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Post by Sir Galahad on Jan 14, 2014 12:10:33 GMT
Since i got into swords i always wondered, why are double edged straight swords drawn like this on cartoons? download/file.php?mode=view&id=15009almost every time a double edged straight sword appears on cartoons, be them asian or western, they are drawn with an inverted taper, a wide triangular point and a weird Y shaped midrib,. not even once in real live i have seen any sword with a Y shaped midrib, does anything remotely similar to this exists? if thats not the case, who came up with such thing and why? Attachments:
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Post by Vincent Dolan on Jan 14, 2014 12:21:44 GMT
As far as I know, such a thing doesn't exist in real life; the closest I can find is this Japanese ken, which looks similar. If I had to guess as to why it's so prevalent in manga and anime, I'd guess that it's a case of "drawing what they know": a katana is a single edged sword with a kissaki, and a Euro sword is basically a straight katana with an extra edge, so give it a second kissaki! At least, that's how I rationalized its appearance to myself. I have no idea why it exists, but it also seems to be more prevalent in older series than in newer ones; specifically, that sword is, unless I miss my guess, Tokijin from the manga/anime series InuYasha, which started serialization in 1996. Tokijin itself appeared in chapter 158, volume 16 from 2000, so it's quite an old sword, as far as anime swords go. Newer anime swords, on the other hand, at least as far as I have seen, trend towards a more generic straight blade with a diamond cross-section that runs all the way to the tip. The only recent sword I can recall using the Y-ridge is Better Half from Hataraku, Maou-sama and that's primarily an animation error, as stills and promotional images show Better Half as being a single edged sword. |
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Post by Sir Galahad on Jan 14, 2014 12:31:44 GMT
wow never seeen such a thing like that before, nice sword... yes thats tokijin, that was the first sword i could think of that had the characteristics i had on mind when writting that. well everything sounds good enough for me, ill stick with that...
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Post by ineffableone on Jan 14, 2014 12:48:40 GMT
I think it is about simplicity of drawing that way. It quickly gets across the concept of it being a dual edged blade. However not all are drawn that way. For example.  |
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Post by randomnobody on Jan 14, 2014 12:53:31 GMT
This being the most likely reasoning also brings to my own mind a minor nuance that's bothered me for years: most katana in anime, where the art crew even bothers do draw a yokote-like line, feature it at a bizarre diagonal much like were the sword half of the one pictured in the original post. Bugs the crap out of me, is it that hard to draw a line perpendicular to the edge? It's not even a matter of angles, it's in every angle. I can't be bothered to find an example right now but surely you kids know what I'm going on about, and have seen the same thing. :?
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Post by Vincent Dolan on Jan 14, 2014 13:18:06 GMT
I know exactly what you're talking about, Random. I've seen it so many times that that's part of why I have the above stated hypothesis in the first place. I think the only time a yokote line is actually drawn straight, when it's drawn at all, are in the extreme close-ups that focus on the kissaki, such as in this clip from a Rurouni Kenshin page showing a close up of Shishio's sword, Mugenjin:  Or this focus on the sakabatou from the same (even though such a sword, by all rights, shouldn't even have a yokote):  That was the only example I could think up off the top of my head, but you see my point. It's only ever straight in an extreme close-up of the kissaki, otherwise it's usually angled no matter the actual angle of the sword, and it's always bugged me, too. |
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Post by randomnobody on Jan 14, 2014 13:29:55 GMT
I'm having the darnedest time trying to find an example. Thought it'd be easy enough to just search the "katana" tag on Safebooru, but I'm into page 16 or so and have only found a couple dozen pictures where the tip is even visible, with the greater majority of those having no yokote representation at all, and the handful that do are as accurate as the art style would allow. I did find this picture of Suika from the Touhou universe that features probably the best overall representation of a katana I've ever seen in an illustration, it even alternates ito, which is hira-maki, (Edit: Actually, it might be tsumami, I'm having a hard time seeing it because my eyes suck) granted, but still:  Artist is tagged as "yamaneko_(lige)": safebooru.org/index.php?page=pos ... %28lige%29 I'm sure I've seen the crooked yokote I'm talking about in Bleach, among others, but I don't have any Bleach to go through right now. Edit: Just noticed that artist has another picture of another Touhou character (one I've never heard of, but I'm not into Touhou so that's probably why) with a very nice looking kogarasu-maru type. (Kissaki moroha-zukuri, whatever you kids want to call it these days; has a huge curve in the tsuka, even...I'm impressed.) There are only a few pictures by this artist on Safebooru, and i'm tempted to say it's a shame they're all Touhou...but whatever, they're really good.  |
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Post by frankthebunny on Jan 14, 2014 13:54:28 GMT
The first thought I had was that it was just exaggerated perspective/foreshortening. Because the tip of a sword would seem the deadliest part to most viewers, it would have more of an impact in a 2d setting if it were exaggerated. Although the Ken sword pictured above does have a reversed taper, I can't see how this fairly unknown blade type would have inspired so many artists drawing western style blades. If you just google "cartoon swords" in images, you'll see many examples of the op's subject right away. It's kind of like looking at the end of a sword through a fish eye lens. It may also be because most of the extremities of cartoon characters are often larger than they should be such as big feet with really large toes, bigger hands, big noses, and so on. At least on many of the more "cartoony" ones I also thought right away of one of my personal favorite examples of an animated sword that is often seen highly exaggerated. Just my 2 cents |
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Post by randomnobody on Jan 14, 2014 13:58:19 GMT
That's a perfect example of not just what I was trying to describe earlier (that yokote, what is it doing?) but another thing I thought of while looking for examples: that's some crazy saki-zori...and the weirdest part of it is, it's not uncommon.
Probably dead-on with the foreshortening. I'm personally still not really sure how the swollen tip got to be such a common feature in illustrated/animated swords, but it definitely is.
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Post by frankthebunny on Jan 14, 2014 14:13:19 GMT
I have watched the AS blu rays dozens of times and did a lot of pausing to see the details of his kat and it actually represents an o katana pretty well. There are a lot of distorted views throughout the scenes because the art is highly stylized but his sword really only has a fairly standard amount of sori and a regular chu or o-kissaki. I figure it has about 30-33" nagasa as he and his father seem like they're well over 6 feet tall.
The few real repros made had extreme sori but this was taken from the publicity images most likely.
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Post by Sir Galahad on Jan 14, 2014 14:16:32 GMT
i think its actually easier to draw double edged blades the way most of them are in real life, less lines, 5-6 straight lines vs 2 curved lines + 1 straight line, just like the he-man's sword you posted, you could even get away with 3 straight lines (type XV)
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Post by Sir Galahad on Jan 14, 2014 14:20:58 GMT
maybe the reverse taper is to give the sword a heavy look, after all, "swords are heavy" is conventional wisdom, any thoughts on this?
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Post by LemuelTheLemur on Jan 14, 2014 14:34:46 GMT
I think that's it mostly. An inverted taper makes a sword look broader, larger, and more heroic.
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Post by randomnobody on Jan 17, 2014 23:29:06 GMT
A recent review here of TFW's gladius reminded me of a point that I'd forgotten: a lot of gladii did actually widen toward the tip, which then cut back in at a very sharp angle. Perhaps this is the shape these swords are trying to reference? Doesn't really explain the Y-shaped grind, but nevertheless.
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Post by jlwilliams on Jan 18, 2014 4:37:41 GMT
It's simpler than many of us are making it. When you distort an image in a drawing, it creates depth. It's called foreshortening. In short, making the tip wider makes it come out from the back ground.
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Post by randomnobody on Jan 18, 2014 4:42:27 GMT
That works when it's pointing toward the viewer, sure; we've established that. The mystery is why it's still present from a sidelong angle.
I mentioned gladii because as I said, the review reminded me that some gladii did feature reverse profile taper, getting wider from the guard toward the tip. Might be that when an artist searched for "ancient sword" they got mostly this style of gladius and so went with that style scaled up, and the visual impact caught on.
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