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Japan is awesome for origami, and hell, they ought to, they invented the freaking thing! And so here we have a video of someone doing the Eva 01 from Evangelion with a single sheet of paper. It looks terribly complicated and at some points my mind cant comprehend the difference between careful folds and just crumpling the fucking paper around but the end result is pretty impressive, considering its a single sheet of paper.

[JP]

This painting above, made by Japanese artist Hisashi Tenmyouya, sold for over $615,000.00 USD at a Christie’s art auction in Hong Kong. The artist describes the painting as such:

I produced this painting for the exhibition, “GUNDAM: Generating Futures,” which was held at the Suntory Museum from July 15 to August 31, 2005. The work was later exhibited at the Ueno Royal Museum and other venues. In Japan there are many “Gundam-Otaku’s,” and their adoration of Gundam is intense. Therefore, I did not want to change their image of Gundam. By changing Gundam’s “mobile suit” to tattoos, I altered his body, and made him even more customized. I emphasized the very concept of the “mobile suit,” and by setting Gundam against a background of gold leaf from traditional Japanese painting, I emphasized Gundam’s samurai origins.

Tenmyouya has actually created more works in this vein combining Japanese pop culture to traditional Japanese art, you can see more of his work on his personal website.

Now if only I could convince someone that my notebook sketches of Princess Zelda eating a triforce sandwich are worth a tenth of what this went for…

[Bloomberg]

Note: We’ve been informed that Gurren Lagann won’t be dubbed, only subbed. Good news!

Note 2: Ok false relief, the series will indeed be dubbed althought the cast has not yet been announced.

Someone finally picked up Gurren Lagann in the US. The Sci-Fi Channel will be airing Gurren Lagann on Mondays starting late July. The show will apparently be aired in one hour blocks during the Ani-Monday block. I have to say it though, this has mixed feelings all over it.

We should be ecstatic that someone other than Cartoon Network picked it up, just imagine the whole Naruto-Bleach demographic taking on a liking for Gurren Lagann in full scale. Actually don’t imagine it, its too painful. Then again its going to be dubbed and like most American dubs, it will most likely suck. It will also be localized to a certain extent and that could go either way, when anime gets Americanized it can be pretty traumatic. Bottom line is that having more people experience Gurren Lagann can’t be bad, its like a punch to the face for the tired spirit. Spin on!

[ANN]

An ASU engineering student presents his capstone robot project, but instead of a boring, run-off-the-mill delivery what you get is perhaps the most intense engineering presentation you’ve ever seen. All of this done to the music of Gurren Lagann, using GL visuals and even paraphrasing the show. Sometimes anime works its way into everyday life, under the radar, and it works marvelously! It even begins with a little red robot.

I can barely listen to what he’s talking about but I’m still really excited, arent you?!

$742,000,000.00 is a big amount of money but when you think about the possibilities of owning your own giant functional Gundam it starts to look reasonable. I mean, who’s gonna mess with you when you have a 60 feet tall robot? Takayuki Furuta, director of Japan’s Future Robotics Technology Center did the numbers and came to the $742 million magic number. Such a budget would get you a robot with $372 million in propulsion engines, a cockpit with panoramic screens and a hull made completely out of….. titanium. You know, because Gundanium doesn’t exist.

The man didn’t run the numbers in vain either, he plans to build one, not a 60 feet tall one mind you, but a much more budget conscious 13 feet one.

[Wired]

Some media leaks on information regarding Tokyo’s International Anime Fair 2008 have confirmed that a theatrical version of Gurren Lagann is indeed in the works and will be officially announced in the April issue of Newtype magazine.

There, I said it, now sit back and enjoy the afterglow of the otakugasm you most surely just experienced. No more information is available but you can expect more details to surface once April’s Newtype comes out, which will be on March 10. So you’ve got 6 days to fantasize about it but you can be sure we’ll keep you updated once anything becomes available.

[ANN]

In a recent symposium held by Japan’s Ministry of Defense a conference took place and caused great controversy. Titled “Towards The Realization Of Gundam“, it sparked a lot of discussion on the feasibility of an actual program to develop a Gundam as a defense system, however the expo dealt more with the development of technology which are used in Gundams but for developed for other purposes, such as a functional exoskeleton and better armor materials.

While the prospect of fighting with giant robots in space seems pretty damn awesome, warfare isnt so much about things hitting other things as it is more about building things that can efficiently throw things (usually explosive) at other things. Too many things and not enough giant robots says this humble writer.

[tobeASIAN]

A recent investigation at the Japanese agriculture ministry revealed that all that hard work their staff had been putting on the computer wasn’t exactly about making more geometrically modified watermelons. It was much more about giant earth-saving robots.

The 6 staffers this investigation focused on had apparently spent countless work hours editing Gundam articles on Wikipedia, about 260 of them. The staffers received a stern talking to (which is the Japanese equivalent of punching your mother in the face) and Wikipedia was banned from all of the ministry’s computers. Then a ministry official released the following revealing statement:

“The Agriculture Ministry is not in charge of Gundam.”

They should just send them to work with Taro Aso, the declared manga otaku and maybe form the Ministry of Gundam, it’s long overdue.

[Tokyomango]

FIGHT DA POWAH!

(I’ll try to keep this as free from spoilers as possible)

Read more!

For those excited about the Gundam Crisis ride that features a life-sized Gundam, which opened at the end of July, here’s a Japanese TV report on it.

As you can see the thing is huge, yet there is a lot of attention to detail, which is great so it doesn’t just look like a gargantuan toy. The ride costs 800 yen and once inside you are given a special device which you take inside the Gundam to complete missions. You do this by sticking the thing into mission stations along your path. The overall story, as far as I know, is to get the Gundam ready for deployment and if you actually manage to finish every mission you get to go into the cockpit and watch a video reflecting your tremendous efforts to save the day.

It might be bigger, but that other giant replica still has a special place in my heart.

[Danny Choo]

The most recent edition of Newtype Japan announces that Petit Eva: Evangelion @ School, the chibi styled series which places Evangelion characters on a high school setting, will be made into an animation. Adding to the money making strategy of Gainax, this series is sure to generate more money than many small european countries.

Petit Eva takes place on Nerv School where not one, but 3 Rei Ayanami “sisters”, a really small EVA-01 as well as an even more helpless Shinji are under the command of teacher Misato and principal Ikari Gendo (aka most badass principal ever).

The video adaptation will inevitably lead to an onslaught of merchandize based on these characters, which already appear on the Evangelion Doritos we saw a while ago. There is no stopping Gainax now, they have Akihabara under their command.

[Petit Eva Official Site]

There is a current exhibition running  by Tokyo’s J-art Project completely dedicated to Evangelion inspired art/merchandise. The exhibit features some old classics like the Evangelion angel dishes and utensils to official merchandise from the Evangelion Store. But the pièce de résistance is this you see above, a human sized replica of the spear of longinus. The exhibit ends tomorrow with an auction of the spear no news if the spear will be auctioned along the muscular lady with the mischievous look.

[Shibukei / Via ANN]

Fresh off the tubes comes this shaky and really low-fi video of an airing of a trailer for ReBuild of Evangelion. That’s Hikaru Utada singing a new version of Fly Me to the Moon, she will also be lending her voice to other tracks of the new Evangelion movies.

As shitty as the quality is, seeing some original Evangelion content in so many years makes it worth it.

Big films and expensive stunts, they go hand in hand, specially in Japan. For the opening of the new Transformers movie Franz Harary, a famous magician, is going to transform the Tokyo Big Sight convention center into a giant robot.

Now thats one fucking bold statement if I’ve ever heard one. The Tokyo Big Sight is also famous among otaku for hosting Comiket, Japan’s biggest otaku convention. This is like a magician turning Rome into a giant crucifix, it could only be better if he turned Tokyo Big Sight into a giant loli.

[ANN]

Evangelion paraphernalia never ceases to amaze me, a while ago we had the bike, today we have these, the official Evangelion Headphones. This pretty puppies are a collaboration between Chara-Ani (who make all kinds of Otaku stuff) and Audio-Technica, which apparently are “pretty damn good” from an audiophile point of view.

They also come in the official evangelion colors of purple, green and orange, which just happen to be the same as our colors! We should buy a whole lot of evangelion merchandise, rebrand it and sell it as official Dark Diamond merchandise. We’d make a killing, and frankly we need the money, the Champagne and private jets dont pay for themselves.

Thanks Django

[Akihabara News]