally wondering why our characters look so much like children, even when we come with the arguments like "she is (supposed to be) x hundreds/thousands of years old". In a way, I was concerned that Touhou might have also given birth to the "thousand year old loli trope", which just made things worse. It is interesting how fans tried to "fix" his art (be it by drawing safe things or not), even if the fan art going at times more towards the fan-service area. We even have a meme about how fanart is much better than the original art - it is good, but the original needs credit too, since the fan-art would not exist had there not been an original to start from



I know that drawing the characters as more mature or outright adults is also an option in your own style, while also implementing some of the design choices ZUN came up with, one that I actually like a lot and try to use more. Only problem I have noticed until now is that reactions from those you will show then the images tend to be mixed, from people appreciating them to making the whole upper-mentioned statement about Touhou fans even more than before, saying that we are so desperate to legitimize our liking for a child-looking-like character by making them look closer to their supposed ages.



In a way, up to this point I have ended up picking characters for drawing that are either canonically adults by this points (ex Akyuu who is known to be born in 1994) or someone who could work well in a more adult and mature form (ex Eiki Shiki and Iku Nagae). However, I am wondering how I will do with other characters, even if some like Yuuka, Junko and Hecatia will actually work rather well with that vision set in mind.



Anyway, back to the point. Besides the "no fanservice" rule, why do the ZUN characters look the way they do? I find it interesting how much of a difference there is between the main games and spin-offs art, and how much of a contrast there is between his original style and the closer to anime vibe given by, for example, the fighter games.



But what do you think on the topic? Which is your favorite art style among all Touhou games, what is your experience with it, and what clarifications, corrections or opinions would you bring in relation to the original problem stated?[/SIZE]

me personally ive gotten so used to his art style i just see all the characters as children or young adults so its weird seeing them look adult. but because they all look like children any amount of sexualization is gross to me. it was definitely weird for me seeing patchouli not look like a child in lost world and also the fact that lost world clearly has a wee bit of fan service in the sprites its just weird to me.

i like ZUN’s art style though it has a lot of charm

 

[CountVonNumenor]

me personally ive gotten so used to his art style i just see all the characters as children or young adults so its weird seeing them look adult. but because they all look like children any amount of sexualization is gross to me. it was definitely weird for me seeing patchouli not look like a child in lost world and also the fact that lost world clearly has a wee bit of fan service in the sprites its just weird to me.

Greetings. I am happy to see that my thread is still sparking interest, so much time after I published it. For the past handful of years, I have not been so much in touch with ZUN's art, so I do not know how much it has changed since Touhou 19. As for the way it is, I just have to accept it and feel at peace with that just being his art style (more props to him). As for what LostWord did, it's been almost 2 and a half years since I stopped playing, so I lost any touch with what is going on in that game anymore.