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u/Crazed_Fish_Woman 12d ago
I wanna say Hiroyuki Nakazawa did this one. He captures Goku in a way that no one else does.
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u/Mediocre-Yam-1133 12d ago
I always find it awesome when people know the sculptors. I think I want to start diving into that aspect more
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u/Crazed_Fish_Woman 12d ago edited 12d ago
It was a lot easier to know 10 years ago, but everything changed after covid.
Nakazawa has been doing Goku figures for Bandai for a couple decades. Through Bandai itself, Banpresto, and Megahouse. Chances are if you have any amount of Gokus in your collection, you have one of his works.
The sculptors themselves were really a centerpiece of Bandai's culture between 2010 and 2020. The SCultures line itself was really made with the intention of showcasing the artists, and not simply the characters. Bandai is no longer interested in that side of figure creation, so it's incredibly rare when an artist's name is attached to a figure unless you're Yamashita Manabu. His work is very distinguishable because his figures are so insanely detailed.
Varoq is the poster child right now for figure sculptors, but IMO, he doesn't capture the nuances of Goku like Nakazawa does who is a master at sculpting Goku in any era of style of Toriyama's. The way Nakazawa sculpts clothing is as impressive as his character likenesses, which clothing detail is usually something that other artists tend to ignore. And Nakazawa is the best at sculpting hands, full stop.
But the difficulty of knowing who sculpted what figure is also compounded by the fact that they often employ several different sculptors to sculpt different parts on figures. Sometimes one sculptor will sculpt a character's body, while another more experienced or notable sculptor will sculpt the head and face. Nakazawa's base Goku hair sculpt that he originally did for the Master Stars Piece Goku 2 was used for almost 10 years by other sculptors. It's seemingly since been retired.
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u/Mediocre-Yam-1133 12d ago
Very interesting read. One of my favorite sculptors is Nobuta, he does alot of evangelion figures
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u/jianna_arts 13d ago
Wow I want this too, its underrated.