An interesting thread I stole from another board: Anime faces

No. Yokkyun is at least an 8.

Perhaps it's because of the clash of artstyles (Yokkyun being a fictional character within a manga) but I think she's pretty Uncanny Valley.

Aren't 8 and 9 just super chibis?

I'd be fine with all of them, but honestly 8 and 9 are, well, "magical girl's cute mascot fairy thing". You know, something for cute little humanoids, not actual humans.

In any case, I'm rather inclined towards styles 1 to 5.

7, 8, and 9 are way too much.

The first four or five could all honestly be in the same series of art styles, just depicting different ages. 1 comes off as middle-aged, upper 30s. 2 is more like upper 20s. 3 is getting to low 20s, upper teens. 4 reaches mid-teens, where 5 is low-teens or pre-teen.

But, as for my preference... probably 2 or 3. Just enough accuracy in anatomy to keep things down to earth, yet cartoony enough to avoid this uncanny valley of realism. 3 really fits the Phoenix Wright art style, which is probably one of my favorites, so that may be why.

Though honestly I'd take more outrageous looking characters and designs than any of that.

Actually, I think none of these look too animesque. They simply took a western-style realistic drawing at first, and then made caricatures of it with increasinly larger eyes, abusing the stereotype that "anime mean larger-than-life eyes" but in actual shows, there is a lot more to the specific art styles than that. So 1-4 are just ggeneric western drawings, 7-9 are some unholy abomination from a parallel dimension, and 5-6 are somewhere in-between the two, but none of it appears in anime like this.

For example, even the largest anime eyes have barely any eyelashes, while on these drawings, they are exaggerated along with the irises, until they are floating in the air like Disembodied Eyebrows. Also, none of the hair looks particularly animesque either. the first ones are too smooth and fluffy, while the latters are too messy and pointy, as if it would be a 90's male shonen protagonist's hair. Actual unrealistic anime hairs for girls tend to by stylized by several very straight, very thin, mostly parallel lines, with at most only an ahoge standing out, and not the chaotic mess on the latter picctures.

edited 10th Dec '11 3:54:29 AM by Ever9

Some anime styles DO emphasize the eyelashes, especially in the 80's to 90's period. Take Houshin Engi for example.

Same goes for the hairstlyes. Different artists have different ways of drawing heavily stylized hair.

edited 10th Dec '11 4:11:05 AM by Anarchy

If it's good, it's good. That's all I care about, really, and series need to find a style that suits it.

- What you said about the ages actually somewhat made sense. But do people eyes get smaller/face get longer over they grow older? You think it be static after they are 18 or so.

- Yes they took a realistic western drawing for the first picture. But there are subtle shift involving other features besides the eye. Notice how the nose slowly reduce in size as the numbers goes and disappears by 6 or 7. There is the chin (is that what lower line beneath the mouth is?) disappearing earlier, and the thick eyebrow turning into a single by picture 3. Proportions also get more stylized as we go along, like the shortening of the forehead and face in general which results in the Puni Plush style by picture 6. TL;DR version - Of course its a generalization of sorts, but its more than just the eyes.

That said, I never came across no 8 or 9, even in chibi style. Maybe just not this style of eyes.

edited 10th Dec '11 9:17:10 AM by kalandra

@kalandra: I wasn't thinking of moe / GAR / whatever. (Note that I placed Crayon Shin Chan at 11.) That Fist Of The North Star example was pretty off, though. My bad.

edited 10th Dec '11 9:24:16 AM by Pyrite

Probably 2 - 5 for me.

@35

For some reason I'd really like to see a clip of K On in that 60's style.

edited 10th Dec '11 7:46:38 PM by Pokénatic

As someone who's new to anime, I'd actually be interested in seeing more shows with a low number. (I like the way faces are drawn in the clips I've seen from Akira, and that seems pretty low-numbered here—at least, lower-numbered than most of what I've seen.)

edited 10th Dec '11 7:57:50 PM by feotakahari

3-5 normal 1-2 tries to look american 6 - 7 looks like a Fairy Folk from some fantasy series 8-9 is suffering....

5-6

and I'd rather take 9 than 1, that one is just fuuuugly

Lets see low number shows, the Pastel manga is a 2 or a 3 [1]◊ maybe 3. the original Gundam guys were like a 1 and girls were about a 2.

Hidamari Sketch hits 7 or 8 at times [2]◊

Where would Sugar and the other fairies from A Little Snow Fairy Sugar be on this scale?

7-ish for the whole show

8 for just the fairies

edited 10th Dec '11 11:35:14 PM by kthxbyeII

1 or 2. 3 is fine in some areas.

I think I've figured out 8 and 9.

They're not eyes. They are wide open maws waiting for the right moment to lash out with their prehensile tongues and pull you in, to your Doom - those white areas are not actually reflections, they're very sharp teeth.

'60s-'70s Mio. '80s looks off compared to the real thing, if it were actually '80s art, it would be better.

1-6 depending on anime. 2-3 are best.

edited 11th Dec '11 12:52:36 AM by TheStupidExclamationMark

Ghost in the Shell is the closest to 1 I can think of.

(the Majors a 2, Batou is a -1).

Also put me down as another 2-3 as being the ideal.

I think I've seen 1 in a few works by Satoshi Kon (Perfect Blue and Paranoia Agent in particular).

I'd count Vagabond as a 1, TBH. Can't think of any others which might qualify off the top of my head. (Possibly Lone Wolf And Cub?)

edited 11th Dec '11 8:28:18 AM by Pyrite

I don't think Vagabonds art can be categorized into the fairly simplistic art styles shown in this picture.

I can tolerate all the way up to five. Maybe 6 in the right context.

I'm going to assume this is just an increasing eye-face ratio or something. In which case I think my drawing style is actually a 1.

edited 11th Dec '11 8:59:52 AM by annebeeche

i think some josei works are 1-2s
Nodame Cantabile comes into mind

edited 12th Dec '11 8:19:32 AM by CommanderObvious

Vagabond(the manga) is a 1.

And yes there are mangas in the 1-2 range.

edited 12th Dec '11 9:29:42 AM by TheWesterner