Topic: Do you wish Ayami Kojima was back?

[Lumi Kløvstad]

Ayami Kojima should grace us all with renditions of the cast of Lords of Shadow.

That is all I have to say at this point.

[Ridureyu]

The Dawn of Sorrow art switch was... odd, to say the last, although there are two things that I'm fine with.  Dmitrii looks really unique in his art style, and I dunno how well Jokima could have done somebody so blocky.  And the other is Julius - his Aria of Sorrow art looks... justa little off. He looks like a woman in stage makeup and with a fake beard; I think it's something around the eyes, but he reminds me of Julia Roberts's disguise in Sleeping With the Enemy.

[VampirehunterB]

He said "with my own personal captions"

oh..my bad=p

[X]

I will say out of all the images done by Ayami Kojima, the only one that even looks remotely manly enough is Hammer from AoS. It must be the bald look...

[Sumac]

Dunno about Julius. He always looked very manly to me, comparing to most of her other Belmonts. Though, given apperances of Simon and Juste - its not saying much.

[crisis]

Julius is actually Hammer in disguise.

[VampirehunterB]

Julius looked ok in AoS, but she updated him really good in HoDespair!

[Nagumo]

Dunno about Julius. He always looked very manly to me, comparing to most of her other Belmonts. Though, given apperances of Simon and Juste - its not saying much.

Simon just looks like a female body builder?

[VampirehunterB]

I have never understood and will never understand this interpretation of her illustrations being so feminine. I think she clearly distinguish the masculine and feminine features correctly.

[Flame]

look up "Bishounen".

Yes, she differentiates them, but they still look highly stylized and sometimes effeminate.

[Ridureyu]

Some of her men are affeminate, plenty aren't. It varies from work to work. I love her art, but I think she was phoning it in for Juste.

...Juste was hers, right?

[Nagumo]

I think only her early artwork had lots of men with effimnante faces. It's because of the faces that people often mistook Alucard and Juste for girls I suppose. However, from CoD onwards that is no longer the case and you can see Kojima improved over time. When looking at her artwork from Hodespair you can clearly distinguish Soma and Alucard as male.       

[Inccubus]

Anyone else reminded of Yoshitaka Amano by Ayami's art? I mean, Ayami puts more detail into the art, but both have a somewhat fluid art style and both draw the human figure similarly, I think. I dunno, I just see Vampire Hunter D and Final Fantasy in Ayami's art. Locke, Setzer and Edgar had very girly figures.

In a word; no. I could say a lot more, but I don't feel like it right now.

[crimsonmist]

sure, she gave us castlevania art at its prime: mysterious, dark-toned, astounding...

[Odile Kuronuma]

Anyone else reminded of Yoshitaka Amano by Ayami's art? I mean, Ayami puts more detail into the art, but both have a somewhat fluid art style and both draw the human figure similarly, I think. I dunno, I just see Vampire Hunter D and Final Fantasy in Ayami's art. Locke, Setzer and Edgar had very girly figures.

This again? Ok she might have said that she admired Amano's art when she started drawing, but NO her art isn't similar in any way to Amano's. First she likes to use strong contrasts between light and shadow, Amano doesn't. His art looks like it doesn't have shadows at all.
Secondly, she draws the human body in a more realistic way than Amano. The proportions as well as the body types are more close to reality than in Amano's work. Only the faces are drawn in a fantasy way, with idealised figures. Yoshitaka's drawing of the human body is just isn't realistic .
The way she paints is also different. They both use acrylics, but Amano uses very dilluted paint that looks almost like Watercolor.Kojima on the other hand uses dilluted paint, but since she uses sfumato a lot (it's the blury spots in her paintings) she must use two layers at the least. Also she likes to use thickened Acrylic paint for her backgrounds, as well as modeling paste, to give texture to the painting.Lastly she uses a glossy medium or varnish to give her paintings a glossy look.I'm pretty sure Amano doesn't since he uses very dilluted acrylics and sometimes even watercolors.
If anything, her work is more close to the painters of the Italian Renaissance because she uses the Sfumato and because she likes to idealise the human figure.
How do I know all this? Because I tried to copy works made by Kojima and Amano, and I can tell you that their styles are completely different from each other. Also Kojima's way of drawing and painting is a lot more challenging than Amano's.
You might find some similarities in the themes, especially now that Kojima works with the creator of Vampire hunter D. But it's just because they seem to like the same universe, with Kojima being more attracted to gore ,and Amano being more Fantasy oriented.