Huke (Anime Artist)

Huke is a professional illustrator from Japan and while I do not personally draw anime based artwork, he is still a huge influence on me and my artwork. His character designs are out of this world, which is saying a lot as the anime industry slowly becomes more and more stale from a design perspective. The amount of detail in his work is incredible and his darker, grittier and more detailed style make for some of the best anime-based illustrations I've ever seen, if not the best. I even went out of my way to get a copy of the Steins;Gate "Official Materials" art book as the artwork from the game totally blew my mind.

If you're interested in more of my opinions and to see some of his amazing work, continue below. Pictures are courtesy of Zerochan, my number one stop for anime wallpapers and artwork.

Okabe Rintarou, Steins;Gate Volume 1 Blu-Ray cover

Makise Kurisu, Steins;Gate Volume 4 Blu-Ray cover

My interest (And now obsession) with Huke's artwork began shortly after the Black Rock Shooter OVA was released. Before this, a few figures and models caught my eye, but I never thought to have a look at the original illustrations as I really didn't expect anything special. Boy was I wrong.

Shortly after completing the anime of Steins;Gate, I immediately went out to find out more about the original character design. The characters in the show were unique compared to what I usually see in anime and manga and it really peaked my interest in finding out more about who designed them. When I found out that it was the same artist who designed the Black Rock Shooter characters, I was pretty much settled on him being a great character designer, but that isn't where it ended. He didn't just design characters for shows and games... He made character design into an artform as it should be.

Insane Black Rock Shooter

Dragon Slayer

It may sound like I'm being a bit harsh. Isn't all character design an artform?

Unfortunately, character design (Especially within the anime industry) as I mentioned in my first paragraph has become quite stale. It feels like characters are being churned out with no real passion or attention to detail. What we've ended up with is an absolute ton of characters that have no differences beyond hair color and eyes (Possibly bust size if we're talking females). While the problem isn't huge and we still do have plenty of good character designers, I find Huke to be a "Step above the rest".

I want to make this clear right now, art is a purely subjective view, like music. While there is no denying a good artist, where I absolutely love Huke's work, somebody else may prefer another artists. I feel the need to clarify this.

Hashida Itaru, Steins;Gate

To conclude, I really hope to see more of Huke's unique artwork and designs in the future. I will continue to try and find any artbooks and illustrations to add to my collection, and I highly suggest that if you like his work as much as I do, then you do the same.