Subculture Anime Blog

Hey, Totali….wanna blog Sketchbook? HECK YES I DO!

Summary:

A girl who likes to take pictures finds a girl named Kajiwara Sora drawing a cat. She assumes that she likes to draw after looking at her sketchbook, but Sora cannot get herself to say anything. After the girl bids her off, Sora walks through the town. She expresses that she cannot put things to words very easily, and her reason for carrying a sketchbook everywhere around with her. At school, a number of girls enjoy class in their own ways. They are happy to invite Sora in when she arrives, but she has trouble facing a boy named Negishi. This is only because his voice is loud, but Sora is able to go in when he is disguised as a cat. Inside the building, Sora sees something she is interested in outside. A few of the female students discover that this is a cat, so they attempt a song to summon it when it disappears.

On a later date, Sora and her friends Natsumi and Hazuki are out to finish their assignments for class. Sora finds a scene that she would like to draw, but she loses her chance as the wind blows by them. The three of them stop by a restaurant and experiment a bit with their food, resulting in some hot lips for Natsumi and Hazuki. The girls meet up with Sasaki Juju and Kurihara Nagisa outside afterwards, and begin following a small bug. This leads them to a beautifully wide area, where the girls decide to start drawing. In the distance, the girls discover what Sora is interested in. Once they return to class the next day, the teacher finds that all of the girls have chosen simple projects. Sora is elsewhere, trying to get a drawing of a cat. She expresses that there are many things that she would like to draw, as she takes in the setting sun’s rays.

ED: “Sketchbook o Motta mama (スケッチブックを持ったまま)” by Yui Makino - Beautiful. I expected nothing less from Yui Makino, and I adore this song. The actual animation is simple, as it should be.

Preview: Sora does her best to tell us what the girls will be doing next week. Looks like some cat chasing!

Impression:

Oh man, it is so slice of life season for Subculture. This episode of Sketchbook met my expectations, and then some. The episode quickly showed its slow, slice of life nature from the start. Sora is a very likable character, and her friends represent awesome stereotypes of artists. Like I said in my Fall Preview, I am studying art in College right now. I could relate to so many things in this episode, like losing the chance to draw a scene. The BGM and music was absolutely beautiful, from the piano pieces to Yui Makino’s song. Remember how we were drawing similarities between this show and Aria? Well, someone even made an appearance in this episode. This episode will be suffering from a slightly less detailed summary, because it is a series introduction. Also, I just came back from doing some stupid phone service thing on campus, and I’m tired. I might rewrite this when I have time. Oh, and if you didn’t catch my drift, it is pretty much guaranteed that I will be blogging this show.

The opening is “Kaze Sagashi (風さがし)” by Natsumi Kiyoura. It was used as a background in the beginning of this episode, but I suspect that we won’t be getting the real OP until next week.