As you probably know by know, A2M awarded psgels the “Blog Master of 2007 award”. We were initially planning to release this interview before awarding him but unfortunately due to certain circumstances it just didn’t happen. Anyways, we at A2M hope you enjoy this interview with hard-working, dedicated blogger psgels.

A2M: What motivated you to blog anime?
psgels: It was back in 2005, after the start of the Fall-season back then. For me, it was the first time I actively followed the start of a new season, and inspired by the few blogs that I read (Wakaranai was my favourite blog back then), I got the urge to voice my own opinion about the series I watched. What gave me the final push was how I started to notice how nobody said anything about my favourite shows at the time, especially Mahou Shoujotai; nobody seemed to talk about the latest episodes. If you look back into my archives, you can see that my very first episode-post was a Mahou Shoujotai-post, because of this.

A2M: How are you able to maintain such a rigid time frame and be so up to date? Any secrets to your success?
psgels: What I basically do is get the episode in question at the day that it airs (after doing this for a while, you can become quite accurate on when the episodes become available on sites like Tokyo Toshokan and programs like Share), and then watch it whenever I have time. Because I watch most of the series I blog raw, it’s quite easy to just create a schedule for the different series that come out every week. The tricky ones are the series like Gundam and Kaiji, which I watch subbed, since you’ll never know when the fansubbers bring out their release.

A2M: How do you choose which series to blog?
psgels: Basically, through experience I found that for me the better I like a show, the more fun it is to blog. In a deep, dark past, I tried blogging Bleach once, but that turned into a nightmare. Mystery-series or other intriguing anime also are quite interesting, so basically what I try to do at the start of each season is to predict which series will fit these criteria. Sometimes, this doesn’t work (.Hack//Roots), but most of the times, this method turns out to be quite accurate for me.

A2M: What is the best aspect about blogging? What is the worst?
psgels: I think the best part is the satisfaction. When I take a look at the amount of reviews/posts I produced over the years, I can’t help but feel proud a bit of the things that I accomplished. Same with all the people who leave a comment on my posts. I really like the positive support I get from everyone, and the encouragements to keep on blogging.

Regarding the worst part, well nothing brought me more headaches than finding a reliable image-host. Ever since I started this blog, I went through six different image hosts, and I don’t enjoy remembering the pain in finding a new one. Thankfully, I’ve gotten a few helpful tips about how to set up your own image-server, so that problem should be solved in the near future, hopefully. Incidentally, I’m not being attacked by spambots AT ALL. I’m not sure how they did it, but the guys from Blogsome did a great job in keeping all the spam out.

A2M: How long do you think YOU can last without anime ;)?
psgels: Well, the longest I’ve been without anime ever since starting my blog was two weeks, I think, when my exams took up all my time. I think that if I had to, I could survive without anime for quite a while, but there’s no way I’m going to do that without a good reason.

A2M: What are your other hobbies?
psgels: Besides being member of the anime-blogging community, I also hang out at the RPG-making community, and I’ve been quite a while busy with the program called RPG Maker XP. I haven’t been that active in that for the past few months, though. Besides, the only game I ever finished was only ten minutes of length. On top of that, I also practice Karate twice a week, where I’ve got myself a brown belt right now.

A2M: Does blogging ever interfere with your personal life?
psgels: Well, sometimes it is troublesome when a lot of anime is released on a time where I’ve got lots of deadlines for my studies. Though up till now, I’ve been able to manage things quite well.

A2M: On average (be honest), how many hours per day do you spend blogging (so watching the anime, taking screencaps and writing)?
psgels: Hmm, an average entry takes about an hour and a half to compose. My average number of posts per day is 2, which means about three hours per day.

A2M: What are some of your favourite anime? Is there a particular genre you like the best?
psgels: Most people probably already know by now, but by far my most favourite anime ever is Mahou Shoujotai. This is mostly because there is no other anime that made a bigger impact on me than this particular series by Studio 4C, and not to mention that it’s got an awesome storyline and the experimental elements really worked. Other favourites include Noein, Revolutionary Girl Utena, Simoun, Bokura no and Visions of Escaflowne. I actually made a top-10 post once, you can find that one here.

In terms of a favourite genre, for me it’s mystery. I especially love series with a very high emphasis on mystery. An example of this would be Night Head Genesis. While everyone else just quit watching it after a few episodes, I became a huge fan of the mystery-focused storyline, and it turned into a great anime for me, while I’ve seen many others hate it. Another genre that I discovered more recently is the traditional Japanese horror-stories, which use creepy storytelling to captivate their audiences, and I’ve noticed that these horror-series work very often for me.

A2M: Do you like Rurouni Kenshin?
psgels: Well, let me put it this way: I’ve only seen one episode of Rurouni Kenshin, and this was more than two years ago, and it was some kind of strange American dub of the first episode of the TV-series. Let’s just say that I didn’t like it. I’ve heard some great things about the OVA, though.

A2M: Who’s your favourite super hero? (If any)
psgels:Hmm, I don’t really think I have one. I’ve never been too much of a fan of them.

A2M: Do you believe houses can be inherently evil? <--- I'm joking
psgels: Now that you mention it, there could be quite a large of a possibility that houses are conspiring to take over the world. You've heard how most accidents around happen around the house? That can't be a coincidence!

A2M: Have you ever considered cosplaying or if not, have attended any anime conventions?
psgels: Nope. There aren’t many anime-conventions in the Netherlands anyway.

A2M: Coke or Pepsi?
psgels: Actually, neither. I’m not sure why, but I don’t like the added carbon-gas.

A2M: I’ve read that you’re a student in computer science, what do you plan to do for a career?
psgels: My plans for the future are very vague at the moment. I first want to finish my Master (I’m in my third year right now), but I don’t know what to do afterwards yet. I have been toying with the idea to do something with game-design.

A2M: Have you ever considered having a team blog, instead? If not why?
psgels: I have considered in the past, but I quickly put that idea down. If you want a team-blog, you need to do it like you guys and Impz are doing, and at the moment, just feel like my attempt is going to end up like Random Curiosity. No offense to the staff there, but I still see it as “Omni’s blog”, where I expect Omni’s opinion, instead of the opinion of one of the other writers.

A2M: I know you watch raws sometimes, do you rewatch the subs or an English version in case you missed a vital plot turn or information?
psgels: It depends. Sometimes I do, but at other times I’m just too lazy. When I feel like I missed an important plot-part, I can always read about that in one of the other blogs around. The problem is of course with shows where I’m the only one who blogs them. If that’s the case, then I usually tend to rewatch the important episodes once the subs come out.

A2M: With so many anime blogs out there, where blog owners write a synopsis and then comment with their own thoughts, how do you think one could be original?
psgels: Well, the thing I did to stand out is to blog some of the more unknown series. My advice is just to keep writing how you want to write, and don’t try to be like blogger X. In time, this’ll give you your own identity within the blogging-community. Another thing that I wholeheartedly encourage is to not be afraid to experiment. When I created this blog, I started toying with a few ideas here and there. Some ideas might have been bad and were dropped, but others turned out to be great additions to my blog, and that’s how I started reviewing complete anime and the other features Star Crossed currently has.

A2M: We all know life is uncertain, but do you intend to keep blogging for a significant amount of time ? (We certainly hope so!)
psgels: At the moment, I have no intention at all to quit. I’m having too much fun doing it, and I don’t intend to abandon the work I’ve already put into it quite soon. Another tip to the new bloggers is to not put your standards too high. I’m already happy if I create entries of three paragraphs for each episode, and I basically write a synopsis or summary, depending on my mood. If I don’t feel like it, I just write other stuff. I think one of the major reasons why bloggers quit is, besides a busy schedule, that they keep hoping for an anime to equal their favourites. Okazu wrote an excellent article about this, a small while ago.

Tags: Blog Master 2007 interview

Category: Interviews

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