Dragon Ball Art – Goku Digital Paintings
Dragon Ball art is alive and well in the Dragon Ball fan community.
The previous post about Dragon Ball Paintings displayed fine art created with a brush.
Today’s article unveils digital art created with a mouse or pen, yet equally fine.
Using the following images of fan created works I have attempted to tell Goku’s story.
There may be a few pieces missing, but the hardcore dragon ball fans know where to fill in the blanks.
The majority of images are from the Deviant Art website, and I have given credit where I could.
Enjoy…
Goku’s Story
“Gohan” by kadlamalice
“Kid Goku” by XIIINinjaRabbits
“Goku vs Piccolo” by Zuthell
“Little Goku Day” by kadlamalice
“Flying Nimbus Color Wash” by saintchase
“Dragon Ball Fan Art” by elnota
“Epic Battle” by demitrybelmont
“Goku vs Freeza” by mobius9
“Goku” by paranoidvin
“Dragon Ball Cell vs Goku” by nig6ghtmare01
“Gokusan” by osiris999
“Kamehameha” by namekianpikkoro7
“Gokou” by osiris999
“The Super Saiyan” by Fallen Eye
“Dragon Ball Z” by elbrazo
“Goku” by cangdu
“Saiyan” by angel5art
“GSS4” by alveeus
Images and Story Telling
Isn’t it amazing how each image carries an emotional history that we associate with Goku’s tale?
And the realism of several of the paintings helps bring his story to life.
Even though the images are still, they seem to be moving.
As each image enters our minds eye, it stirs our heart.
Such is the wonder of art.
What do you think? Have a favorite image, or how did you feel as you moved through the paintings?
Pretty epic. Definitely not on topic, but I want to see some OP art like this! Maybe you could do a feature on inspiration/similarities between DBZ and OP. (OP’s creator is a fanatical Toriyama fan, constantly and eagerly begging to set up crossovers with DBZ)
In the book I talk about how Toriyama inspired the next generation, such as in One Piece and Naruto (by Masashi Kishimoto), who referred to Toriyama as "a god."
Doing a blog post like you mentioned is also a great idea. I’m adding it to my giant pile of article ideas right now.
Thanks!
The first and the fourth pictures evoke emotional responses from me. It would have been amazing if such pictures were used as chapter covers by the original author himself. They transcend powerful messages especially when the audience connect them to the stories, I also like the picture where Goku battles King Piccolo because it calls for a climatic point in the Dragon Ball series. The Goku by “cangdu” is astonishing since he reminds me of a local celebrity minus the spiky gold hair.
I wanted to ask you about Goku’s “kind-hearted” attitude (if you remember, it was changed from being “magnanimous”). At low power levels, Toriyama-sensei made Kid Goku kill a lot of villains including King Piccolo, a main villain of the Dragon Ball series. The villains where Goku deliberately finished off on his own on DBZ are only Yakon and Kid Buu. How would you describe Goku considering each of the following:
a) sparing Vegeta because he wanted a rematch;
b) blasting Frieza after giving him part of his Qi;
c) ignoring King Kai’s words and waiting for Frieza to go 100% so he can beat the strongest being at that point;
d) defeating Frieza and King Cold in the alternate timeline (according to Volume 28 Chapter 9 page 3 [Chapter 334], Mirai Trunks says “…you could have defeated them easily…”);
e) praising? Trunks by saying “You’re really strong for your age.” when he’s already a Super Saiya-jin himself (Volume 28 Chapter 9 page 2 [Chapter 334];
f) not preparing well enough during the Cell Games because he planned Gohan as a “backup plan” to defeat Cell (Did he really only fought him because he wanted to test his strength against Cell? He even quoted the Cell Games that it would be “fun”.);
g) conceiving Goten knowingly that he may/might die during the Cell Games, thus leaving him fatherless for 6 years;
h) giving Cell a Senzu Bean so it would trigger Gohan’s hidden power;
i) blowing himself with Cell (Do you think he did it to compensate for his earlier mistake when he gave Cell the Senzu?);
j) “…not planning on sacrificing [his] life or anything,,,” because he “…get to keep his body…”, meet “…warriors from the past…”, and “…have a fun time…” in the afterlife (from Vol. 35 Chapter 9 page 12 [Chapter 418]);
k) calming Gohan down from turning into Super Saiyan because Supopo-Bitch is “not going to kill her” as if Videl is not already beaten badly enough (from Volume 37 Chapter 10 page 5 [Chapter 443));
l) attempting to blast? Supreme Kai on Volume 38 Chapter 12 page 9 [Chapter 458];
m) saying “…someone stronger than me would fight him (Good Buu)…”; denying that he’s already the strongest? (Volume 40 Chapter 9 page 9 [Chapter 477]);
n) saluting to Buu before obliterating him;
o) leaving his family behind to train Uub saying that he “…will come back every so often” Volume 42 Chapter 17 page 13 [Chapter 520]?
These are some of his characteristics that are questionable to me; some of them may be inspiring, some are just insensitive. Is this really how Toriyama-sensei wanted his audience to think of the series’ protagonist?
Any thoughts would be great, thank you.
Hi Marianne,
You’ve asked a lot of pertinent questions here. They definitely have merit, but I don’t think I can answer any of them in a simple way, because you’re really asking about Goku’s entire worldview, and you’re also asking about how he perceives the human condition.
Some of Goku’s actions seem contradictory or perhaps even hypocritical at times, but so does everyone’s at some point in their lives. Shakespeare showed that ‘good guys’ can sometimes be ‘villains,’ depending on what part of the story of their life you are perceiving. Goku sometimes seems like a bad guy, or harsh, and heck, maybe he is. But for the most part he’s very kind-hearted and free of the selfish pursuits that most individuals have, at least when it comes to attachments to material gain and being more ‘successful’ in society.
I’ll have to leave answers to each specific question for another day. They would make for great blog posts. Thank you.
I look forward to those answers; thank you for taking the time to reply.