Courtesy of Autobase Aichi Facebook we have our first images of the amazing Transformers 35th Anniversary Exhibition held in Japan.
As we had reported before this event is being held at the Parco Musem in Ikebukuro, Japan from March 15th to Monday, April 1st, 2019. As we had expected this is a very impressive exhibition including:
- An great room full of Transformers decoration and great dioramas of the live-action movies. Official merchandising and books are also available for the visitors.
- A room full of prints and drawings of Japanese Transformers art. Packaging art and special illustrations of characters from the classic G1 toys and the Japanese exclusive series: The Headmasters, masterforec and Victory.
- A great selection and display of Transformers toys from all generations: G1, G1 Japanese exclusives, G2, Siege, and the new MP-44 Convoy (Optimus Prime) 3.0 and MP-45 Bumblebee 2.0
- A special Bumblebee The Movie display, showcasing a huge Bumblebee statue and full of several Bumblebee movie toys.
- A special section of old Transformers prototypes. Some incredible samples, including a wooden prototype of Galvatron, mock-ups, resin samples of Sixshot, Japanese Godmasters (G1 Powermasters) among other treasures.
Click on the bar to see some key images mirrored on this news post and sound off your impressions on the 2005 Boards!
erika3
News about the book?
DoubleClouder
Same here
Digger
Ah that’s bogus. But salute to you for informing us at such great a cost.
onnsake
No, it seems to use the Legacy stuff as a source too. I don't think there's anything in the Japanese book that's not in Legacy except for really tiny reprints of the toy catalogs.
The Japanese book has smaller dimensions and crams more characters on to a page, so the art is smaller too. Like I said, I kind of regret picking it up now.
Moy
Movie? What did you see?
Thundershot
Well mine already shipped from amazon japan. No going back now
Digger
Doesn’t the Japanese book have more art?
DoubleClouder
That's kinda disappointing. I have one on order from Amazon.jp. I'll keep it but I was hoping for the same quality as the Legacy book to be honest.
Avon
Thanks for taking the plunge on behalf of the rest of us at least – that’s good info to know!
onnsake
Since this was bumped, I just wanna point out that I compared the book to the Legacy hardcover, almost page for page.
In just about every way, the Legacy hardcover is superior. So I'd recommend that or the upcoming paperback version of it.
Only get the Japanese book if you're some kind of hardcore completionist. I rather regret buying it now, but oh well.
Gaokaiser
シン@トランスフォーマニア on Twitter
Gaokaiser
https://twitter.com/TF_pr/status/111628623160680857
Nagoya PARCO Version pics.
DoubleClouder
The TF art that was the same as the Diaclone art, most were actually copies that were then air brushed to add Autobot symbols and other changes.
onnsake
Oh, I forgot to mention my favorite piece of the exhibitL
The package art for the Japan only Transformer Grandus. Now you may remember seeing Grandus in a TF guide here or there. He was one ugly big brick of a figure. I mean, sometimes we call a toy a brick to be mean, but this thing was literally just a damn brick.
It's rare, which makes it expensive, but that doesn't make it cool in my book.
What IS cool however, was the packaging. I'm gonna borrow Botch the Crab's image to give you an idea:
That's an awesome pic, but in person it's just breathtaking. It's just a gorgeous example of early 90s Japanese mech-anime aesthetics applied to perfection. The actual piece, which I could see the brush marks on, extends beyond this….you see buildings and cities and every little window in these giant buildings are an individual dot of paint.
Most of the stuff I saw today was cool….THIS piece belongs on permanent display in a museum.
It's in the Legacy book but the details are just a bit sharper in the new Japanese book. Sadly, neither truly capture the "grandness" of the real thing. Groan. Sorry. Puns suck.
Oh, and another thing….the Prowl artwork had no autobot symbols and had Diaclone written on his shoulder badges. Was that art used for Diaclone? We'll have to ask Maz I guess.
All right, one last thing, I swear….the coolest part of seeing the original art was was mixed media…meaning paint, pencil, whiteout to cover mistakes or to add shimmer. The Soundblaster art had this lovely gold lining to his inner mechanics that sadly did not translate to the printed pieces. Same with Prowl's pistons on his inner leg….it almost looked three dimensional in the original painting.
The more I think about it, the more I'm glad I stopped in there today.
onnsake
https://www.amazon.co.jp/ART-TRANSF…+transformers&qid=1553690201&s=gateway&sr=8-1
Also, it looks like Legacy is being reprinted as a paperback, so there's options for everyone!
Avon
Oh cool, I didn’t realise there was a book! Don’t suppose you happen to have a link to the amazon Japan page? No worries if not, I’ll have a dig!
Digger
Good for you man.
onnsake
Well, I said I wasn't gonna go, but I was kind of in the area today, so I said "why not?"
Other posters have described it pretty well, so there's no need to reiterate, but I will back up the opinion that the coolest thing was seeing the original artwork up close. Some of them were facsimiles, but some were the genuine, hand drawn and painted originals used on the packaging. You could tell cause they were behind glass and also, you could SEE the brushstrokes and white out! Very very cool.
I'm a sucker so I ended up buying the book even though I already have Legacy. Looks to be mostly the same but I just got home and haven't done a page by page analysis. Some stuff that's NOT in Legacy, I'm fairly sure….so if you missed out on that one a few years ago just get this book cause it's cheaper and it potentially has more content. All in Japanese though, but hey, there's not that much text.
Lots of old toys were on display and that's always nice, but I'm spoiled by living in Tokyo cause we get to see a lot of this ultra rare stuff in Mandarake all the time.
MP 44 Convoy was on display….looked handpainted to me….he looks very nice from the front.
MP 45 Bumblebee was right next to him. I'm sorry guys, there's no easy way to put this…..it's ass. It just sucks. It's so ugly I'm embarrassed for the designers' moms who have to admit their sons worked on that thing.
There was some movie stuff too, cause it was promoting the Bumblebee movie, but I ignored all that. Not my thing. Gift shop was neat…lots of unnecessary crap for us to waste money on. And I did. Cause I'm a sucker.
Anyway….my verdict is GO if you're in Tokyo or are passing through Tokyo, but don't go out of your way to see it cause it's not really a life changing thing. The book is available on Amazon Japan, too. They ship books internationally, no?
Cykill 1
They should\'ve had at least a couple of bot from every line displayed. I think that would\'ve looked cool and more inline with the 35 years of Transformers theme.