held in Tokyo. It was directed by Mushishi anime director Hiroshi Nagahama and its original script was written by Kazuaki Nakamura, while the anime voice actors acted as their respective characters. The production used augmented reality on its visuals, which was designed to span a 270 degree field of view. Reception Awards and public response The series has won numerous awards: in 2003, the manga was awarded an Excellence Prize for manga at the 7th Japan Media Arts Festival, while in 2006, the series won the Kodansha Manga Award for general manga. At the 10th Japan Media Arts Festival, both the anime and manga series were placed among the top 10 in their respective categories for best manga and anime. The anime series won grand prizes in the categories of television series and best art direction (for Takashi Waki) at the 5th Tokyo Anime Award competition held at the Tokyo International Anime Fair in 2006, while Nagahama won the Animation Kobe Individual Award for his directing. It also ranked 13th in a "Top 20" poll conducted by Japanese anime magazine Animage in 2006. In the following year, Mushishi was placed in 9th on Japan's Agency for Cultural Affairs's list of best manga, as well as ranked in 6th place on its list of best anime. Young Adult Library Services Association also listed the manga among 33 titles with "good quality literature and appealing reading for teens" in 2008. Mushishi was also well received by Japanese-language readers. The ten volumes have sold over 3.8 million copies. Individual volumes frequently appeared on the weekly lists of best-selling manga there. Furthermore, the eighth volume was the 9th best-selling manga of Amazon.com in the first half of 2007. A similar feat was achieved by the last volume which was ranked 49th in the Oricon list of best-selling manga of the first half of 2009. In North America, ICv2 has listed the manga among the "Top 300 Graphic Novels" of the month twice. Readers of About.com voted it the best seinen manga released in North America in 2007. The sixth volume of Mushishi was also among the best-selling manga in Malaysia in the week of March 1, 2009. Critical reception Mushishi was chosen as the best manga of 2007 by Deb Aoki of About.com, elected the best anime series of 2007 by Anime News Network's Carl Kimlinger, and was ranked seventh by Ramsey Isler in