telophase: (Koumyou - hee)
telophase ([personal profile] telophase) wrote2006-10-10 09:38 am
Entry tags:

Random stuff, manga, manhwa

Good advice for freelancers.

Last night, during part of my period of insomnia, I read the manhwa Comic, by Si-Hyun Ha, published by ICE Kunion. I enjoyed it - highschool girl wins third place in a manhwa competition, and life thereafter is complicated by discovering that the teacher she'd based the story (girl gets crush on teacher) on is now an editor at the company, plus the hot manhwa creator whos work she loves is (a) a total jerk (b) actually top student at the boys' school next to hers and nobody there knows he's a manhwa creator, and (c) just may sort of like her, but expresses it by being as annoying as possible. My biggest problem with it - and I have no idea if this is a choice of the original creator or a completley inexplicable choice by the publisher - is that all the characters, despite having Korean family names and explicitly living in Korea, have English personal names. If anyone knows if the original manhwa has Korean first names, let me know please. :)

I also read [livejournal.com profile] svetlania's Dramacon 2, and wow! what a difference! Dramacon 1 was good, but this is even better: and I'm going to have to read it again to actually pay attention to the story this time, because the art was great: it's more solid, the backgrounds are better (they're sketchy, as is traditional in shoujo-style works, but give more of a sense of place than the ones in book 1), and the inking is a stunner - it's developed a bit of expressive roughness, and is dynamic, with thicks and thins, and I think could stand on its own without the toning. The toning, too, is good - it didn't get in the way of the art. :) [livejournal.com profile] svetlania: whatever you're doing, it's working. :)

[identity profile] yhlee.livejournal.com 2006-10-10 02:56 pm (UTC)(link)
Fascinating--Korean-Americans frequently have "American names" to make things easier on non-Koreans. (I used to be asked semi-regularly what my "American name" was; Yoon Ha Lee is my American name so far as I am concerned. *snrk*) I don't know that the practice is all that common in Korea proper, although I'm sure it happens.

[identity profile] telophase.livejournal.com 2006-10-10 03:01 pm (UTC)(link)
It's strange - every single character has one - Alice, Patrick, Sean, Julia, Claudia.

Oh wait ... flipping through it, I see that the assistant to the jerky-yet-cute manhwa creator (Patrick) is named Jino. So ... one exception that I can see. Huh. That just makes it weirder.

[identity profile] telophase.livejournal.com 2006-10-10 04:09 pm (UTC)(link)
He's obviously part of the Korean branch of the O'Shaughnesseys. Duh.

[identity profile] telophase.livejournal.com 2006-10-10 04:49 pm (UTC)(link)
"Server maintenance in progress, please try again in a few minutes."

WOES. Will try later.

[identity profile] telophase.livejournal.com 2006-10-10 03:04 pm (UTC)(link)
I can't remember if I read this somewhere, or if someone I know once told me that her husband/boyfriend/whoever was nicknamed "Michael" by the college girls next door because they couldn't pronounce his name. I think it was one of my Indian grad student workers who told me that, actually - I think it was her fiancee. And his name wasn't all that difficult for the American tongue, as far as Indian names go, although I can't remember it. I vaguely recall that she was sort of offended by it, although her fiancee shrugged it off.

[identity profile] telophase.livejournal.com 2006-10-10 03:58 pm (UTC)(link)
(lj user="octopedingenue"> reports in coments that they're Korean in the original, and pleas for help in pronouncing them. :D)
oyceter: teruterubouzu default icon (Default)

[personal profile] oyceter 2006-10-10 08:12 pm (UTC)(link)
Yah. My first name is actually Chinese, but after I moved to Taiwan, one of the American teachers there decided she didn't want to remember a ton of Chinese names and made me use my English middle name instead. Which is why I use my middle name now...

[identity profile] telophase.livejournal.com 2006-10-10 08:21 pm (UTC)(link)
I had a PE teacher who hated that he had to deal with OMG more than one person with the same first name in his class, who asked my middle name in order to call me that. Upon hearing it (Glynne), he actually visibly winced and rejected my middle name. I suppose that it at least got me called by my regular name in class, unlike the other Stephanie, but still...

[identity profile] cerusee.livejournal.com 2006-10-11 04:07 am (UTC)(link)
That's high on the list of "Easy Ways to Scar Your Students For Life."

[identity profile] telophase.livejournal.com 2006-10-11 01:12 pm (UTC)(link)
He specialized in that. I mostly remember that there was one student - a natural athlete, popular, and the like - who he favored above all others, basically treating him as a student assistant, and when the rumblings of the plebes got to him, he sat us all down and lectured at us for fifteen minutes about how he didn't play favorites. Hm. This guy is a team captain every single time we divide into teams and you don't play favorites. Right.

Mind you, I'd already become quite the cynical person by then, so I don't think he did me any more damage than I already had. :)
octopedingenue: (bree is SO shojo)

[personal profile] octopedingenue 2006-10-10 03:31 pm (UTC)(link)
Yay, I didn't know Comic had been licensed! I read it in scans and loved it. But has ICE Kunion improved in translation/art transfer quality? I picked up its freebie sampler last year and was really put off by how carelessly put together it felt--cheap paper, art with smudges and messed-up sound effects, translations with grammatical mistakes typed in Times or Comic Sans left-justified in speech bubbles.

And you are right, the characters in Comic had Korean names in the original. Transcribed from my HMR scanlation--ALLCAPS is the surname, at least what I took as the surname from context.

Protagonist mahwaga girl: SONG Hae Won
Girlfriend with glasses: HAM Bok Nam
Manhwa shoujo editor: LEE Jung Eun
Teacher-crush turned shoujo section leader: HWANG Shin Yup
Famous manhwaga/impolite but hot teen guy: KANG Tae Soo (manhwaga pseudonym), KANG Hwe Sung (real name)
Hwe Sung's easygoing manhwa assistant: YOO Jin Oh
The jealous longhaired girl who attacks Hae Won: Mee Sook
Manhwaga-lady who offers Hae Won a towel: Won Eli
Manhwaga-girl in fetish gear: KIM Yuri
Manhwaga-boy with long scarf: JAE GAL Jin
Hwe Sung's flashback girl: "Nuna" ("Sister", like what guys would call an older girl)
Girl who disses Hae Won's manhwa in the magazine: Jin Soo

I have no idea how to pronounce any of these. Help?

In the scanslation, the girls keep referring to Hwe Sung as "West Gate DiCaprio" (a la Leonardo), but I don't know if that was in the original or was a substituted equivalent. I have a hunch it's the former.


"You have a very important job. DANCE!"
octopedingenue: (Default)

[personal profile] octopedingenue 2006-10-10 03:36 pm (UTC)(link)
Oh, and the manhwa magazine is named Cake (and is apparently a real magazine).

[identity profile] telophase.livejournal.com 2006-10-10 03:52 pm (UTC)(link)
It seems to retain its title, at least. "Sean" is the editor of Sonyun Pump in the translation, and the publishing company is ICE Kunion. :D

[identity profile] telophase.livejournal.com 2006-10-10 03:48 pm (UTC)(link)
The quality is much better than you got in the samples, it looks like - I didn't notice anything wrong when I read it. And no Comic Sans! The names are the only thing screwy.

Names:

Protagonist mahwaga girl: SONG Hae Won Alice Song
Girlfriend with glasses: HAM Bok Nam Nancy
Manhwa shoujo editor: LEE Jung Eun Julia Lee
Teacher-crush turned shoujo section leader: HWANG Shin Yup Sean Hwang
Famous manhwaga/impolite but hot teen guy: KANG Tae Soo (manhwaga pseudonym), KANG Hwe Sung (real name) Saturn Kang (pseudonym)/Patrick Kang
Hwe Sung's easygoing manhwa assistant: YOO Jin Oh Jino Yoo
The jealous longhaired girl who attacks Hae Won: Mee Sook Claudia
Manhwaga-lady who offers Hae Won a towel: Won Eli Ellie Won
Manhwaga-girl in fetish gear: KIM Yuri Cynthia Kim
Manhwaga-boy with long scarf: JAE GAL Jin Dominique Jegal (they refer to him as "him" so whoever named it didn't realize the American English male version is "Dominic," I assume, or wanted that French flair)
Hwe Sung's flashback girl: "Nuna" ("Sister", like what guys would call an older girl) Unnamed
Girl who disses Hae Won's manhwa in the magazine: Jin Soo Unnamed

And when "Nancy" says she didn't tell anyone and reels off the list of names ... it's "Melissa, Evangeline, Susan. Brian, Elena, and Lisa."

They're calling him the "Dicaprio of Seomoon High" in this.
octopedingenue: (gojyo is less than amused)

[personal profile] octopedingenue 2006-10-10 04:05 pm (UTC)(link)
Alice, Nancy, Julia, Sean, Patrick, Susan, Brian, Lisa
Clearly this is the Korean city where all the Irish-Catholic expats settled down.

I'm torn about buying this now; I love the comic, but the name changes will drive me nuts.

Wasn't Saturn Kang one of the aliens on The Simpsons?

[identity profile] yhlee.livejournal.com 2006-10-10 04:21 pm (UTC)(link)
I've known Korean-Americans named Susan and Brian, and possibly some of the others, but Sean? Now that's creativity.

[identity profile] telophase.livejournal.com 2006-10-10 04:53 pm (UTC)(link)
I went to school with a Korean-American named Helen. I can't remember what her sisters were named, but I think they were all that sort of name that was more popular in previous generations. Maybe one was named Susan? (She and her three sisters did indeed form a string quartet, with Helen on viola, so I suspect their parents of ulterior motives when choosing to have exactly four children. XD)

[identity profile] yhlee.livejournal.com 2006-10-10 04:20 pm (UTC)(link)
All of these are approximate.

Song: oh as in gore, Hae = heh, Won = one

Ham: ah as in father, Bok: oh as in gore, Nam: ah as in father

Lee = ee (as in teeth; long story), Jung: probably rhymes with "young" (they're not using standard romanization), Eun = Yoon (ooh as in room), funnily enough

Hwang: ah as in father, Shin = sheen, Yup = probably yup

Kang: gahng (ah as in father), probably, Tae = deh, probably, Soo = sue
Hwe = hweh, probably, Sung: probably rhymes with "young"

Yoo = you, Jin = jean, Oh = oh

Mee = me, Sook: ooh as in room

Won = won; I have no clue where "Eli" comes from, as [l] is not a phoneme in Korean (or rather, a non-velarized [l] occurs as a phonological alternation with [r], the alveolar tap, but...)

Kim = geem, Yuri = you ree

Jae: eh as in bed, Gal: ah as in father (the [l] is non-velarized, but this is so approximate I'm not worrying about it...I'm not...I'm not...), Jin = jean

Nuna = noo nah, and yeah, the definition is right on

Jin = jean, Soo = sue
octopedingenue: (double your juliet double your fun!)

[personal profile] octopedingenue 2006-10-10 04:34 pm (UTC)(link)
Thank you so much! I should print this out and save it somewhere.

The scanlators are here, should you want to investigate further and/or rail.

[identity profile] mundeemo.livejournal.com 2006-10-10 04:22 pm (UTC)(link)
Where did you buy Dramacon 2? I have been looking for it for the past two weeks. Wait let me guess the Borders by your work.

[identity profile] telophase.livejournal.com 2006-10-10 04:38 pm (UTC)(link)
Yup. :) Hulen & I-30. It was on an endcap and not the shelf, BTW.

The Borders Store Inventory Search (http://www.bordersstores.com/search/search.jsp) is of the gods, and is pretty accurate - the I-30/Hulen location is 99% accurate in stock, but the I-20/Hulen location is much less accurate.

[identity profile] lilrivkah.livejournal.com 2006-10-13 07:24 pm (UTC)(link)
life thereafter is complicated by discovering that the teacher she'd based the story (girl gets crush on teacher) on is now an editor at the company.

I almost picked this comic up the other day, but if I'd known this small detail, I actually would have. :P

[identity profile] telophase.livejournal.com 2006-10-13 07:25 pm (UTC)(link)
:) I have hopes that the crackiness continues to develop. It's what I read shoujo for. XD