Tony Taka C76 ‘Collect 1’ review

For some time now have wished that Tony Taka would release an artbook filled with his greatest miscellaneous illustrations and doujin images. Those prayers were answered at Comiket 76!

Aptly titled ‘Collect 1’ this full color book contains over seventy images of Tony’s best art from his previous Comiket doujin releases and recent miscellaneous single illustrations.

Roughly A4 sized, the soft cover book is dwarfed by the massive “Tony’s ARTworks from Shining Wind” book but don’t let that fool you, this is still a sizable artbook and thicker than most doujin releases.

The pages are neither too glossy or too mat, what struck me most however is the terrific print quality. Each page contains a full size illustration, there are no two page spreads or multiple illustrations per page, which creates perfect focus and viewing experience of each illustration.

One of the most striking images is this sublime illustration of Hinagiku from “Hayate No Gotoku!” as featured in Tony’s C72 ‘Nekomimi Batoraa’ doujin.

Art like this perfectly captures and illustrates Tony Taka’s great skill and typical style. There’s plenty of excellent artists out there, but few can render female characters as well and as enticing as Tony does.

Although he took some artistic liberty by increasing Hinagiku’s bust size, upon seeing this image this is more than forgiven!

Lovely artwork of a mini-skirted miko! The book also contains a second illustration of this cute priestess in state of undress.

It was to be expected for a book that features art from Tony Taka’s doujin illustrations, however let me make sure to point out to interested viewers and buyers that this is a NSFW book featuring explicit nudity.

You may rest assured though that this review is worksafe and does not contain any illustrations featuring explicit nudity.

Always adored this particular illustration of a bikini clad brunette by Tony Taka.

To be frank, ‘Collect 1’ contains quite a bit of nudity, some of the most daring hentai illustrations Tony crafted for his Comiket doujin releases over the past years appear in the book.
But it also contains some of Tony’s most artistic nudes, like his sublime illustration of Horo from “Spice And Wolf”.

Opted to not include any explicit images in this review as the illustrations shown are all already rather ecchi, yet they perfectly illustrate how good an artist Tony Taka is and how he excels in creating art that shows females in such a sensual fashion one cannot ignore the lust and beauty in them.

Only a single “Clannad” image graced the book, this nice illustration of Tomoyo.

Including a simple content page at the start, it alas doesn’t reveal which doujin the images were originally featured in but just mentions the source material, like “Gundam Seed”, “Neon Genesis Evangelion” or “Bamboo Blade”.

Roughly half of the illustrations in ‘Collect 1’ are original works, most of those are grouped together in the latter half of the book.

Rumor has it that due to various work commitments such as several recent eroge titles like ‘Fault!’ for which he provided the art, Tony Taka did not create a new doujin for C76 but opted to release this commemorative artbook collecting many of his previous illustrations instead.

We can only be grateful for that. With this book being called ‘Collect 1’, we can hope that a trend has been set and Tony may very well release a ‘Colllect 2’ in the future.

Excellent original illustration from the C74 doujin ‘Deculture’ which was centered on the “Macross Frontier” characters.

Surprisingly while ‘Collect 1’ contains over ten illustrations from the C74 ‘Deculture’ doujin, none of those featuring the “Macross Frontier” girls was used. Wonder why…

Nonetheless, the images retained from that doujin for this book each are excellent works of art.

Another stunning artwork featuring a cute maiden clad in some sort of -very short- kimono which also has more gothic themed dress like frills.
Really lovely illustration with a unique fall season atmosphere to it, it also appears in the “Girls Girls Girls! 3 ~ E2 Illustration Collection” book.

‘Collect 1’ also contains some of the dakimakura images that Tony Taka created which were included in the C73 ‘Kiteruyo’ and C75 ‘Botan Nabe’ doujin releases.

This is one of my favorite illustrations by Tony, though guess I could say that of all the images included in this review, as I adore each and every one of them.

Do favor this particular illustration though with its implied yuri theme of two cute maidens together in a tropical setting. Like the one above it, this one too was also published in the “Girls Girls Girls! 3 ~ E2 Illustration Collection” book.

Also printed on a large wallscroll and as a bed sheet, previously spotted this illustration in tapestry form for sale on Yahoo! Auction Japan. Alas the price was rather exorbitant so passed up on it. Perhaps someday in the future?

There’s always something about a shapely maiden dressed in an unbuttoned white shirt, a unique appeal Tony masterfully captured in this image.
If only it were real, what a lovely sight to behold in the morning this would be!

Purchased the ‘Collect 1’ artbook from Toranoana for the decent price of 1260Yen through the deputy service Shopping Mall Japan.

If you’re a fan of Tony Taka’s amazing art and looking for an excellent artbook that bundles his best doujin and single illustrations then do not hesitate to get this book. It’s currently still available at Toranoana but stock is unlikely to last so get it while you can.