Thursday, May 28, 2020

Analog Toys Tribute to Bob Brechin of Palitoy

5/28/2020

Wow, it's been over a year since I've did my last blog. Sorry guys, I had a lot of personal things I was dealing with in my life.

Anyhow, I was asked by Tony Roberts of  #analogtoys to do a tribute piece for #BobBrechin, the chief designer for #Palitoy, a toy company in England that made the popular #ActionMan and #ActionfForce line in the UK. Head over to Analog Toys on YouTube as Tony does excellent reviews of toys from the 70s and 80s. https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCVvR_X1TXqUeLDV_hDPA2yA

So there were several teams in Action Force toyline; Space Force, Z Force, Q Force, and SAS vs their nemesis #RedShadows. There was another team that was developed, but never went into production called the Special Weapons Force (SWF). A character in the line was rumored to be Palitoy's headman Bob Brechin and the likeness is very similar to Bob.

I decided to sorta do a Ron Rudat style illustration trying to capture the likeness of Bob Brechin and the first prototype of the SWF scientist figure.

I start off with a gesture of the action pose for the illustration. I often get too hung up with facial details before I develop the entire figure.


I normally try to do three concept sketches, but to be honest, I could think of any but more than two, plus I was eager to get going the project. 



Tony liked the standing pose. I also wanted him to decide if he wanted the character to wear glasses or not. Four-eyes it is!

I was asked to remove the Uzi and replace it with some futuristic tool, kinda like a Dr. Who device. 

Since I was trying to mimic Ron Rudat's style, I used one of his illustrations to sample the color palette he used. Always tone your canvas kids. It helps you develop midtones.

 A little further in development.
 A little #breakingbad joke. I'm not saying or implying they were making more than toys at Los Palitoys Hermanos.
 For the packaging I had traced traditional Action Force design in Adobe Illustrator. Tony also provided me the bio he wanted to use on the back of the packaging.


And here we have the final illustration. Front and back respectively.



Thanks again to Tony over Analog Toys to work on this project. And again, check out Analog Toys and please consider sharing and subscribing to his channel.

Sunday, May 5, 2019

The return of clone wars.

5/28/20

Holy smokes it's been almost a full year! Sorry, but I completely for got to share the image.
Here is the final rendering.


5/31/19

Illustration is complete, but I can't show the final product yet. It will be release as an exclusive for #geekypinups. I don't have a time for it's release, but as soon as I have it I'll post it up my blog.

Thanks for your support!



5/23/19

This may be my last entry for awhile. I've got another project that I have to focus my attention on. The figure is coming along nicely. It's a shame that I have to put her aside for now.



5/18/19

Sorry guys. Life just gets in the way. Finally started rendering Ahoska. Decided to do vector on this one. Here's a work in progress.




5/5/19

I think Dave Filoni is the only director who truly understands Star Wars and we thank him for the Rebel series. Now with the continuation of Clone Wars, I thought it would be approerate to do a sketch for Ahoska and what happened prior to episode III.

Initial sketch for Ahoska.


Thursday, March 7, 2019

RetroBlasting New Logo

3/7/19

For about a year I discovered a group called #RetroBlasting on #Youtube; a ruthless organization determine to... oh wait, sorry... wrong group. RetroBlasting (RB) is a fun, humorous but very informative group that examines toys and pop culture, mostly (but not limited to) of the 80s and 90s. Along with toy restoration and reviews, RB tries to examine the who, what, and why things were of yesteryears and the decision making process of shows, movies, and toys.

I enjoy their presentations very much, but I always thought their logo could use a makeover, so I reached out to the folks at RB and asked if they would be interested in an upgrade and to much to my delight they said yes.

To keep with the theme of the show, I decided to re-envisioned their character logo to the style of cartoons you'd find in the mid-80s which were some of the most exciting and influential mediums of pop-culture.

You can check them out on youtube at: https://www.youtube.com/user/retroblasting or their website at http://www.retroblasting.com.

So I begin my work process with their original logo which is based the show's two hosts; Michael French and Melinda Mock.




At the beginning of each show you see this logo with occasional variations depending on theme of episode (kinda like the Simpson couch gag).

I always had in mind to present the characters in 80s style cartoons so I started off with a rough sketch.



Once approved, I gather reference material and proceed with rendering the characters.


I'm currently running off of CS6 Illustrator and rendering this as vector images made most sense.
So typically I start blocking in the image.

I spend a lot on the face of my characters first before anything because in my mind the image won't work unless you get the face right.

As the character rending develop, some of the decision making process you have to make is color choices and design handling. Sampling the colors from the original logo was too dark and didn't matched up with the feel of mid-80s cartoons so you have to strike a balance between capturing the characteristics of both source materials.

Many cartoons in the 80s were done overseas in Japan so you get a feel of proto-anime here in the US. Many of the character designs were done by American artists, but the production was done by studios in Japan with a few expectation such as #Filmation. FB touched on this one of their episodes on a #He-Man panel. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t7OH9YXu_XI

I had to really examine how characters were rendered during this period, which uses quick simple shading and highlights. You have to remember that this was before CGI, so you're producing a lot of episodes by hand drawing/paintings and you're not going to have the tight renderings or crazy anime hair styles you see in the later decades.

 
The last thing usually tweak is the hair. I decided to cheat a little bit and give a little bit more rendering then you normally see in cartoons of the period. And there you have it.

Please consider being a subscriber of RetroBlasting and if you like their content, please support them  at #pateron  https://www.patreon.com/retroblasting.

They're producing great stuff and I look forward to seeing them grow within the pop-culture community!






Thursday, February 14, 2019

TOMY Disney Share the Smiles App

2/14/19

Rendered illustrations used for #TOMY #Disney #Mickey and #MinnieMouse 3-in-1 Potty System. It is app for child development.

Roger Andrews proved the line work; I just render them to color/vector.

Disclaimer: All images belong to TOMY and Disney.



Check it out: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=chI1OX1Hh9w

Wednesday, February 13, 2019

The Judge YES Network Promo

2/13/19

Awhile back I help rendered the illustrations of #RogerAndrews for #NewYorkYankee's #AaronJudge for the #YESNetwork which won an #EmmyAward.

Disclaimer: Images and video belongs to the YES Network.


Check it out.


http://www.warshawblumenthal.com/emmy-award-winner-program-promo-sports-judge-superhero-spot/

Sunday, February 10, 2019

Independant film "KevCoin" poster

2/10/19

Awhile back, I was hired to create a poster for an independent movie called "KevCoin: The Movie" back in 2018. Basically, it's about a director trying to create a comedy film about cryptocurrency.

They wanted a style similar to #InvaderZim.

 Here's a link to their website. https://kevcointhemovie.com

Disclaimer: All rights and ownership belong One Light Productions.


Works for Hasbro

2-10-19

Thought I'd shared some work I did for #Hasbro a few years ago for their #MighyMugs line. These were concept works that were never put into production. I work with an artist #RogerAndrews and help render these.

There's plenty of other cool stuff I did for Hasbro, but unfortunately I can't show them just quite yet.