A look back at 2018

I don’t remember exactly when I first started thinking about it, but I’ve always wanted to write a novel that would be commercially published.
Thinking it was about time to start writing little by little, I began writing a novel intermittently from September 2017.
This year, I’m thinking of submitting it to a newcomer award competition.

Books

Classical Music

LINE Emoji

When I heard that anyone could now sell LINE emoji, I started creating them. My first set went on sale on 12/31.

Creator Page

LINE’s Creators’ Stamps started in 2014, but at the time I was still a student. Since I hadn’t studied art, I felt somewhat reluctant to create them just because they were popular, so I ended up not trying.

I genuinely liked LINE emoji, and had always wanted to create them if Creators’ Emoji ever became available, so I was able to start working on them naturally.

I was particularly interested in creating fonts. I think it’s fun to be able to sell characters I’ve created.

Generally, selling fonts is extremely labor-intensive. For Japanese, JIS Level 1 (2,965 characters) and Level 2 (3,390 characters) kanji are often required, and selling with fewer characters requires creative marketing strategies - either way, it’s difficult.

I think it’s wonderful that LINE emoji only requires 265 characters including hiragana, katakana, and alphanumeric characters. For a while, there will likely be many handwritten-style fonts since they’re easier to create, but I believe that over time, unique letterforms as well as Gothic and Mincho styles will start to increase.

Camera

I bought a camera on impulse without properly researching the market price, so I ended up paying quite a high price for it.

The next day, there was heavy snowfall in Shinjuku.

I walked around in the snow-covered landscape, constantly pressing the shutter, and through beginner’s luck, I managed to take a few good photos, which got me completely hooked.

After that, I kept taking random photos wherever I went during my travels, but when I looked back at them later, they were terrible. I realized I needed to start seriously with classroom learning.

I’m still struggling just to shoot landscapes horizontally, but I want to keep improving little by little.

Music

I went to TK from Ling Tosite Sigure’s year-end acoustic live performance.

It was my first acoustic live, and even though the slightest touch of the strings resonated throughout the hall, the performance had the stability of listening to a CD. I thought, “Professionals are amazing…”

I was extremely happy to hear my favorite song, Showcase Reflection.

CEDEC 2018

The talks about blockchain game development were fascinating.

Since blockchain itself is just a technology, blockchain games are being used in various ways.

While everyone is still in the exploratory phase, I think the public is most interested in blockchain games as a means of mining.

Although ICOs are currently volatile, if mining were to take place on a gaming platform, I think it could bring about different changes.