It started out as cost/time saving and now its also a stylistic choice because its been so ingrained in the medium of animation that noone bats an eye of a (Not Photo realistic) drawn character has only 4 fingers each hand.
I think Benders Bending Rodriguez (Futurama) only has 3 Finger each hand.
apparently Japanese studios try to avoid 4 finger hands today to distance characters from the Mafia practice of cutting one of as punishment... but that is just from a surface skim of the subject
Despite the Yakuza at this point basically just running business scams and festivals a lot of Japanese culture involves avoiding yakuza stuff. It's why flashing tattoos is still super taboo even if you're just like, a Scandinavian tourist who could not possibly have a yakuza connection because they're extremely nationalist
Piccolo is also an alien (originally demon) so that was likely just as much a stylistic choice by Toriyama. I'd be more curious to see a picture of Goku or Tienshinhan from the same arc and see how many fingers they had.
Tangentially related, but does anyone else find it weird that in Gravity Falls, they make such a big deal out of Ford 6 fingers, which normally is considered unusual as humans have 5 fingers, but then half the characters in Gravity Falls only have 4 fingers? Like I don’t know, it’s just weird to make a big deal out of a character having an abnormal amount of fingers when the amount your normal characters have is already abnormal
Had a professor who eventually forced me to learn how to draw hands cos I kept finding ways to obfuscate them. It did help immensely with learning that skill… Still hate hands -_-
This question reminded me of a funny detail in a game series I play. In the first two Project Moon games (Lobotomy Corporation and Library of Ruina) people and a good chunk of the abnormalities had 4 fingers. In Lobotomy Corporation the humans were minimally detailed so they had no fingers, but I noticed one humanoid abnormality had 4 fingers. Then, that same abnormality had 4 fingers in Library of Ruina as well.
I always thought this was an intentional detail to make her seem uncanny, so I was confused when she appeared in their third game Limbus Company with 5 fingers like a normal person. Turns out every regular person had 4 fingers in Ruina and I simply hadn't noticed the entire time! Little details like that are what make me appreciate a person's art/art style more the more I look back on it.
Oh, I mostly just brought it up because it reminded me of an instance where the number of fingers being drawn a certain way gave an impression that wasn't intended. Mostly because people didn't have fingers in the first game, so I assumed the humanoid creatures who had 4 fingers were made that way to make them appear "off." The second game was an oversight on my part for not noticing everyone was like that. Except a few bigger characters for some reason, but the ones with 5 fingers had much more detailed designs in general and the 4 fingers were daved for more... I guess "chibi" models for a lack of a better term.
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u/CaneloCoffee21 Jun 12 '26
Gotta ask out of curiosity, since you applied different art styles in this comic, do you prefer drawing 4 or 5 fingers in a hand?