Despite a lack of experience, one man is credited with developing the images and icons that represent the nation’s top-flight baseball competition.
Manga artist Chung Meng-shun (鍾孟舜) 25 years ago produced in a four-year period all the commercial art designs for the Chinese Professional Baseball League (CPBL), as well as mascots, logos and promotional materials for its four founding teams.
Before becoming a manga artist with multiple publications under his belt and Comic Artist Labor Union president, Chung had already put his stamp on Taiwanese baseball and cartoon history by creating the iconic logos of the then-Chinatrust Brother Elephants, the Uni-President Lions, and the now-defunct Mercuries Tigers and Wei Chuan Dragons.
Photo: Wu Po-hsuan, Taipei Times
Unique circumstances made him the CPBL’s de facto general director of art, Chung said.
In 1989, Chung left the army equipped with a Taiwan University of Art bachelor’s degree in traditional Chinese painting and a passion for manga, but no formal training in commercial design or cartoons.
He decided to give the CPBL a try simply because its preparatory office was hiring artists.
Brother Hotel Inc chairman Hung Tung-sheng (洪騰勝), who was emerging as a key figure in the CPBL, took a personal interest in Chung’s work and put Chung on every design-related project within the league, including making logos, mascots and posters for the teams, Chung said.
Chung said that in the following four years he served as the CPBL’s “first and only art director,” working simultaneously for all four teams.
Chung’s job description was all-encompassing. At one point, he was even asked to put together cheerleading squads, he said.
Even the championship trophy for the first CPBL season was his design, Chung said.
“Actually, in the first six months prior to the league’s first official game, I had to role-play being a spectator and watched ‘games’ all day long,” he said.
“My butt hurt plenty,” he added.
Chung designed cartoon baseball cards featuring individual players, drawing caricatures of noted baseballers, as well as writing a book, Baseball Stars: A Concept Art Special Edition (職棒明星漫畫造型－鍾孟舜專輯).
The players for whom he designed cards included luminaries such as pitcher Chen “Holiday Flycutter” Yi-hsin (陳義信), who earned the nickname for his skills and because the Elephants fielded him in games on holidays; leading base-stealer and later Brother Elephants skipper Lin “Commander Stealer” Yi-tseng (林易增); and Lee “Mister Baseball” Chu-ming (李居明), a famed hitter and center fielder who was a stalwart of the national team.
Chung said his experiences with the CPBL provided him with plenty of material for comic books after he left the league.
Chung’s comic book Violent Baseball (暴力棒球) was based on match-fixing that he heard of or witnessed during his time in the league, with mobsters telling players to throw games with threats against life and limb.
Controversial at the time, Chung was vindicated when baseball scandals became public knowledge years later.
“I had so much fun,” Chung said of his four years in the CPBL.
“Every trick of the trade I know, I learned on the job,” he said.
“I didn’t know anything at the time, but I caught a big break by never saying: ‘I don’t know how’ when I faced a challenge,” Chung said.
“Experience is not important; what you do not know, you can ask,” he added. “Anything is possible if you try.”
Three Taiwanese airlines have prohibited passengers from packing Bluetooth earbuds and their charger cases in checked luggage. EVA Air and Uni Air said that Bluetooth earbuds and charger cases are categorized as portable electronic devices, which should be switched off if they are placed in checked luggage based on international aviation safety regulations. They must not be in standby or sleep mode. However, as charging would continue when earbuds are placed in the charger cases, which would contravene international aviation regulations, their cases must be carried as hand luggage, they said. Tigerair Taiwan said that earbud charger cases are equipped
Foreign travelers entering Taiwan on a short layover via Taiwan Taoyuan International Airport are receiving NT$600 gift vouchers from yesterday, the Tourism Administration said, adding that it hopes the incentive would boost tourism consumption at the airport. The program, which allows travelers holding non-Taiwan passports who enter the country during a layover of up to 24 hours to claim a voucher, aims to promote attractions at the airport, the agency said in a statement on Friday. To participate, travelers must sign up on the campaign Web site, the agency said. They can then present their passport and boarding pass for their connecting international
UNILATERAL MOVES: Officials have raised concerns that Beijing could try to exert economic control over Kinmen in a key development plan next year The Civil Aviation Administration (CAA) yesterday said that China has so far failed to provide any information about a new airport expected to open next year that is less than 10km from a Taiwanese airport, raising flight safety concerns. Xiamen Xiangan International Airport is only about 3km at its closest point from the islands in Kinmen County — the scene of on-off fighting during the Cold War — and construction work can be seen and heard clearly from the Taiwan side. In a written statement sent to Reuters, the CAA said that airports close to each other need detailed advanced
UNKNOWN TRAJECTORY: The storm could move in four possible directions, with the fourth option considered the most threatening to Taiwan, meteorologist Lin De-en said A soon-to-be-formed tropical storm east of the Philippines could begin affecting Taiwan on Wednesday next week, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said yesterday. The storm, to be named Fung-wong (鳳凰), is forecast to approach Taiwan on Tuesday next week and could begin affecting the weather in Taiwan on Wednesday, CWA forecaster Huang En-hung (黃恩鴻) said, adding that its impact might be amplified by the combined effect with the northeast monsoon. As of 2pm yesterday, the system’s center was 2,800km southeast of Oluanbi (鵝鑾鼻). It was moving northwest at 18kph. Meteorologist Lin De-en (林得恩) on Facebook yesterday wrote that the would-be storm is surrounded by
RSS