Akira Toriyama

From Dragon Ball Wiki, the ''Dragon Ball'' encyclopedia

Jump to: navigation, search

Akira Toriyama born on the 5th of April, 1955 is a Japanese manga artist, most famous
for his Dragon Ball series.

His first manga comic was the the story Wonder Island, published in Weekly Shonen
Jump magazine in 1978, and first gained fame for his Dr. Slump, published in Shonen
Jump from 1980 to 1984.

He is best known for his Dragon Ball series. Its success "forced" Toriyama to work on
Dragon Ball from 1984 to 1995. During that time, he made 519 chapters, collected into
42 volumes. Each volume has an average of 200 pages, so the entire Dragon Ball
storyline extends to almost 9,000 pages. The success of Dragon Ball led to three
animated television series (Dragon Ball, Dragon Ball Z, and Dragon Ball GT), feature-
length animated movies and video games. Unlike Dragon Ball and Dragon Ball Z,
Dragon Ball GT was not based on Toriyama's original manga, instead being created by
Toei Animation as a sequel. For this reason, some fans consider it to be non-canon,
though Toriyama did oversee its production and offer insights and ideas for the series.

His works after Dragon Ball tend to be short (100-200 page) stories, including Cowa!,
Kajika, and Sandland, as well as one-shots, like the spoof Neko Majin Z.

He has also stated that his favorite character in Dragon Ball was Piccolo.[citation needed]

Toriyama's clean line and design sense led to jobs designing characters for the
phenomenally popular Dragon Quest series of role-playing games (formerly called
Dragon Warrior in North America). Toriyama has also served as the character designer
for the Super Famicom RPG Chrono Trigger, the fighting game Tobal No. 1 for the
PlayStation (as well as its sequel, Tobal 2, released only in Japan), and the Mistwalker
Xbox 360 exclusive RPG Blue Dragon.
Akira Toriyama
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Akira Toriyama
Toriyama Akira
鳥山 明
Born
April 5, 1955 (age 54)
Kiyosu, Aichi, Japan
Residence Aichi Prefecture, Japan
Nationality Japanese
Occupation Manga artist, game artist
Years active 1979-present
Employer Shueisha, Bird Studio
Known for Dragon Ball, Dr. Slump
Spouse(s) Yoshimi[1]
Children 2 (son and daughter)

Akira Toriyama (鳥山 明 Toriyama Akira?, born on April 5, 1955, in Kiyosu, Aichi,
Japan[2]) is a widely known and acclaimed Japanese manga artist known mostly for his
creation of Dragon Ball in 1984. It is difficult to pin point the source of Toriyama's
artwork inspiration. He admires Osamu Tezuka's Astro Boy and was impressed by Walt
Disney's One Hundred and One Dalmatians, which he remembers for the great art.[2]
Jackie Chan's early movies had a noticeable influence on Toriyama's stories.[3]

Contents

[edit] Biography

He debuted in 1979 with the story Wonder Island, published in Weekly Shōnen Jump, and
first gained popularity for the anime and manga series Dr. Slump, originally serialized
weekly in Shōnen Jump from 1980 to 1984. In 1982, he won the Shogakukan Manga
Award for Dr. Slump for best shōnen or shōjo manga series of the year.[4]

In 1984, Toriyama was responsible for developing Dragon Ball which was initially
serialized in Weekly Shōnen Jump. It became an instant accomplishment—primarily
selling over 35,000,000 copies in Japan, Dragon Ball eventually became a record-
breaking best seller with over 120,000,000 copies sold.[5] Aside from the Japanese fame,
the series was equally successful internationally as well, including in Europe (1988), the
United States (1996) and Latin America.

Toriyama is mostly acknowledged for his major hit Dragon Ball. This work was one of
the linchpins for what is accepted as the Golden Age of Jump. Its success encouraged
Toriyama to continue working on Dragon Ball from 1984 to 1995. During that eleven-
year period, he produced 519 chapters, collected into 42 volumes. Each volume has an
average of 200 pages. Moreover, the benefit of the manga led to three anime adaptations,
numerous feature-length animated movies, several video games, and mega-
merchandising. Though Toriyama had been planning to end Dragon Ball for a long time,
his editors agreed to let him end the manga so he could "take some new steps in life," as
he put it.[6] The third anime adaptation, Dragon Ball GT, was not based on his manga;
however, Toriyama was still involved in the project by supervising its production,
although in a limited way.[7] The Dragon Ball anime, including installments that
followed, spawned over 500 episodes made in Japan, and are produced and licensed for
North America and Australia by FUNimation.

Toriyama's clean line and design sense led to jobs designing characters for the
phenomenally popular Dragon Quest series of role-playing games (formerly called
Dragon Warrior in North America). Toriyama has also served as the character designer
for the Super Famicom RPG Chrono Trigger, the fighting game Tobal No. 1 for the
PlayStation (as well as its sequel, Tobal 2, released only in Japan), and the Mistwalker
Xbox 360 exclusive RPG Blue Dragon.

His works after Dragon Ball tend to be short (100-200 page) stories, including Cowa!,
Kajika, and Sand Land, as well as one-shots, like Neko Majin.

Toriyama worked on a one-shot called Cross Epoch, in cooperation with One Piece
creator Eiichiro Oda. The story is a short crossover that presents characters from both
One Piece and Dragon Ball respectively.

Recently, Toriyama and his studio have begun developing Dragon Ball Online, a follow-
up to the Dragon Ball manga, with Bandai Namco Games and NTL for release in South
Korea and Japan. The game will act as a direct sequel to the manga, and Toriyama will be
supervising all aspects of the game, from storyline and setting to character and location
designs.[8] In a press conference in South Korea on February 14, 2008, Kazuhiko
Torishima, the director of Shueisha (and Toriyama's original editor), stated that Toriyama
had immersed himself in creating character designs and providing editorial supervision
for the game for the past five years.[9]

Toriyama's studio is called "Bird Studio", which is a play on his name, "tori" meaning
"bird". Toriyama does almost all of the work in Bird Studio; his assistant does mostly
backgrounds. The studio has not been very active over the last few years and has only
done occasional one-shots.
In an interview conducted in 2007 with Shōnen Jump, Toriyama revealed that he does not
consider what is to occur in proceeding chapters of his stories.

The genius and creator behind Dragonball and Dragonball Z, Akira

Toriyama has helped create over 20 different Anime/Mangas. Here you can find all about
who this man is and all about his different anime/mangas.

How Akira Got Started:

Akira Toriyama wanted to become an artist. He studied art in high school, and by 1977,
he got a job at one of the biggest and well known Manga publishers in Japan known as
Shueisha. In 1978, he started a Manga called “ Wonder Island”. It wasn’t a big success,
but gave him more confidence in his work. His next piece of work was called “Dr.
Slump”, which was a huge success. His most famous piece of work however, is the
“Dragonball” series, which is also explained on this page.

Akira Toriyama Timeline:

» 1955 = Akira was Born
» 1974 = Started School of Art
» 1977 = Quit School of Art
» 1978 = Akira's first Manga, Wonder Island
» 1979 = Created Manga Highlight Island
» 1980 = Toriyama's first Big Hit, Dr. Slump
» 1985 = Started the Dragonball Mangas
» 1995 = Akira Ends Dragonball Z

After Dragonaball Z had ended, TOEI Animation asked permission from Toriyama to
continue the Dragonball trilogy with a new series called Dragonball GT. This new series
aired in Japan from 1996 to 1997, and was no where near as successful. Toriyama was
not directly involved with Dragonball GT, but he did supervise the development. As
Toriyama's success grew he decided to open up his own studio know as Bird Studios
where he was able to publish many more of his other stories and comics.

Akira Toriyama Was Staff In:

» Chrono Trigger (OVA): Art
» Chrono Trigger (SNES): Art
» Cowa! (Manga): Story, Art
» Dr. Slump (Manga): Story, Art
» Dr. Slump (Animes): Original Manga
» Dragon Boy: Story, Art
» Dragon Quest: Dai no Daiboken (TV): Producer
» Dragon Warrior: Design
» Dragonball/Z (Mangas): Story, Art
» Dragonball/Z (Animes): Original Story
» Dragonball GT (Anime): Original Creator
» Ikimarusama: Animation
» Kajika (Manga) : Story, Art
» Kennokai-sama (Movie) : Design
» Neko Majin Z (Manga) : Story, Art
» Pink Mizu Dorobou Ame Dorobou (Movie) : Design
» Sand Land (Manga) : Story, Art
» Shinsukesama: Animation
» The Apprentice Mangaka (Manga): Author
» Tobal No. 1: Design
» Wonder Island (Manga) : Story & Art

Akira’s Hobbies and Such:

Akira enjoys other subjects other than Manga. He enjoys being with his family, and
rumor has it that he quit Dragonball for that reason. It sucked up too much time from his
family. He also enjoys playing video games, and even did the art work for the well
known game “Chrono Trigger” for the SNES, as well as other games.