quote:
Originally posted by Doddler:
From what I could tell of sales at animethon, very few artbooks (of any kind) end up getting sold. Unless its based on something popular, people will just look at the pretty pictures and put it back down. I'm guilty of this to some degree too. But you have to look at it this way. At an anime convention, people are there first for the anime, and then merchandise for the anime they like. While they might look at some artbooks, thier interest lies else where. And for the most part you can't really collect artbooks here, since they're usually rare or expensive.I have to say, I like collecting things. I collect Anime, I collect Manga, and I collect anime figures. I'd probably get artbooks, but because they're so rare (around here anyways), I feel its not worth it. I'd probably pick some up though if the opportunity arised.
And I guess its also about practicality. You can watch anime, read mangas, and display your plushie army, but artbooks, you can go through it as much as you want, but its got limited content. I have to say my attention span is a bit short, so I don't dedicate much attention to something like that. Its just pictures. Now callenders, say, thats a good idea. Or perhaps a different medium to distribute the same thing.
Doddler
Well, I do agree with you to some extent. One thing I don't understand as a heavily Japanese-focused guy is...anime conventions, if people are there mainly for the anime like you said (and I presume you are talking about those anime showroom/theatre thingys), from what I read from schedules of various cons, the anime is nothing new and are mostly stuff you can readily buy or rent.
You may be right about people here not into collecting, which is why I am shifting the consumer base to Japan, where doujinshi fairs happens almost once every month and there are tons of avid collectors including myself; I blew at least a thousand bucks last year trying to get my hands on many of the world's most famous, best and rarest doujinshis.
I do agree with you about books having limited content and the attention span is short for many people. However, aren't *all* books (regardless if it's magazine, manga, comic, novel, etc) like that (especially porno mags)?
Calendars, nice suggestion, but they have a very short life span; if I can't sell them all within the year (within the first half of the year to some extent) they will become absolute garbage since if I make a 2003 calendar by jan01 2004 it will be totally useless. Even for something like 18-month calendar (something longer than a year) the later it gets sold, the less practical it comes (much less practical than books in my opinion). Books...they will sell in time as my reputation increases in Japan. However, for outdated calendars, even if I am the most famous artist in Japan, what can one do with a calendar with outdated months? Anyhow, the bottom line is that calendars are risky on my part financially (in producing it and making sure it sells). CD-ROMs is another option but I will not sell it here (and I will be pretty damn stubborn and adamant on this) because people here will not pay 10-20 bucks for CDROM while they are typically priced 1000-2000yen in Japan (there was a thread here about some guy complaining the borderline cdrom being too expensive for the contents inside)...and second (and more importantly), art thieves.
. So you’re making an adult bishoujo gmae yourself and will sell it in both the US, Japan and the rest of the world!? Cool!