#KAIJUNE - Instagram Drawing Challenge for the Month of June (#KAIJUNE2018)
"#Kaijune" is a month-long giant monster drawing challenge created by Riley Phillips (@phileyrillips), which sees the entire month of June filled and fueled with 30 x monsters - in the vein of "Inktober" and "March of Robots" (Both of whom I've personally been attempting for a few years myself :p).
I'd first featured Kim Hu's #Kaijune, which had since opened me up for this discovery, and am considering jumping up, even if it meant a few odd scribbles here and there LOL ... we'll see... meanwhile, folks can also refer to the *Prompt List for 'Kaijune 2018' (*Where you just follow the prompted words for the particular day, instead of cracking your brains o think of anything specific :p).
Scroll down to view some of my favs (Spotted thus far on the #kaijune-hastag), which I'd love to share with YOU folks!
The lyrical and fantastical behemoths by Alan Cortes (IG @flancortes / KAIJUNE 2018 / ko-fi.com/flancortes / ko-fi.com/flancortes) - who had also done the top banner image for this blogpost!
The magical neon-esque illuminated kaiju by Kelly Smith (IG @beatfist / beatfist.storenvy.com).
Designer & concept artist Katerina goes analog with her #Kaijune kreations in stark black+white (IG @kay_cit / DeviantART / VIRINK).
Magical and adorable wee kaiju abound in every corner of Mother Nature, with visual development artist Fayefox's creatures! (IG @fayefox_art / ArtStation).
Don't know about you folks, but I am pretty charmed with Collin David's "League of Kaiju Wrestlers" (Not real name, I just made it up :p) as I'd think they'd make pretty fun three-dimensional (in)action figures! Somebody help make it so! (IG @resfishdesign / Online Shop).
Charmed by the adorably-kawaii food-stealing kreatures by webcartoonist/illustrator Elle Skinner, looking very much "alive" with their water-colour treatment too! CHARMED, I say! (IG @ellescribbles / Tumblr / Etsy Online Shop)
Canada-based graphic designer Phou Camvan evokes a "super-sentai"-influenced line-up of (possibly) nefarious ladies with kaiju-heads (IG @arealdesigncynic).
"MONSTER'S PARADISE"-creator Eric Schuster presents more "traditional" Ultraman-kaiju in glorious and "fun" action! (IG @ericjschuster / Patreon).
"KAIJUNE" looks to be made up of to words: "KAIJU" and "JUNE", which makes for a clever wordplay to use for a hashtag and theme, IMHO!
The term "Kaiju" has been used and interpreted for decades, ever since the terminology originated with Ultraman starting in the late-1960s ("Kaiju" roughly translates to "monster" - see quote below from Ultraman Wiki), and had been a somewhat niche moniker in toy culture - in the not-to-distant past literally referring to vinyl toy adaptations of Ultraman and their monstrous nemesis.
"Kaiju (怪獣 Kaijū, Mystery Beast?), which roughly translates as Monster, is the classification given to any non-intelligent beast found throughout the works of Tsuburaya Productions. Kaiju are generally organic, and do not cover robots. They can be both terrestrial or extra-terrestrial, but are not labeled as aliens (Seijin) unless they show major intelligence like that of a human." (ultra.wikia.com)
UPDATED: I have since started doodling kaiju/monsters, and they can be found Hashtagged #kaijune2018toysrevilart, or on my dedicated TOYSREVILART-Facebook ~ Thank You For Your Indulgence!
In recent years, the term has been co-opted into current toy culture, to represent more than established Ultraman monsters, beyond to anything that resembles a non-traditional humanoid / bipedal / quadrupedal creature that came be and is termed a "monster" (re: the yummy selection of drawings I'd featured above) ... and speaking purely as a non-traditionalist and ultimately greedy consumer, I am delighted that the term is as "endearing" to current culture, as is it "consumeristic" enough that Western Hollywood had adopted it into their filmmaking eco-system - prime example being "Pacific Rim"!
Cheers
Andy TOYSREVIL
