[Click here to view the video in this article]
Japanese design group Mieru Record, a collective of 11 artists inspired by the relationship between music and comics, has created the ‘Otowa’, a hand-cranked mechanical device that plays music as you read a manga.
The ‘Otowa’ was born out of the idea of a comic book having its own score, just like a movie. A cross between a music box and a player piano, it produces music from strips of perforated paper fed through it, instead of having pre-programmed songs.
The manga strips read from left to right and the accompanying music matches the story as it unfolds. For panels with dialogue, the music pauses and starts back up once the talking gives way to action. Other strips have instructions for the user to crank the music box faster or slower to adjust the tempo to suit the scene in the panel.
The ‘Otowa’ was sponsored by Japanese papermakers Tokyo Shiki, and won a jury’s prize at the 17th Annual Japan Media Arts Festival.
It is a charming and simple concept that provides a whole new experience to the act of reading comic books. Don’t get your hopes up if you’re planning to get one for yourself or for a manga fanatic though – the ‘Otowa’ is only a prototype.
Watch a video of it in action below.
[via Fast Company, images via YouTube]
Japanese design group Mieru Record, a collective of 11 artists inspired by the relationship between music and comics, has created the ‘Otowa’, a hand-cranked mechanical device that plays music as you read a manga.
The ‘Otowa’ was born out of the idea of a comic book having its own score, just like a movie. A cross between a music box and a player piano, it produces music from strips of perforated paper fed through it, instead of having pre-programmed songs.
The manga strips read from left to right and the accompanying music matches the story as it unfolds. For panels with dialogue, the music pauses and starts back up once the talking gives way to action. Other strips have instructions for the user to crank the music box faster or slower to adjust the tempo to suit the scene in the panel.
The ‘Otowa’ was sponsored by Japanese papermakers Tokyo Shiki, and won a jury’s prize at the 17th Annual Japan Media Arts Festival.
It is a charming and simple concept that provides a whole new experience to the act of reading comic books. Don’t get your hopes up if you’re planning to get one for yourself or for a manga fanatic though – the ‘Otowa’ is only a prototype.
Watch a video of it in action below.
[via Fast Company, images via YouTube]