This is my fav manhua ever.It probably beats all the manga too.
First of all i know that art at first seems ugly but after a while it gets better and gets beautiful.Story is like so many others yet so different,mostly because of the emotions it makes you feel.I love the characters,they have soul,attitude,flaws..main couple is adorable,that tension and anticipation when they are near each other is just awesome.Development between them goes at slow pace and makes your heart ache from all the sweetness.
I could go on and on about this manhua...wish it was so much longer.One of works where i wanted it to never end,made me sad when it finished.
This one moved me so much,made me feel all kinds of emotions and it became special for me.

Also to those that didnt like it i have to say that this manhua was written in 1998 and its better than most od todays manga where chars are empty and you cant feel any emotion form it.So those that are thinking wheter to read it or not...give it a try and dont give up after few chapters because after volume 1 this manhua has alot to offer.

... Last updated on April 30th, 2013, 6:56am

I read this up to volume 10 a couple of years ago, and I really loved this series. Now I decided to read the whole thing.

This manhua is by no means perfect. The plot features a stupidly high rate of gorgeous people and the setting is pretty stereotypical, though the focus on cameras spices it up a bit. The two main characters have some serious mood-swings and that dad is just too far out to be taken seriously.

I could keep on pointing out flaws in this series, but truth is that I got pretty addicted to it. I read all 15 volumes in two days, needing to know what happens next. The characters don't act completely irrational (even though they make things unnecessarily dramatic) and some of the most puke-inducing shoujo cliches are left out. The female lead isn't completely useless, actually has some talent and pursues something other than love! Even if she's younger than Jo, you don't get the impression that they aren't equals - they just have different personalities and experiences from life.

Nonetheless, yes this is a bit cheesy, and it gets even more so in the second half. But I loved the second half the most. The pace gets faster compared to the rather slow first seven or eight volumes.

I'm glad that this didn't happen:

If you're looking for a long series (and you already read all the very good ones) with a slow romance, much drama and some cheesiness, this is for you. After some volumes you most likely won't complain about the art anymore either. It gets better.
I'm more critical than a few years ago, but it's still pretty entertaining if you can overlook the cheesiness.

... Last updated on July 5th, 2012, 8:55am

I was thoroughly enjoying this story until around volume 12 or 13. I'm not sure how can Yung Jo claim to love Jiayu while simultaneously being such a total jerk. In addition, for being such a playboy, he's really awful at handling women. The chemistry between them was incredible before, but now it's really sort of deteriorated into romantic-tension-squabbles-without-romance. I'm kinda disappointed.

That said, the art was pretty, the research good, and it held my attention for a whole day, which is pretty awesome. So I gave it an 8. =D

Even though the characters aren't like the bishounen/shoujo nowadays -older- but they're still VERY hot and the story is really exciting, leaves you wanting more! Oh btw, the cover looks nothing like the people inside~ the art inside is MUCH better, 180 difference!

This series was kind of enthralling for me weirdly enough. I say its weird because the art wasn't exactly my favorite (i.e. I really had second thoughts about reading the manga when I first saw the artwork) and the story was a bit drawn-out for my personal tastes.
The reason for my absolute interest and undying devotion: Ding Jiaya (the main female lead). This may be the first time that I've liked and could relate to a female lead. I always find myself irritated with female leads because mangaka often make them unrealistically headstrong or innocent or weak or happy or stubborn or some other character that normal people have in real life just never to the extent that they're endowed with in the manga. Her personality was just so admirable, strong and REALISTIC: naive, bright, playful, but then when something really made her sad, she actually let herself wallow in it for a quite a bit before someone was able to pull her out of it. Ryan (our wonderful mangaka) had to have known someone like her in real life to be able to create a character with such a lasting impression.
Something else I loved about our female lead:

My annoyance with the manga: Yung Jo (the main male lead). Don't get me wrong: I love a headstrong, arrogant male lead in my manga, but sometimes he just went a bit too far for me.


Besides my one little annoyance, the manga was GREAT. Of course, it gets slow at times (what manga that lasts for 15 volumes doesn't drag a bit at parts?), but the bit of dragging is the price we pay for a really memorable manga.

I gave it a 10

... Last updated on June 6th, 2011, 5:50am

First of all, I think the art isn't that bad, when compared to a lot of shounen/seinen/shoujo/josei/BL I've read: there're series with worse art. Though the art itself could never compare to the stuff in say... Bokko or 7 seeds or Demon Sacred, Son of the dawn, or many other series I've looked at. So, the art is... just fairly acceptable for a shoujo series.

The plot is pretty much standard-fare shoujo: read standard romance with possible rivals turning up in parts of the series, and in terms of complexity, I'd place it at somewhere between simple to slightly complicated. Though, the photography aspect certainly makes it a bit more interesting, I think there're likely at least a few other series which've possibly portrayed this aspect far better(Komatta and possibly a few non-BL series I haven't read).

Some of the characters are the standard-fare noisy/upbeat characters you'd find in Chinese dramas + literature, so they're not very interesting for me but they might be a refreshing departure for others tired of typical "japanese shoujo characters", though I think that Super Girl or Cinema Empire had far more interesting and varied strong heroines and female/male characters. Btw, I thought most of the male characters were quite bland since they seemed to be based mostly on stereotypes and ugh, they might have been "bishies" or "biseinen", they didn't have any enduring characteristics that made them worthy to read about.

Talking about jokes: the jokes between the characters and that the characters themselves make/say are a mixture of interesting and entertaining as well as "seen it, read it a million times" so that's a mixed bag. Some of them were really funny while others were a little boring or even annoying.

So far, I haven't fallen in love with any aspect of it and am still on volume 2 so I can't say whether I'd recommend it to anyone or not. I'll probably update with more thoughts on this.

(Update: Just read up to vol 4 and I'm stopping at this point since the drama and plot aren't interesting enough to sustain my attention. However, for you fans who're seriously into shoujo, I guess it's probably decent enough to keep you entertained for a while.)

... Last updated on May 26th, 2008, 11:07am

I love this manga. It's different. It's older, but I still think the artwork is good. It's not top notch like some of the newer ones coming out, but it is defintely not that bad to the point you have to get used to it. It's got a good storyline with a little bit of gender bender at the beginning. I think overall it's a great manga. It's not your typical scene in the high school shoujo manga, but set more in the adult atmosphere.

... Last updated on December 5th, 2007, 10:42am

look at it or think too hard you'll miss the hilariousness and even loving care that is in this manga. Just read it and don't take too much stock in the age difference. Maybe it didn't affect me as much because hubby is 9 years older than me lol

I truly enjoyed this manga and am reading Steel Rose and looking forward to more! :-D

Half way through the first few chapters I already knew how this was going to end. This really was good just not that original. It had a tendency to drag at times and I feel that several chapters could have been left out and you till would have gotten the same effect. Over all the art was well done which is what kept me coming back for more.

I liked the manga...though it was very slow at times, and got a little repetitive. I actually skipped a couple of chapters and even pages within chapters and still understood what was going on. Truthfully some of the characters that appeared were unneeded and some loose ends remainded but overall this was a nice manga. I liked the ending too. I felt bad of aiwen, but I am supportive of the main couple even if both of them have a few missing screws.

I do have to say I love both the mother and father of Jiyau. They crack me up! I died laughing at some parts.
The art is okay, its not the best art I have ever seen but the character's personalities made up for it. So not to many complaints here...