DBZ Production Guide \ Toei's Rules for Merchandising.

[Tanooki Kuribo]

I was watching this extra on the DragonBall Z Season 8 blu-ray set that talked about merchandise, and surprisingly they showed off their style guide. This is usually never seen by the public, so seeing what they had in it was really a rare treat, well at least for me! If you're unfamiliar with what a Style Guide is, here's a quick explanation:

A Style Guide is a book companies have that is full of something called "production art" which was created solely for the purpose of putting on merchandise, or to use for promotional purposes. It also has a brief explanation of who everyone is, what their relation is to everyone else, some back story, their power ups... etc. The information portion is usually so people making the merchandise don't put, for example, Saiyan arc Vegeta fighting along side Boo just because he was (is?) a bad guy. A Style Guide could range from one sheet of paper to a phone book sized monster! I'd imagine a Pokemon Style Guide is huge, while something like Frozen, where you notice they use the same art for almost every piece of merchandise, is very small. Here's a very small look at some of the images FUNi has, you'll notice it's categorized by story arc!



It was really awesome seeing all this stuff and learning about some of the behind the scenes things we wouldn't have otherwise have known about. Like how Toei didn't want FUNimation capitalize on the "Over 9,000" meme because it was a mistranslated. All this was great, but what really peaked my interest was the rules. I don't know why, but I was really into what rules Toei gave FUNimation for using their characters on merchandise. They have about 5 pages of rules. I took pics with my phone but, the words are a bit blurry and hard to read:




At this point I coulda' just left it at that. Fine, the pics are blurry and hard to read, I'd just move on with my life and tons of people wouldn't even know it existed. But no. I'm a little crazy and decided to reproduce the rules section as best as I could for the sake of an open discussion! The only thing that's different is the images. I don't have these images so I used images that were as close as I could get. Also, the reproduction I did is word-for-word so when you see "catalouge", it's not a typo I made, it was a typo Toei made and I left it as-is just to be that similar.

So, now I give you~ Toei's rules for FUNimation when making merchande:







Also, I understand the words might be too small in these reduced images, so here's a link to the full sized pages.

[Adamant]

I'd imagine a Pokemon Style Guide is huge

Part of the BW style guide got leaked a while ago, it particularly concerns itself with how the characters are to be represented rather than specific use of artwork.
Amusingly it has a tendency to simplify things down to the point of outright lies, like a note saying that human characters must never be depicted eating anything resembling meat products, adding that the anime always depicts food as either fruit/vegetables or vague masses of food that can't be identified as anything in particular... which isn't true at all, but it's easier for everyone if they just lie and pretend it is.

It was really awesome seeing all this stuff and learning about some of the behind the scenes things we wouldn't have otherwise have known about. Like how Toei didn't want FUNimation capitalize on the "Over 9,000" meme because it was a mistranslated.

So where does this come from? It's not in the pictures you posted from what I can see.

[Tanooki Kuribo]

I'd imagine a Pokemon Style Guide is huge

Part of the BW style guide got leaked a while ago, it particularly concerns itself with how the characters are to be represented rather than specific use of artwork.
Amusingly it has a tendency to simplify things down to the point of outright lies, like a note saying that human characters must never be depicted eating anything resembling meat products, adding that the anime always depicts food as either fruit/vegetables or vague masses of food that can't be identified as anything in particular... which isn't true at all, but it's easier for everyone if they just lie and pretend it is.

It was really awesome seeing all this stuff and learning about some of the behind the scenes things we wouldn't have otherwise have known about. Like how Toei didn't want FUNimation capitalize on the "Over 9,000" meme because it was a mistranslated.

So where does this come from? It's not in the pictures you posted from what I can see.

Oh, sorry if it wasn't clear. It was something they mentioned in the feature. https://vine.co/v/eAVqXEvVqX9

[Herms]

All quite interesting. Thanks for posting this!

[songohan619]

I'd imagine a Pokemon Style Guide is huge

Part of the BW style guide got leaked a while ago, it particularly concerns itself with how the characters are to be represented rather than specific use of artwork.
Amusingly it has a tendency to simplify things down to the point of outright lies, like a note saying that human characters must never be depicted eating anything resembling meat products, adding that the anime always depicts food as either fruit/vegetables or vague masses of food that can't be identified as anything in particular... which isn't true at all, but it's easier for everyone if they just lie and pretend it is.

It was really awesome seeing all this stuff and learning about some of the behind the scenes things we wouldn't have otherwise have known about. Like how Toei didn't want FUNimation capitalize on the "Over 9,000" meme because it was a mistranslated.

So where does this come from? It's not in the pictures you posted from what I can see.

Where can I see that Pokèmon Style Guide?

[DragonBoxZTheMovies]

Thanks for putting this all together! I love this sort of behind-the-scenes stuff. Very fascinating little insights.

Might actually have to seek these Blu-Rays out at some point...it seems like they all have a pretty substantial set of extras- by FUNimation DB release standards, anyway.

[NitroEX]

Most of these rules just come down to common sense.

[VegettoEX]

Most of these rules just come down to common sense.

As someone who works in marketing and deals with design firms and various internal customers...

You would think so, but it's not to most people, and it's horribly depressing.

[Gaffer Tape]

Wow, thanks so much for reproducing these!

First off, as someone who sees these kinds of problems with fan works quite often, I was extraordinarily pleased that they specifically called out against flipping images and distorting the aspect ratios of images. And while I agree that most of these seem like common sense, there is one I'm having a hard time deciphering. I don't know if anyone could elucidate it for me, but what does it mean when they say "DO NOT MIX NORMAL IMAGES AND SPECIAL IMAGES"? Which of the two is the normal one and which is the special one? Do they mean not to mix Super Saiyan and non-Super Saiyan? Or is it because Gohan is a full-body image while Goku is cut off at the knees? And if so, again, which one is normal and which one is special?

[Fionordequester]

Some of you say it's common sense...but, some of these do actually confuse me.

1) Flipping the character image. Why does this matter if the image isn't different in any other way? (does it have to do with the way eyes tend to go from left to right, top to bottom when scanning a page)?

2) What does "don't use normal images with special images" refer to?

3) Why is it not okay to crop people's heads? I could see that being very handy for, say, selling special DBZ candy or something.

[Tanooki Kuribo]

Yea, when I was writing this up, I wasn't 100% sure what they meant by "special" and "normal" images. I'm thinking maybe they mean don't mix action shots with posing shots? And for no real reason other than it came up, here's the original image as it's shown in the book...

1) Flipping the character image. Why does this matter if the image isn't different in any other way? (does it have to do with the way eyes tend to go from left to right, top to bottom when scanning a page)?

If I had to guess, I'd say it's the same reason they don't flip (most) manga anymore. It distorts the art and also flips symbols and text that manufacturers probably won't even pick up on.

[Gaffer Tape]

Most of the time, unless characters are perfectly symmetrical, you can tell when it's been flipped. Goku's hair is a certain direction. Yamucha's scars are distinct to each side of his face. Tenshinhan's chest scar. Certain armor battle damage. Scouters. And, of course, the kanji. Not just the kanji itself, but where it is located on a character's body. Everyone knows that the Kame school-type dougi has the kanji over the left breast.

At any rate, when you flip the image, it looks incorrect and unprofessional.

And thanks, Tanooki Kuribo. It's nice to know I wasn't the only one who was a bit stumped by the special image one. I was beginning to wonder if I was really stupid.

[BlazingFiddlesticks]

No wonder Funimation could ask Toei for their season Blu-Ray cover mural, they already run everything they intend to put out by them!

Most of these rules just come down to common sense.

As someone who works in marketing and deals with design firms and various internal customers...

You would think so, but it's not to most people, and it's horribly depressing.

A couple of them raise questions in my mind, though; presuming, say, Shueisha has a similar policy, would Viz have had to have every cover of their American Shonen Jump checked, despite having distribution rights to all manga involved?

[Rukura]

It's equal parts sad, funny and ironic that Toei doesn't allow FUNimation to crop or cut off official artwork....and they present this information to the public in a feature that comes inside a release where ALL OF THE FOOTAGE IS CROPPED. And blurred to crap. How about a Style Guide for that?

[TheDevilsCorpse]

It's equal parts sad, funny and ironic that Toei doesn't allow FUNimation to crop or cut off official artwork....and they present this information to the public in a feature that comes inside a release where ALL OF THE FOOTAGE IS CROPPED. And blurred to crap. How about a Style Guide for that?

The style guide already addresses that, just like it addresses everything else. "In the event that you must crop and blur the product to crap, please kindly contact Toei Animation for approval first."

[Rukura]

It's equal parts sad, funny and ironic that Toei doesn't allow FUNimation to crop or cut off official artwork....and they present this information to the public in a feature that comes inside a release where ALL OF THE FOOTAGE IS CROPPED. And blurred to crap. How about a Style Guide for that?

The style guide already addresses that, just like it addresses everything else. "In the event that you must crop and blur the product to crap, please kindly contact Toei Animation for approval first."

Ah, my bad. And going by the Boo arc of Kai, that conversation went really well

[WhiskersTheWonderCat]

I don't know if anyone could elucidate it for me, but what does it mean when they say "DO NOT MIX NORMAL IMAGES AND SPECIAL IMAGES"?

I assumed that special images would be images from a video game or drawn by a different artist, where normal images would be from the anime. It would look unnatural if you mixed video game and anime images together.