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National Geographic Magazine: Planet Manga September 2007 (31 images)

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Assignment for National Geographic Magazine France, with magazine staff writer Sylvie Brieu.
  • Two girls dressed as their favorite manga characters enjoy a ride at a Tokyo amusement park.

  • Street scene in the Akihabara neighborhood of Tokyo with advertising hoardings annoucning the newest manga comics and manga character-based video games to be released soon. Akihabara, once the center of Tokyo technology industry, is fast being taken over my the manga comics and paraphernalia markets.

  • Inside a maid cafe. Such cafes are popular hangouts for Japanese men though many also cater to families. The fast growing popularity of such establishments has also lead to many spin offs. There are now maid massage parlours, hair salons opening in cities like Tokyo.

  • Friends gather around during a break at a cosplay even in Tokyo. Such events attract hundreds of manga fans and are an important element of the manga culture.

  • M. Yasuno Yuushi, a Kamishibai performer, puts on a show for visitors at the Kyoto International Manga Museum. Today there are only a handful of Kamishibai performaners left in Japan, but the craft is considered to have influenced the love of picture based story telling amongst Japanese children and the eventual popularity of manga comics in the post-WWII period.

  • Participants and security guard at a cosplay event in Tokyo. Cosplay attendees can spend hours preparing and dressing and then posing for professional and amateur photographers who come in droves to such events.


  • Scene from a cosplay event in Tokyo - an usher, dressed as a manga characters, keeps an eye on an elaborate manga character costume being prepared for a performance.

  • Street scene in the Akihabara district, the center of Tokyo's technology and manga comics lifestyle and culture.

  • Cosplay participants in the early hours before the start of a Cosplay event in Tokyo. Such events can attract hundreds of participants who arrive with their elaborate makeup and costumes in roll on bags and spend the entire day in character for their friends, peers, amatuer and professional photographers from agencies and magazines.

  • Tourists at the Hello Kitty theme park

  • Scene at a cosplay event in Tokyo

  • A cosplay attendee at an even in Tokyo Japan. Cosplay attendees can spend hours preparing and dressing and then posing for professional and amateur photographers who come in droves to such events.

  • Young boys hang out near Comic Toranoana, one of the largest chains of manga comic bookstores in Japan and a multi-story video game complex. Akihabara is considered a mecca for manga fans and otakus, and hundreds spend their days there at the many video game parlours, comic books stores, and maid cafes.

  • The lone figure of a main costume clad manga cafe sales girl on the streets of Akihabara. Maid cafes use the girls to distribute advertisements for the cafe and to solicit customers.

  • Thousands of manga fans line up hours before the start of a weekend manga comic market. Such events bring together readers, independent and commercial manga artists, merchandisers, critics, publishers, and recruiters. However, their principal audience tends to be those interested in the works of amatuer and independent manga artists producing non-mainstream works.


  • Girls prepare for a cosplay event in Tokyo. Attendees can spend couple of hours getting ready in make up and costume, and then the entire rest of the day at the events posing for professional photographers, friends and spectatoris.

  • Friends dressed in their favorite manga character outfits at a cosplay event.

  • Street scene in Akihabara, outside a Pachinko parlour

  • Street scene outside an electronic store selling manga and anime videos and games.

  • Street fashions in Shibuya

  • Scene from a cosplay even in Tokyo

  • A Kitaro character entertains on the streets of Sakaiminato.

  • Two girls dressed as their favorite manga characters enjoy a ride at a Tokyo amusement park.

  • Young men, possibly otakus, take a break from spending a few hours at a video game parlour.

  • Young girls in manga costumes hang out in the Harajuku neighborhood. Harajuku is a popular gathering spot for manga fans and fashionistas.

  • Street scene in the Akihabara district, the center of Tokyo's technology and manga comics lifestyle and culture.

  • Portrait of a young girl on the streets of Harajuku, Tokyo. Manga comics provide the inspiration for her outfit and the reason for her hanging in what is considered the youth fashion district of Tokyo.

  • Images of Mizuki's popular Kitaro characters decorate a local commuter train. The train is just one of many forms of homage to the town's local son and world famous manga artist Mizuki Shigeru.