twenty-one
21 Animanga multifandom
01-07
08-14
15-21
Ahhh I couldn't resist the nostalgia theme at somein30. I've had too many fandoms over the years to mix TV shows, films, anime, animated shows and games all in one post, so I settled on anime/manga only, since I've been on a major anime binge since September and there's no sign of stopping yet. I'd say this is semi-extra hard mode, since I included both fandoms and styles, but the styles are not in order ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ I wrote down a list of styles I remember doing, but I honestly couldn't tell you WHEN I did them since I only have my icons from 2014 onwards, and I started around... 2003. So I iconned fandoms chronologically, but styles are more mix-and-match for whenever they suited the image I chose to icon.
The rainbow effect over the entire post was something I felt I had to do, since I've been doing rainbow posts for a long long time and NOT having it in this nostalgia theme would be just... wrong. Also, I love doing rainbow posts.
Textlessness was not deliberate, but I think it does fit the style journey theme, since text is my nemesis. I even went back to check and apparently the last time I added text to an icon out of my own free will (meaning, not because it was a theme) was mid-2018, which sounds about right lol
Some ramblings about fandoms/icons under the spoiler tag!
[writing this took longer than making the icons]
1.
Fandom: Sailor Moon (1994-1995?) - my first one! If you count a bunch of 7-8 year old girls obsessing over a show airing on TV lol. But I do think it set me up for a life of fandomness.
Style: One of the first styles I remember using - cut out with a 2-3px white stroke, on a solid background. Usually there would also be a thicker white border and a 1px darker border around it, but since its 2020 not 2005 now, let's not do that anymore.
2.
Fandom: Slayers (2003-2004) - my first Actual Fandom. This was pre-LJ and I barely spoke English back then, so I mostly operated on message boards and tiny fandom websites... thankfully none of my icons from back then survive to this day, because they were Really Really Bad, Even For 2003. But that aside, Slayers fandom was one of my favorites to be in.
Style: A basic cutout + solid background + shadow is something I always default to when I have no special idea for a full-body image and this is what happened here too ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
3.
Fandom: Fullmetal Achemist (2004) - ahh, FMA. It's one of my favorite stories to this day, and I'm honestly a bit sad that I discovered it so early because it gave me unreasonable expectations for other animanga. I iconned the hellll out of it back in the day, but I think it was still before I joined LJ?
Style: Red-yellow-blue, my one true love when it comes to color schemes for single icons. When in doubt, go red-yellow-blue. I've used it a loooot over the years.
4.
Fandom: Bleach (2005) - I was totally in love with this manga up until it got really bad after the Aizen arc. But the early years were great, and I remember having a lot of fun in this fandom.
Style: This icon is an attempt at recreating something I used to do in late 00s that included contrasting light textures both in the background and on top... it used to look different, it embodies the spirit of that style I guess?
5.
Fandom: xxxHolic (2006) - discovering xxxHolic and TRC sent me on a massssssive Clamp bender, I think I read everything they ever released.... their mangas are kinda cliche and have way too many plot twists, but their storytelling is top notch. And the visual style of xxxHolic is just amazing.
Style: Ahhh manga coloring, my greatest iconmaking love. There is just something about taking a b&w manga page and turning it into a colorful icon exactly the way you want it to look... I wish I had more time for it, and my old tablet, which was way better than the cheapo one I picked recently. I remember making many, many icons that were just basic manga coloring with no textures/brushes/text etc, and that's what I did here.
6.
Fandom: TRC (2006) - same as above, since those two mangas are interconnected and I read them at the same time.
Style: Who else remembers the radioactive cyan/red colorings that were super popular around maybe 2007-2008? People shared .psds of the coloring so there were tons of icons that had the same exact values applied to them and they allllll looked nasty. I tried to recreate that but less... eyeburning. Also, textures with unreadable handwritten text and some random dots/lines were my jam back then and honestly I want to bring them back, I like this look still.
7.
Fandom: Tanemura Arina's mangas (2006) - the guilty pleasure fandom. Her mangas are so cheesy but at the same time, totally fun? I'm not super into the romance bits, but the plots and fantasy elements won me over. Doesn't hurt that the art is totally gorgeous and a huge pleasure to icon.
Style: I think this style was popular among animanga makers around 2010-2012 or so... very vibrant, few light textures, but overall simple and focused on highlighting the beauty of the screencap/artwork.
8.
Fandom: Gunnm (2007) - the fandom that was not a fandom, because this manga is criminally underrated. Idk if it had any significant popularity when it was published in English, but when I read it as it was published in my country, literally no one was talking about it here... which is a shame because it's GREAT. It started my love for cyberpunk.
Style: Around 2015-2016 I started using difference layers a lot... I discovered what happens when you set a layer with a white element to difference and it blew my miiiind. And then my mind was blown again when I checked what happens if you experiment with channels on the difference layer. So many colors! Still one of my favorite techniques to use when I feel like making something more complex.
9.
Fandom: Hikaru no Go (2007) - this was a time when I got into 2 sports mangas - HnG and Prince of Tennis. Chose to icon only one of them here, and I picked HnG because years later, I have a lot more sentiment for it than for PoT.... for a manga about tennis, PoT just got super weird in the end.
Style: Manga coloring + negative space. I don't really go for extreme negative space since it's tricky to use well, but then theiconquest started I REALLY wanted to get on those rogue points, so around that time I remember using this technique a lot. (TIQ, I miss u ;_;)
10.
Fandom: Tengen Toppa Gurren Lagann (2007) - ahh TTGL. The one anime I would recommend to anyone anytime, the visual style, craziness of the plot, and amazing characters just stole my heart. This wasn't really a fandom I got involved in (if there even was one, idk), but to this day I'm happy to see it mentioned somewhere so I think it deserved a spot.
Style: RAINBOW. Where a rainbow does not technically belong. I started doing this in tumblr posts around 2013 and then it migrated to icons, just making weird happy edits and adding rainbows to things.
11.
Fandom: Gundam 00 (2008) - this fandom was wiiild. I love all things sci-fi so I was into it from the start, but the memes that developed, theories, shipping drama.... I'm glad I was there for it. I don't remember iconing it much for some reason, but I was definitely invested in other parts of it.
Style: It happens a few times in this post, but in this icon it was deliberate - blending the subject with the background, both through coloring and lighting and just plain blurring/masking the edges of the cutout. I remember doing this a bunch around 2010/2011 maybe...?
12.
Fandom: Natsume Yuujinchou (2009) - I miss this fandom, it was as peaceful as this anime. I recall discussing episodes in a LJ comm as they aired, and there was never any drama or arguments, which was honestly refreshing, since the 00s were when the craziest fandom/ship wars happened.
Style: This was an attempt at recreating one of my earliest iconing techniques from around 2005/2006, in which every screencap/image got the same treatment: beige soft light layer, pastel blue soft light layer, merge all visible layers, blur, set as soft light. The result was a brownish blurry mess but I kept with that style for a solid year or two lmao. Obviously it's toned down here, and I picked a dark image so that it wouldn't get super washed out, but that is the style.
13.
Fandom: Kuragehime (2010) - I honestly have no idea how I got into this fandom, because I have zero interest in fashion or romance manga. And yet? The characters are so relatable and charming that I felt I had no choice but to fall into it.
Style: Another very early style, from maybe 2006-2007? A rough outline around the character made with polygonal lass tool, and a patterned background that matches the colors of the image. I used to always add the ubiquitous 3px-white, 1px-dark border but I don't think there is any way to make that look attractive so let's not bring that back lol
14.
Fandom: Pandora Hearts (2010ish...?) - I... don't remember what this was about. Whatsoever. I remember being obsessed with this manga, making tons of icons, generally participating in the fandom, but.... the plot actually eludes me. I think it got super weird in the end and I erased it from my memory somehow. But the art was super pretty and what I do remember that the character I iconned here was secretly a deceitful manipulator, which is my favorite character type, so I have vague fond memories of him lol
Style: The white decorative element over a colorful icon! I think there were posts where 50% of my icons had that in some way, I loooved this style. I feel it kinda fell out of use recently, but wasn't it really popular a few years ago?
15.
Fandom: Durarara!! (2010) - I got super involved in this fandom, particularly in Izaya/Shizuo ship, to the point of starting a doujin translation group with a friend and having a feud with another group who accused us of stealing their projects haha. I think I iconned it a lot too, the art is pretty and I honestly liked almost every character. Celty won for the icon appearance since shipping aside, she was my fave.
Style: Another icon with difference layer, plus the yellow-cyan-magenta color scheme, which is also something I use a lot.
16.
Fandom: Free! (2016) - Free! was like a fandom one night stand for me hah. I watched both seasons in some ridiculously short amount of time, read some fanfics, made some icons, and then mostly forgot it existed but looked back on it with fond memories whenever I saw a mention. It was fun! And iirc I can blame jsfunction for it entirely lol
Style: My other great iconing love, painting over anime screencaps to give them different lighting. This was originally a night scene! But I wanted an orange icon for the rainbow, so I turned it into a sunset with sunset illumination over the characters. Another thing I wish I had more time for, but it does get a bit time consuming to do...
17.
Fandom: Haikyuu!! (2016) - sports anime were always my weakness (all those shippable characters man), and Haikyuu!! is another one in a long line... it doesn't help that it's just SO GOOD. Do I care about volleyball? Not at all. But even when the episodes are entirely filled with volleyball scenes, this anime manages to keep me interested, proabably because every single character is lovable and all ships are great. (fun fact: I have a tattoo inspired by it)
Style: the Generic Anime Icon, behold. I think I made literally hundreds of these, just super basic coloring, character either cut out or left in the original background, a single light texture or no textures at all. Most often I'd make these for ongoing anime series, as episodes were airing, when fandoms would want current icons to use in discussions or whatnot.... Not really a ~flashy~ challenge icon style but I used it A LOT so I wanted to include it. And the screencap is so adorable that it works without much decoration anyway :v
18.
Fandom: Yuuri!! on ice (2017) - this was the first time I watched a LGBT-themed anime and genuinely enjoyed it, I think. When I started watching, I actually had no idea it would be an actual gay love story - I thought it would be just another baity anime aimed at attracting female fans, but then... they actually got together? That was such a great moment in the fandom, I remember staying up realllllly late on a workday to read the discussions and reactions. Definitely one of my favorite fandoms to date, hope season 2 will come out eventually :D
Style: Another-screencap-as-background was my go-to technique for when I had no idea what to do to make a full-body cut out icon more interesting.
19.
Fandom: Kimetsu no Yaiba (2019) - This hit just when I was craving a fantasy-action story after rewatching FMA and it filled that void sooo well. An emotional journey with a pair of siblings and their companions, in a finished, coherent story that has no filler, no bs 'arcs' and wraps up well without tacking on unnecessary new villains? SIGN ME UP. Can't wait till the rest of it is adapted into anime!
Style: More manga coloring! I was making the icons chronologically and tbh at this point I ran out of past styles to include, so. It was one of my main styles over the years so I feel it should be represented in this post!
20.
Fandom: Promare (2019) - I did not expect a random anime action film to drag me into a fandom, but Promare was just WILD. I went in ready to watch an action bromance flick, but instead got an actual action romance wrapped in amazing visual style and great soundtrack. And it actually has a decently sized fandom so it was an unexpected treat, and I had to icon it here. Love those dumb gays ♥
Style: Honestlllly, this is just an icon in my current style. But since it's the end of a timeline, I guess that fits? This is why I said it's semi-extra hard mode, I did not do the style part that well at all lol
21.
Fandom: My Hero Academia (2020) - so I avoided this for the longest time, since the idea of a hero school seemed kind of dumb and immature to me. But I was unemployed for a while in this trash fire of a year, and I needed something to do, so I cracked and it was an unexpectedly pleasant experience... I'm still not 100% sold on the general idea, but the plot is fun and the characters are interesting, so I might end up getting more into in the future.
Style: Just more pure manga coloring, decided to use it for the last icon since that's something I want to do more of in the future. Hopefully :v
I don't actually expect anyone to read all of this, but if you did, congrats! I honestly just wanted to ramble about fandoms for a bit.
01-07
08-14
15-21
Ahhh I couldn't resist the nostalgia theme at somein30. I've had too many fandoms over the years to mix TV shows, films, anime, animated shows and games all in one post, so I settled on anime/manga only, since I've been on a major anime binge since September and there's no sign of stopping yet. I'd say this is semi-extra hard mode, since I included both fandoms and styles, but the styles are not in order ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ I wrote down a list of styles I remember doing, but I honestly couldn't tell you WHEN I did them since I only have my icons from 2014 onwards, and I started around... 2003. So I iconned fandoms chronologically, but styles are more mix-and-match for whenever they suited the image I chose to icon.
The rainbow effect over the entire post was something I felt I had to do, since I've been doing rainbow posts for a long long time and NOT having it in this nostalgia theme would be just... wrong. Also, I love doing rainbow posts.
Textlessness was not deliberate, but I think it does fit the style journey theme, since text is my nemesis. I even went back to check and apparently the last time I added text to an icon out of my own free will (meaning, not because it was a theme) was mid-2018, which sounds about right lol
Some ramblings about fandoms/icons under the spoiler tag!
[writing this took longer than making the icons]
1.
Fandom: Sailor Moon (1994-1995?) - my first one! If you count a bunch of 7-8 year old girls obsessing over a show airing on TV lol. But I do think it set me up for a life of fandomness.
Style: One of the first styles I remember using - cut out with a 2-3px white stroke, on a solid background. Usually there would also be a thicker white border and a 1px darker border around it, but since its 2020 not 2005 now, let's not do that anymore.
2.
Fandom: Slayers (2003-2004) - my first Actual Fandom. This was pre-LJ and I barely spoke English back then, so I mostly operated on message boards and tiny fandom websites... thankfully none of my icons from back then survive to this day, because they were Really Really Bad, Even For 2003. But that aside, Slayers fandom was one of my favorites to be in.
Style: A basic cutout + solid background + shadow is something I always default to when I have no special idea for a full-body image and this is what happened here too ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
3.
Fandom: Fullmetal Achemist (2004) - ahh, FMA. It's one of my favorite stories to this day, and I'm honestly a bit sad that I discovered it so early because it gave me unreasonable expectations for other animanga. I iconned the hellll out of it back in the day, but I think it was still before I joined LJ?
Style: Red-yellow-blue, my one true love when it comes to color schemes for single icons. When in doubt, go red-yellow-blue. I've used it a loooot over the years.
4.
Fandom: Bleach (2005) - I was totally in love with this manga up until it got really bad after the Aizen arc. But the early years were great, and I remember having a lot of fun in this fandom.
Style: This icon is an attempt at recreating something I used to do in late 00s that included contrasting light textures both in the background and on top... it used to look different, it embodies the spirit of that style I guess?
5.
Fandom: xxxHolic (2006) - discovering xxxHolic and TRC sent me on a massssssive Clamp bender, I think I read everything they ever released.... their mangas are kinda cliche and have way too many plot twists, but their storytelling is top notch. And the visual style of xxxHolic is just amazing.
Style: Ahhh manga coloring, my greatest iconmaking love. There is just something about taking a b&w manga page and turning it into a colorful icon exactly the way you want it to look... I wish I had more time for it, and my old tablet, which was way better than the cheapo one I picked recently. I remember making many, many icons that were just basic manga coloring with no textures/brushes/text etc, and that's what I did here.
6.
Fandom: TRC (2006) - same as above, since those two mangas are interconnected and I read them at the same time.
Style: Who else remembers the radioactive cyan/red colorings that were super popular around maybe 2007-2008? People shared .psds of the coloring so there were tons of icons that had the same exact values applied to them and they allllll looked nasty. I tried to recreate that but less... eyeburning. Also, textures with unreadable handwritten text and some random dots/lines were my jam back then and honestly I want to bring them back, I like this look still.
7.
Fandom: Tanemura Arina's mangas (2006) - the guilty pleasure fandom. Her mangas are so cheesy but at the same time, totally fun? I'm not super into the romance bits, but the plots and fantasy elements won me over. Doesn't hurt that the art is totally gorgeous and a huge pleasure to icon.
Style: I think this style was popular among animanga makers around 2010-2012 or so... very vibrant, few light textures, but overall simple and focused on highlighting the beauty of the screencap/artwork.
8.
Fandom: Gunnm (2007) - the fandom that was not a fandom, because this manga is criminally underrated. Idk if it had any significant popularity when it was published in English, but when I read it as it was published in my country, literally no one was talking about it here... which is a shame because it's GREAT. It started my love for cyberpunk.
Style: Around 2015-2016 I started using difference layers a lot... I discovered what happens when you set a layer with a white element to difference and it blew my miiiind. And then my mind was blown again when I checked what happens if you experiment with channels on the difference layer. So many colors! Still one of my favorite techniques to use when I feel like making something more complex.
9.
Fandom: Hikaru no Go (2007) - this was a time when I got into 2 sports mangas - HnG and Prince of Tennis. Chose to icon only one of them here, and I picked HnG because years later, I have a lot more sentiment for it than for PoT.... for a manga about tennis, PoT just got super weird in the end.
Style: Manga coloring + negative space. I don't really go for extreme negative space since it's tricky to use well, but then theiconquest started I REALLY wanted to get on those rogue points, so around that time I remember using this technique a lot. (TIQ, I miss u ;_;)
10.
Fandom: Tengen Toppa Gurren Lagann (2007) - ahh TTGL. The one anime I would recommend to anyone anytime, the visual style, craziness of the plot, and amazing characters just stole my heart. This wasn't really a fandom I got involved in (if there even was one, idk), but to this day I'm happy to see it mentioned somewhere so I think it deserved a spot.
Style: RAINBOW. Where a rainbow does not technically belong. I started doing this in tumblr posts around 2013 and then it migrated to icons, just making weird happy edits and adding rainbows to things.
11.
Fandom: Gundam 00 (2008) - this fandom was wiiild. I love all things sci-fi so I was into it from the start, but the memes that developed, theories, shipping drama.... I'm glad I was there for it. I don't remember iconing it much for some reason, but I was definitely invested in other parts of it.
Style: It happens a few times in this post, but in this icon it was deliberate - blending the subject with the background, both through coloring and lighting and just plain blurring/masking the edges of the cutout. I remember doing this a bunch around 2010/2011 maybe...?
12.
Fandom: Natsume Yuujinchou (2009) - I miss this fandom, it was as peaceful as this anime. I recall discussing episodes in a LJ comm as they aired, and there was never any drama or arguments, which was honestly refreshing, since the 00s were when the craziest fandom/ship wars happened.
Style: This was an attempt at recreating one of my earliest iconing techniques from around 2005/2006, in which every screencap/image got the same treatment: beige soft light layer, pastel blue soft light layer, merge all visible layers, blur, set as soft light. The result was a brownish blurry mess but I kept with that style for a solid year or two lmao. Obviously it's toned down here, and I picked a dark image so that it wouldn't get super washed out, but that is the style.
13.
Fandom: Kuragehime (2010) - I honestly have no idea how I got into this fandom, because I have zero interest in fashion or romance manga. And yet? The characters are so relatable and charming that I felt I had no choice but to fall into it.
Style: Another very early style, from maybe 2006-2007? A rough outline around the character made with polygonal lass tool, and a patterned background that matches the colors of the image. I used to always add the ubiquitous 3px-white, 1px-dark border but I don't think there is any way to make that look attractive so let's not bring that back lol
14.
Fandom: Pandora Hearts (2010ish...?) - I... don't remember what this was about. Whatsoever. I remember being obsessed with this manga, making tons of icons, generally participating in the fandom, but.... the plot actually eludes me. I think it got super weird in the end and I erased it from my memory somehow. But the art was super pretty and what I do remember that the character I iconned here was secretly a deceitful manipulator, which is my favorite character type, so I have vague fond memories of him lol
Style: The white decorative element over a colorful icon! I think there were posts where 50% of my icons had that in some way, I loooved this style. I feel it kinda fell out of use recently, but wasn't it really popular a few years ago?
15.
Fandom: Durarara!! (2010) - I got super involved in this fandom, particularly in Izaya/Shizuo ship, to the point of starting a doujin translation group with a friend and having a feud with another group who accused us of stealing their projects haha. I think I iconned it a lot too, the art is pretty and I honestly liked almost every character. Celty won for the icon appearance since shipping aside, she was my fave.
Style: Another icon with difference layer, plus the yellow-cyan-magenta color scheme, which is also something I use a lot.
16.
Fandom: Free! (2016) - Free! was like a fandom one night stand for me hah. I watched both seasons in some ridiculously short amount of time, read some fanfics, made some icons, and then mostly forgot it existed but looked back on it with fond memories whenever I saw a mention. It was fun! And iirc I can blame jsfunction for it entirely lol
Style: My other great iconing love, painting over anime screencaps to give them different lighting. This was originally a night scene! But I wanted an orange icon for the rainbow, so I turned it into a sunset with sunset illumination over the characters. Another thing I wish I had more time for, but it does get a bit time consuming to do...
17.
Fandom: Haikyuu!! (2016) - sports anime were always my weakness (all those shippable characters man), and Haikyuu!! is another one in a long line... it doesn't help that it's just SO GOOD. Do I care about volleyball? Not at all. But even when the episodes are entirely filled with volleyball scenes, this anime manages to keep me interested, proabably because every single character is lovable and all ships are great. (fun fact: I have a tattoo inspired by it)
Style: the Generic Anime Icon, behold. I think I made literally hundreds of these, just super basic coloring, character either cut out or left in the original background, a single light texture or no textures at all. Most often I'd make these for ongoing anime series, as episodes were airing, when fandoms would want current icons to use in discussions or whatnot.... Not really a ~flashy~ challenge icon style but I used it A LOT so I wanted to include it. And the screencap is so adorable that it works without much decoration anyway :v
18.
Fandom: Yuuri!! on ice (2017) - this was the first time I watched a LGBT-themed anime and genuinely enjoyed it, I think. When I started watching, I actually had no idea it would be an actual gay love story - I thought it would be just another baity anime aimed at attracting female fans, but then... they actually got together? That was such a great moment in the fandom, I remember staying up realllllly late on a workday to read the discussions and reactions. Definitely one of my favorite fandoms to date, hope season 2 will come out eventually :D
Style: Another-screencap-as-background was my go-to technique for when I had no idea what to do to make a full-body cut out icon more interesting.
19.
Fandom: Kimetsu no Yaiba (2019) - This hit just when I was craving a fantasy-action story after rewatching FMA and it filled that void sooo well. An emotional journey with a pair of siblings and their companions, in a finished, coherent story that has no filler, no bs 'arcs' and wraps up well without tacking on unnecessary new villains? SIGN ME UP. Can't wait till the rest of it is adapted into anime!
Style: More manga coloring! I was making the icons chronologically and tbh at this point I ran out of past styles to include, so. It was one of my main styles over the years so I feel it should be represented in this post!
20.
Fandom: Promare (2019) - I did not expect a random anime action film to drag me into a fandom, but Promare was just WILD. I went in ready to watch an action bromance flick, but instead got an actual action romance wrapped in amazing visual style and great soundtrack. And it actually has a decently sized fandom so it was an unexpected treat, and I had to icon it here. Love those dumb gays ♥
Style: Honestlllly, this is just an icon in my current style. But since it's the end of a timeline, I guess that fits? This is why I said it's semi-extra hard mode, I did not do the style part that well at all lol
21.
Fandom: My Hero Academia (2020) - so I avoided this for the longest time, since the idea of a hero school seemed kind of dumb and immature to me. But I was unemployed for a while in this trash fire of a year, and I needed something to do, so I cracked and it was an unexpectedly pleasant experience... I'm still not 100% sold on the general idea, but the plot is fun and the characters are interesting, so I might end up getting more into in the future.
Style: Just more pure manga coloring, decided to use it for the last icon since that's something I want to do more of in the future. Hopefully :v
I don't actually expect anyone to read all of this, but if you did, congrats! I honestly just wanted to ramble about fandoms for a bit.