Old artstyle vs New Artstyle 2.0

[emperior]

Yamamuro's modern stuff looks like he either drew every single line with a ruler or assembled a bunch of shapes together. Extremely flat and lifeless.

That’s exactly what if feels like. His lines are so damn straight it seems like he really uses a ruler, it’s terrible and it gives the characters that toys/lifeless look which surely doesn’t go well with the excessive use of highlights and stiff bodies.
Super looked like an action figures show under Yamamuro. I’m so glad it seems like now all he will do is Heroes work and some art for merchandise. His horrible modern art style has plagued Dragon Ball for too long,
The quote JazzMazz has posted above just couldn’t be more right. The majority of the fans of Dragon Ball truly have been washed because of how prevalent Yamamuro’s style has been in all kinds of DB mediums in the last 20 years or so.
It’s really sad to see people associating Dragon Ball’s look with those horrible models: it’s like people never watched Dragon Ball when it was under Maeda’s designs or never read Toriyama’s manga.
Luckily we now have Shintani who is like almost 1:1 to Toriyama’s manga. It will take some time, and a new weekly show will be what’s needed to really make people appreciate the style more, but eventually I am sure everyone will look back to Super and be like “what the hell was that?”... or at least I hope so.

[Metalwario64]

The quote JazzMazz has posted above just couldn’t be more right. The majority of the fans of Dragon Ball truly have been washed because of how prevalent Yamamuro’s style has been in all kinds of DB mediums in the last 20 years or so.

Ever since the post Jump Special animated works, I could tell tell that the modern designs looked very bubbly and off compared to the old stuff, but Budokai 2's intro was probably the first time Yamamuro's style outright looked "wrong" to me, but 3 looked a lot better, though still not perfect, so back then I didn't even think it was the same animator.

I really want to see Shintani work on a continuation of Super, and have Yamamuro as go back to being just a key animator and have his work be heavily corrected into Shintani's style, which would be ironic and have him come full circle, considering that's how he started under Shindou Pro, and ended up becoming himself. That might also help give him a fresh perspective on his art, and maybe push him to improve once again.

Honestly though, I highly doubt that as he's seemed for so long that he's just burnt out and in it for the money and not the passion, considering he admitted to only really watching his own series and being unaware of the rest of the industry, and the staleness and stagnancy of his current art, along with an overall sloppy attempt at anatomy just makes him seem like he doesn't care anymore.

[Attitudefan]

Oof... Yamamuro's latest work is truly awful. And yes objectively it is incorrect. The fusion dance one has shading all over the place that makes no sense: Goku's shading on his hair has light coming from underneath while Vegeta's lighting comes from above.... awful. He's got to be phoning it in by now. Not only is he overexposed to the franchise, working on it far too long and getting stale, him being pushed aside surely has affected his work ethic. He probably feels spited being the number 2 guy now.

It kinda annoys me that the fan artists are just gonna switch over now to the new style despite being so gung-ho about Yamamuro's awful designs for the last 20 years. It's like early Dragon Ball and the other various styles didn't exist except for the Buu-Super era style.

Rant aside, Shintami's work looks great!! Love the style and really reminds me of Toriyama and the manga, especially around Freeza but with a modern twist. It's really capturing what is timeless in Toriyama's art.

Also MetalWario, I really like your positive POV on this. It's really sad to see a legend fall from grace. Maybe he will get inspired by his collegue(s).

[KBABZ]

Also MetalWario, I really like your positive POV on this. It's really sad to see a legend fall from grace. Maybe he will get inspired by his collegue(s).

I agree. For all my complaints about modern Yamamuro, I did really like his aesthetic back when it was fresher in the late DBZ/GT stages of the show. Heck even the boxart for Kai was pretty good!

[Attitudefan]

Also MetalWario, I really like your positive POV on this. It's really sad to see a legend fall from grace. Maybe he will get inspired by his collegue(s).

I agree. For all my complaints about modern Yamamuro, I did really like his aesthetic back when it was fresher in the late DBZ/GT stages of the show. Heck even the boxart for Kai was pretty good!

From someone who's not as big of a fan of it, I still appreciate the aesthetic of his work during the Broly era and thereabouts. I actually really like his artwork for the episodes with Trunks and Goku meeting for the first time. They have a really cool look to them: very sharp and gritty.

Life can be funny, and if it is giving Yamamuro a curve ball, perhaps something great can come out of it later.

[KBABZ]

Also MetalWario, I really like your positive POV on this. It's really sad to see a legend fall from grace. Maybe he will get inspired by his collegue(s).

I agree. For all my complaints about modern Yamamuro, I did really like his aesthetic back when it was fresher in the late DBZ/GT stages of the show. Heck even the boxart for Kai was pretty good!

From someone who's not as big of a fan of it, I still appreciate the aesthetic of his work during the Broly era and thereabouts. I actually really like his artwork for the episodes with Trunks and Goku meeting for the first time. They have a really cool look to them: very sharp and gritty.

Life can be funny, and if it is giving Yamamuro a curve ball, perhaps something great can come out of it later.

I think Yamamuro needs a kick up the bum personally. I'm not sure if it's a coincidence, but I feel that animating on Super AND doing all the promo art for Dragon Ball (such as the cover and Arc Posters for FighterZ) probably stretched him too thin and he got used to how he had to work under that sort of pressure.

[Lord Beerus]

Honestly though, I highly doubt that as he's seemed for so long that he's just burnt out and in it for the money and not the passion, considering he admitted to only really watching his own series and being unaware of the rest of the industry, and the staleness and stagnancy of his current art, along with an overall sloppy attempt at anatomy just makes him seem like he doesn't care anymore.

You summed it up perfectly. I think Yamamuro is just burned out from working on the same franchise for so long. And the lack of willingness to evolve his style because it's still being seen as Toei as acceptable to varying degrees had lead to him phoning it in simply because its more pragmatic for him as he being called to work in every area -- TV shows, promo material, movies, DVD/Blu-Ray box art etc.

[Baggie_Saiyan]

Oof... Yamamuro's latest work is truly awful. And yes objectively it is incorrect. The fusion dance one has shading all over the place that makes no sense: Goku's shading on his hair has light coming from underneath while Vegeta's lighting comes from above.... awful. He's got to be phoning it in by now. Not only is he overexposed to the franchise, working on it far too long and getting stale, him being pushed aside surely has affected his work ethic. He probably feels spited being the number 2 guy now.

It kinda annoys me that the fan artists are just gonna switch over now to the new style despite being so gung-ho about Yamamuro's awful designs for the last 20 years. It's like early Dragon Ball and the other various styles didn't exist except for the Buu-Super era style.

Rant aside, Shintami's work looks great!! Love the style and really reminds me of Toriyama and the manga, especially around Freeza but with a modern twist. It's really capturing what is timeless in Toriyama's art.

Also MetalWario, I really like your positive POV on this. It's really sad to see a legend fall from grace. Maybe he will get inspired by his collegue(s).

That will never ever happen. He supervised Takahashi for the final DBS episode, it didn't affect Yamamuro. His old deisgns were shoved in his face but he ignored. He has seen all these movie designs also hasn't changed anything, beautiful flowy hair repalced by bricky stuck on with glue hair!

You'd think with all that he'd improve but he's just gotten worse. It's why he needs to GTFO the franchise, he has had too many chances. But somehow he is still around.

[Attitudefan]

Oof... Yamamuro's latest work is truly awful. And yes objectively it is incorrect. The fusion dance one has shading all over the place that makes no sense: Goku's shading on his hair has light coming from underneath while Vegeta's lighting comes from above.... awful. He's got to be phoning it in by now. Not only is he overexposed to the franchise, working on it far too long and getting stale, him being pushed aside surely has affected his work ethic. He probably feels spited being the number 2 guy now.

It kinda annoys me that the fan artists are just gonna switch over now to the new style despite being so gung-ho about Yamamuro's awful designs for the last 20 years. It's like early Dragon Ball and the other various styles didn't exist except for the Buu-Super era style.

Rant aside, Shintami's work looks great!! Love the style and really reminds me of Toriyama and the manga, especially around Freeza but with a modern twist. It's really capturing what is timeless in Toriyama's art.

Also MetalWario, I really like your positive POV on this. It's really sad to see a legend fall from grace. Maybe he will get inspired by his collegue(s).

That will never ever happen. He supervised Takahashi for the final DBS episode, it didn't affect Yamamuro. His old deisgns were shoved in his face but he ignored. He has seen all these movie designs also hasn't changed anything, beautiful flowy hair repalced by bricky stuck on with glue hair!

You'd think with all that he'd improve but he's just gotten worse. It's why he needs to GTFO the franchise, he has had too many chances. But somehow he is still around.

I agree. I think either way, he leaving or improving would be good for the franchise. I'm no fan of his work, never liked his designs. If he doesn't imrpove I can see him retiring from the franchise for good and there's nothing wrong with having younger talent take over at the helm with fresh new ideas.

[majinwarman]

Oof... Yamamuro's latest work is truly awful. And yes objectively it is incorrect. The fusion dance one has shading all over the place that makes no sense: Goku's shading on his hair has light coming from underneath while Vegeta's lighting comes from above.... awful. He's got to be phoning it in by now. Not only is he overexposed to the franchise, working on it far too long and getting stale, him being pushed aside surely has affected his work ethic. He probably feels spited being the number 2 guy now.

It kinda annoys me that the fan artists are just gonna switch over now to the new style despite being so gung-ho about Yamamuro's awful designs for the last 20 years. It's like early Dragon Ball and the other various styles didn't exist except for the Buu-Super era style.

Rant aside, Shintami's work looks great!! Love the style and really reminds me of Toriyama and the manga, especially around Freeza but with a modern twist. It's really capturing what is timeless in Toriyama's art.

Also MetalWario, I really like your positive POV on this. It's really sad to see a legend fall from grace. Maybe he will get inspired by his collegue(s).

That will never ever happen. He supervised Takahashi for the final DBS episode, it didn't affect Yamamuro. His old deisgns were shoved in his face but he ignored. He has seen all these movie designs also hasn't changed anything, beautiful flowy hair repalced by bricky stuck on with glue hair!

You'd think with all that he'd improve but he's just gotten worse. It's why he needs to GTFO the franchise, he has had too many chances. But somehow he is still around.

I agree. I think either way, he leaving or improving would be good for the franchise. I'm no fan of his work, never liked his designs. If he doesn't imrpove I can see him retiring from the franchise for good and there's nothing wrong with having younger talent take over at the helm with fresh new ideas.

I think Heroes is a place for Yamamuro to phone it and enjoy his way of drawing characters. I think Toei Animation knows now that people love Shintani and hopefully stay with him when Super returns eventually.