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Kazunori Saito Collection
-- M.A.
"In my personal experience, purchasing the Saito Encyclopedia of Chogokin
was what triggered my nostalgia muscle. Seeing GA05 photographed in such austere
simplicity kicked me into acquisition mode. I'm still waiting for the
momentum to subside..."
by Matt Alt,
October 1998
The Kazunori Saito Collection series, commonly referred to as the "Saito
Books," is a three-volume set of high-quality photos of Popy toys. The
three volumes are called
The Encyclopedia of Chogokin, The Encyclopedia of Popinika,
and The Encyclopedia of Jumbo Machinders, respectively.
Besides being an avid toy collector, Saito is a
commercial planner for Japan's largest advertising agency, and the
quality level of the photos in his books is outstanding.
The only real problem with the Saito series is that it's simply not as
comprehensive as books such as Green Arrow Graffiti or
The Chogokin. Furthermore, as they feature toys directly from Saito's
personal collection, several of the pieces are incomplete, damaged, or
missing stickers. All in all, they're great books, but those seeking an
absolutely comprehensive guide to chogokin and popinika would probably
do better with Green Arrow or Nishimura's Treasure Apprasial Guide.
However, when it comes to the big guys, Saito's Encyclopedia of Jumbo
Machinders is currently the only game in town. It's got beautiful,
reverential photos of every Popy Jumbo ever made (although it's coverage
of non-Popy Jumbos from companies such as Clover, Takatoku, or Bullmark
is spotty at best.) Also, for some inexplicable reason, Saito filled the
second half of his Jumbo Encyclopedia with almost twenty pages of
early-1990s Bandai Kyomoto Collection Ultraman vinyl toys. Whether this
was done to insure a high enough page count for publication is unknown,
but there's no question that these Ultra-toys are almost completely
unrelated to Jumbo Machinders. What's even more frustrating is that
these toys seem to have taken up space that could have been used for
cataloging Jumbo arm accessories or of photos of the boxes (there's nary
a shot in sight.)
Alen adds:
"Despite the shortcomings of the Saito books, it's important to note that these books represent
the first, and to my knowledge, the only photo publications which contain the
names of the featured toys in english. The significance of this translation can't be discounted since,
prior Saito's publishings, only a handful of people even knew what to call a Kagestar
or a Hover Pilder -- let alone a kame Bazooka. Giving english-reading collectors
an opportunity to even inquire about a piece by name opened the floodgates to US collecting,
allowing those of us raised on the heretical Shogun Warriors to expand our knowledge base
and move closer to experiencing the unadulterated cool of Popy toys."
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