Koji Nishida / en

Koji Nishida (raku-gaki.com) / 4scandals

Q1: Lets begin with your brief background and what lead you to start your current job.

*I was born in 1976
*Graduated from Kurashiki Univ. of Science and the Arts with degree in Glass technical art in 2001
*Started freelancing since 2001
*Opened RAKU-GAKI.COM in 2002
*Doing design in my own speed since then.

My college major was in Glass technical art. But for some reason, I was able to graduate with my senior project in web designing using school computers. Since I’ve got into this and occupied one corner of the school entirely to complete the project for about a whole year, people even rumored that I was living there with my pet. Seriously, I was living in between school, laundry and family restaurants.
Then, since almost no one around me seemed to be making any action to be employed upon graduation, I did the same. There wasn’t any choice for me but to be a “freelance” designer after graduation (meaning I had almost no job and barely able to live!) and end up being dumped by my girlfriend and that was just terrible.
My-heartbroken-self spent that whole year looking at crazy amount of well designed websites and graphics. I have gotten really into collaging and then incorporated this with flash and experimented with it in actual website design. You can view these work in (http:// stooped.jp/ (year:2002)) and (http://kenkichi.org/(year 2001)).　 This is where I was beginning to figure out what my style really is. Then, opening of the site called Raku-Gaki.com lead me to different kinds of jobs one after another and gives me enough money to eat everyday up until today.

Q2: Tell us about your recent activities.
Adding interactive function to graphics (I call it “interactive graphic”) to create its own atmosphere is what I am mainly focusing on. Use of plants and buildings in collage format gives depth when it is given interaction by flash. I am having lots of fun by doing crazy stuffs like making “takoyaki” fly the sky. It seems like I am succeeded establishing my image of craziness but it kinda worries me sometimes thinking where this is taking me to. And then, in between all of these thoughts, I have started playing around with 3D graphics. Of course, people around me tells me not to and I also understand it is just not cool to start 3D at this age. But, I am not gonna give up. I’m making a Taxi today. There is this weird wrinkle on it but I don't know what to do…. Damn it…

Q3：Who have influenced you the most or who do you respect?
I respect this old man I know. He drinks cup of green tea sitting at the deck of the house. Even though he looks like an weak old man, he is filled with energy and thought inside. That is my ideal figure of a man.

Q4： How many hours a day do you spend in front of your computer?
Well, except when I am sleeping, I spend all my day in front of the computer. Since people doesn't allow me to sleep these days, it feels like I am there all day long and I am living in the virtual world. My computer monitor must have gotten tired of looking at my face. So do I. Our relationship hasn’t been working out well but I will try to show more love to him.

Q5：Which one do you like better, Motion Tween or Shape Tween?
I love the both. I don't discriminate things in such matters. I will keep using both as much as I can. I am not gonna let flash to be stuck in the script world.

Q6. What is your best song to boost up your moods?
"Sad-dharma-pundarika-sutra" It is the buddhist player which is I am sure you have seen it somewhere that crazy numbers of monks read at loud together. I guess people see me listening to this believes I'm insane but I am in the highest stage of concentration at the moment. Feels like I can keep going. I just gotta be careful not to pass out... By the way, my family is
from Shingonshu Buddhism background so i have nothing to do with "Sad- dharma-pundarika-sutra" .. oops.

Q7：What are the 3 things you have to have in your book bag everyday?
HARDDISK: I travel in between my office and apartment everyday. So that I need my hard disk in order to share my data in between both environment. Most of my data is in here. I don’t know what to do if I lost this.

BUSINESS CARDS: Just for incase, I carry this with me. But when I really need it, my case is filled up with other people’s exchanged cards and none of mine is in, which upsets me a lot whenever it happens.
That is all I have. I don't usually like to stuff my bag.

Q8： If you did not end up being involved in the web businesses, what do you think you would be.
In my case, I would be helping my father. My father’s dream was to expand his company but I think I have ruined it and it makes me feel bad sometimes thinking about this. But at the same time, doing what you want is the best thing for each other so I guess it is okey. I will just keep doing my thing.

Q9：If you can move abroad today, where would that be and why?
I would love to pull optical fiber cable in Tahiti and take things easy. Yah. It is an escape. It is an illusion.
Opening up a bar or takoyaki store in Thailand or HongKong and creating website in the back will also be fun. Place like Kowloon castle is idal.

Q10：Tell us about your secret specialty.
I can do mimicry of Umechin of Yonsca.

Q11: For the last question, what do you have planned in near future and what you want to do.
I have been felling the lack of the skill and over capacity of work recently . So that I am studying really hard to cover this up but it is all really complicated and confusing. Once I settle things down more, I will take it to another step. For now, it is pretty messed up and not making any sense to me but I will take it slow and after one- two years, I will sharpen my skill and creativity to show you something very cool.

translation by Rika Goto

BACK TO MAGAZINE8 TOP : 2005年09月16日 12:59