Just a quick update, so you know I haven’t fallen off the face of the earth. I’ve been busy stitching a secret squirrely design for a Fantasy themed exchange I am taking part in; and while it isn’t due to be posted until mid-July, I thought I’d get it stitched and out of the way, just in case my life gets really hectic (i.e. I get a job and might need to move cities) and I don’t have time closer to the mailing date. I haven’t quite decided how to finish it yet… sort of going back and forth between a needlebook or a simple ornament. The design is 60×60,...

I am often reminded of how small a world it is. Helen McCarthy is the author of several excellent books on anime & manga; and her book ‘Anime! A Beginner’s Guide to Japanese Animation’ was one of the first books on anime I ever bought, almost 16 years ago while I was living in England. At the same time I bought several books of hers and have always appreciated her tireless work at promoting anime and manga back in a time when it was still very much a niche thing in the Western world. So when she recently commented on my blog, I knew I had to write about this… In mid-June this...

I decided to post this here because it merges two interests of mine, and may be of interest to others: Auckland Festival of Photography: As a Hero of Nippon Satellite Gallery presents an exhibition of photos by Mark Leonard Watts on display as a part of the sixth Auckland Festival of Photography from June 2nd – 13th 2009. This series draws on the stereotypical heroes of Japanese society; the idolized beautiful young girl and, soldier of the economy, the salary-man. Influenced by Japanese anime, Watts’ unique style of self portraiture suggests a desire to live vicariously through the...

I am sitting here cursing fate for killing my camera, and cursing myself for my own lamentable lack of being able to make a decision on which digital SLR camera I should buy. Why? Well was about to go and create photo albums of my anime & manga collection, only to realise that most of the photos are superbly out of date… and I have no camera to take new photos Oh well, I shall leave you with this slightly older image of my camera and go research (to death) the Canon EOS 50D, and somehow convince myself it’s ok to buy that instead of the much better Nikon D300 or Nikon D90....

Interesting article I came across this morning about three cases going to trial around the download of objectionable material, specifically, hentai. Censorship inspector Peter Pilley of the New Zealand Department of Internal Affairs reported on Wednesday that three cases of possession of “sexualized Manga cartoons (Hentai)” were about to go to trial. Piley talked about his department’s enforcement techniques during a meeting of the Netsafe organization for cybersafety education in Auckland. He cited the use of “proactive R&D” and a peer-to-peer tracking software called...