Creation and Conception
Takeshi Obata, the artist for Death Note, said that he had "a lot of fun" during the creation of the Shinigami. He also felt that the process was "very difficult" since he started "with nothing." He cited the difficulty in his creation of Ryuk as an example. Obata said that at first Shinigami appeared like "beasts" and that with later Shinigami such as Sidoh he designed them to look like crustaceans and insects because "it was easier." Obata said that he felt difficulty in basing characters on animal designs and keeping "the same feeling of the series." Obata said that he considered basing Shinigami on wizards but decided against the idea; he says that the rags on some Shinigami serves as a remnant of that concept. Obata added that Shinigami have no physical differences separating males and females; he says that he knew about the genders as he drew the characters and that the sole differences consisted of details added "subconsciously."
Obata said that he used "no real design motif" for the Shinigami Realm, and that he never settled on any concrete appearance; Obata described the Realm as changing appearance in each instance in Death Note, with it sometimes appearing as a dry field and sometimes appearing as a room "full of cookies." Obata says that he likes to think of the Shinigami Realm as "an abandoned building with chunks of chocolate sitting around." Obata said that he thought of the realm as being "inside something" and having a "claustrophobic feeling." Obata added that he would like to develop the Shinigami Realm further if it was used as the setting for a story.
Tsugumi Ohba, the author, said that when he first inserted the numbers representing Light Yagami's lifespan (as visible with the Shinigami Eyes) he created a "complicated math equation" that could determine Light's lifespan in human terms; he added that he forgot the equation. Obata created subsequent lifespan numbers.
Read more about this topic: Shinigami (Death Note)
Famous quotes containing the words creation and/or conception:
“We should always remember that the work of art is invariably the creation of a new world, so that the first thing we should do is to study that new world as closely as possible, approaching it as something brand new, having no obvious connection with the worlds we already know. When this new world has been closely studied, then and only then let us examine its links with other worlds, other branches of knowledge.”
—Vladimir Nabokov (1899–1977)
“The philosopher’s conception of things will, above all, be truer than other men’s, and his philosophy will subordinate all the circumstances of life. To live like a philosopher is to live, not foolishly, like other men, but wisely and according to universal laws.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)