Mangaka

The daily life of a mangaka

The manga or draftsman of Manga creates an original story, characters and context to captivate readers' attention from the beginning to the end of his narrative.

Art in its own right, the Manga is close to the cinematographic culture; so the mangaka takes care to script his story and transmits in each of his pages emotion and aesthetics without comparison.

Find a publisher

Once he holds the frame of his story, he must already think about the commercialization of his work by proposing his idea to publishing houses, newspaper companies or to an agent for example.
With the rise of the web, new modes of writing have appeared. Some mangaka distribute their works exclusively online.

A passionate craft

It's a craft of passion, mangaka do not count their hours to see their achievements come to fruition.
Mangaka can work as a team: it can involve a scriptwriter, assistants (very frequent in Japan), a publisher.

Skills needed for this job

- Know how to draw and taste for the Manga
- Editorial skills
- Sense of composition and staging
- Patience, rigor and thoroughness
- Curiosity, originality

Training to become mangaka

There is currently no mangaka degree in France. But do not become mangaka who wants. It is possible to integrate, after the baccalauréat, a school specialized in the image or to follow a Visual Communication BTS before taking courses for example.

Specialized in the teaching of manga, the International School of Manga and Animation EIMA offers since the beginning of 2016, a training of mangaka in three years, accessible from 16 years.

The EIMA curriculum, which is taught by professionals in the field (edited mangaka, publishers, illustrators, computer graphics ...), allows the aspirants to understand and master this art.
Manga, illustration, traditional and digital colorization, scripting, modeling, history of art and Manga, web Manga, law, management and accounting will be on the program.

The future mangaka participate in masterclasses and meet throughout their training, publishers and confirmed authors.
Their projects are published in the second year to enable them to understand the constraints of publishing. They must also do internships to develop their skills and develop their employability.

Language courses (Japanese and English) are offered to them to internationalize their curriculum, by the way.
In the final year, students must submit two projects:
- an editable manga project
- an illustration project to validate their certification before a jury of professionals.