It's Nintendo After All: Super Mario Bros.

I really stink at updating, I'll try to better, for the greater good!

Here is am illustration I made of the mushroom kingdom, inspired by It's a Small World, by one of my most favorite artists, Mary Blair. Enjoy.

It's Nintendo After All- Super Mario Bros.

Adobe Illustrator CS4

May 2014

Fan Art: April O'Neil

As a product of the 1980's, I got on the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles (TMNT) band "Party Wagon" with a Leonardo action figure. From there it was all up hill, from Action figures to the television show, to lunch bags (that I still have) I love the TMNT. My biggest crush on the show was Irma, but I also had a crush on April (what little boy that watched the show didn't?) so here's my fan art of her.

April O'Neil

Adobe Illustrator CS3

January 2014

Nintendo Jam: 4 Captain Syrup

I love Wario games so I had to do the lesser known Captain Syrup.

Captain Syrup

Standard Edition

Adobe Illustrator CS4

January 2014

Captain Syrup

WarioLand: Super MarioLand 3 Edition

Adobe Illustrator CS4

January 2014

Nintendo Jam: 3 Princess Daisy

What happened to 2? It's Zelda and I'm not happy with it so I won't post it. Actually it was Tetra.

#3 is Princess Daisy but Barrie did Peach, I'm a Daisy fan so sue me.

My favorite Mario game is Super a Mario Land, so again, I did a GameBoy edition.

Princess Daisy

Standard Edition

Adobe Illustrator CS4

December 2013

Princess Daisy

Super Mario Land Edition

Adobe Illustrator CS4

December 2013

Nintendo Jam: 1 Samus

My high school buddy, Barrie Punsalan and I began our art studio, RazBarrie Studio, at the end of 2013. Our first project was a Video Game Art Jam. 

Samus was the first in the series. I would link you to Barrie's work but he doesn't have a page yet so here's mine.

As a fan of Metroid II: Return of Samus, I decided to add a gameboy edition.

Samus

Standard Edition

December 2013

Samus

Metroid II: Return of Samus Edition

December 2013

Mid-Century Marvels: X-Men

The first comic book characters that I enjoyed growing were Superman and Batman. It wasn't until I was a pre-teen that I found the awesomeness of the X-Men. There was Spidey, and good ol' Captain Ace, but the first comic books I read were the X-Men, drawn by the great Jim Lee. I'll admit, Fox Kid's X-Men on at 10 am Saturday mornings helped, heck that animated show put them on the map for me. Wolverine, forever being my favorite, and my biggest crush, Jubilee. 

Eventually I'll do a fan art of these X-Men, but I gotta give props to the originals, Cyclops, Iceman, The Beast, The Angel, Marvel Girl and the main man Profesor X. 

 

This is the quick sketch I drew up in procreate.

"X-Men (1963)"
Adobe Illustrator CS4 
Inspired by: X-Men (1963) and Ink Master tattoo artist Sausage
April 2014

Mother's Day: The Reynolds (2013)

This mother's day I made this piece for my mother-in-law in NY. It's her family and the family dogs. Dad walking Rufus, Mom walking Logan, and my fiance walking Chloe.

The Reynolds

Adobe Illustrator CS4

May 2013

Mid-Century Metal Gear: Sniper Wolf

 

I'm a huge Metal Gear fan. I saw that The Metal Gear Art Studio was holding a Females of Metal Gear Art Contest, so I made a fan art piece of Sniper Wolf from Metal Gear Solid on the PlayStation. It turns out that you have to draw from the website. Oh well, at least I made out with a cool fan art piece.

"Sniper Wolf"

Adobe Illustrator CS4 

April 2013

Mid-Century Marvels: Iron Man

Marvel Comics has some great stories behind them and some of the most memorable origin stories to be told in the world of comic books (alongside with DC comics.) 
I decided to make some Marvel Comics inspired pieces.

"Iron Man: Armor Wars (1987-1988"
Adobe Illustrator CS4 
Inspired by: Iron Man: The Armor Wars (1987-1988)
May 2012

In the Armor Wars (1987-1988) Tony Stark's Iron Man armors are stolen by The Spymaster who then sells them to Justin Hammer. (His "Silver Centurion" armor remains untouched) Iron Man believes that there are other villains that stole his technology, among them Titanium Man and The Crimson Dynamo. 
During the storyline Iron Man Changes armors from "The Silver Centurion" (red/grey) to a modified "Stealth Armor" (blue) to what would be the newest Iron Man armor of that time period.
It's a good story, but I wish that we could see the stolen armors in action...

"Iron Man: Armor Wars (2009)"
Adobe Illustrator CS4
Inspired by: Iron Man and The Armor Wars
(2009)
May 2012


In this version of the Armor Wars (2009) Tony's Stark's Iron Man armors are also stolen after Tony creates a new type of non-lethal rescue armor. After he finishes, he has a press conference about it and doesn't realize that ALL of his armors are stolen including the rescue armor. The thief is a Russian, The Red Barbarian.
Krushki wears the "Golden Avenger" armor (similar to the original grey armor)
Hammer wears the "War Machine" armor
Sickle wears the original "Red/Gold" armor
Darkstar wears the "Stealth" armor
Fantasma wears the normal Iron Man armor (of that time)
and The Red Barbarian wears  "THE HULK BUSTER"

"The only armor that's been designed for a specific opponent, just in case"-Tony Stark 

Tony goes out and finds each of his armors and defeats each villain. With every defeat, he wears that armor starting with the most primitive to the most advanced.
This was pretty cool, because we get to see all the armors in action (oh and he also fights Omega Red) the only thing is that it was created for all ages, so what could have been some super cool fight scenes are really watered down, but it's still pretty cool.

Speeder Bike Chase

 One of my most favorite scenes in Star Wars involves my favorite type of storm trooper, the scout trooper. That scene is "the speeder bike chase" in Endor with Luke and Leia, this Diptych is from that scene.

It took me a while to come up with the ground. Originally it was grass blades, but it made the image look still,  there wasn't that speed element. Then I came up the lines that match the trees and made the perfect speed element that I was looking for.

"Speeder Bike Chase"
Adobe Illustrator CS3
Inspired by: Star Wars / May Blair
4/2012

Echo Base Are Belong To Us

I don't know why, but I've been on a Star Wars kick. It doesn't help that my girlfriend has also gotten into the same kick as me. Don't get me wrong, I think it's the best space opera ever created by a human brain. and it's super cool that my girlfriend enjoys it as much as me, but this just came out of nowhere.

I haven't done fan arts in a while so I decided to do a piece with the characters from "A New Hope" (which isn't finished yet) I haven't figured out a background yet. I moved on to vectorize a bunch of light sabers and make a chart type of design, but again, i'm just not happy with the end result so far, plus I couldn't get this other idea out of my head...

I couldn't wait to make a piece for "The Empire Strikes Back." I just went for it. I made it semi mid-century style. I love the snowspeeders and the AT-AT Imperial Walkers, so i made this diptych of the two sides about to clash. I think it came out great. I hope you guys enjoy it as much as I do. I also can't wait to make this into a framed piece cause it deserves it!

"Echo Base Are Belong To Us"

Adobe Illustrator CS3
Inspired by: Star Wars / May Blair
4/2012

Besty in color

I've been using an ap on my iPad called procreate, which has lead me to venture away from vector. Not to mention that my computer is dying out, so my iPad has become the place I go to, to make my sketches digital. Here's a couple of Betsy pieces done with procreate.

This is a digitized and colored version of the sketch that I used for the Betsy& Veronica: Betsy's Late Date title panel.

This is the digitized and colored version of the original sketch that was on the second panel of Betsy & Veronica: Betsy's Late Date.

The Good Life: Betsy & Veronica

I took digital painting this spring at Grossmont college and for our last project we had to make a comic page.
I had been trying to do this since 3rd grade and every time it was the same outcome; First couple of panels were good quality, but the last few were chicken scratch. This was usually because I was in such a hurry to get to the point that I stopped caring how it looked by the end. This put me off of comics for future ideas that I had.
For years my friends keep asking when I was going to do a comic, and my answer was always I LOVE comics, but I don't do comics.
For this project I took a different approach, I drew every panel separately, then I put them together on the computer.
To fulfill the project's needs we had to have 8 panels (plus title), and lines given to us by the instructor (which were taken from the play "Waiting for Godot"
I realize that I got a long way to go in making comics, but this one got me into it again.
What I decided to test drive my new comic page drawing techniques by using two characters that I've been designing early this year, Betsy and Veronica, my second attempt at furry characters (The first being my very first original characters based on my pet rabbits Yakko and Dot.)
This comic page is also going to be part of my "The Good Life" series which is where i decided to put my new furries. I got the name from one of my favorite Weezer songs of the same name. so here it is Enjoy. The Good Life: Betsy and Veronica: Betsy's Late Date

Project Peach in the style of Braniff

Braniff International Airways has some of the best posters the mid century has to offer. I decided to make this illustration sort of in that style with color and shapes.

Mid-Century Marvels: Fantastic Four

The Fantastic Four is classic. whenever I hear the name I think of "The Golden Age of Marvel Comics." Jack Kirby and Stan Lee at their best.
I made this Fantastic Four fan art for the 50 year anniversary of this awesome team.

 

The Lion, The Witch and The Wardrobe

This book was written in 1950 by C.S. Lewis, it's one of my favorite books of all time, and I recently reread the book and was inspired to make this illustration. The other books on the Narnia series are okay, but none of them are as good as this one.
I got the idea for the witch from the intro to the 1986 anime, Saint Seiya where the main villain shows up for the first time in the intro. Also from the intro to the popular 1992 anime Sailor Moon where it shows Tuxedo Mask for the first time in the intro.

"The Lion, The Witch and The Wardrobe"
(Feb 2012)

Mid-Century Marvels: The Amazing Spider-Man

June 1973 Marvel Comics released The Amazing Spider-Man #121. This issue changed comic book history. This would mark the end of the "Silver Age of Comic Books" (1956-1973) and begin the darker, grittier "Bronze Age of Comic Books." (1973-c.1985)

The Green Goblin kidnaps Gwen Stacy (Spider-Man's girl friend) and while fighting decides to hurl Gwen off the side of the George Washington Bridge (but depicted as the Brooklyn Bridge) Spidey goes to the rescue her and shoots his web to catch her. The web catches her leg and Spidey pulls her up thinking he saved her. But that was not the case, when he caught her the whiplash snapped her neck.

"The Night Gwen Stacy Died"
May 2012

Previously Unfinished and Unreleased: Star Wars

Like all artists I have some stuff that I never finished because I got caught up doing something else; didn't like it; or I didn't know how to finish. I also have some stuff that I never released because I didn't like it or I felt like something was lacking.
Sometimes I end up at the folder of an unfinished piece that I really like and has potential and I try to think of of ways to finish, but I rarely find a way or inspiration at that time.
So here is the Star Wars related work that I've done that is Unfinished and/or Unreleased.

The first image is the Tattooine mountains with Luke's landspeeder. I got the idea from an old record cover of the Grand Canyon. I don't know why but It just didn't turn out as great as I had hoped.

 Here is the Star Wars gang. The problem was getting a background done good enough for this. I love the way the characters came out, especially Chewbacca, I'm sure this will be finished sometime soon.

Here's another attempt at Tattooine, this time it's Luke, Obi-Wan and the droids looking over Mos Eisley Space Port. This one is better, but I feel that it's still lacking something.



with this semester wrapping up, I'm sure I'll be posting more, I have a lot of previously unfinished and unreleased work that I want to show, and maybe get some advice, ideas or suggestions on how to finish. Also I have some more new work that I'd like to post.

Four for Forty: part 1

In the fall of 2011 my photo instructor, Suda House, asked me to create a flier for a program they were starting for a photo lab on the weekends (since we lost our weekend lab time thanks to California school funding being a joke)
The program would be that you could buy four lab days (two weekends) for forty dollars. This would be for either our wet/ traditional lab and our digital lab.
I came up with the flier above, which is a watered down version of what came out of these two figures.

The digital lab full version was okay and even my instructor dubbed the guy in it one of our photo teachers, Paul Tournet.

The wet Lab full version is what is now considered one of my most favorite illustrations that I've ever done. it's stylized and very mid century. Suda liked it so much that she dubbed the girl as herself, but thinner and with a pony tail. To me this was like catching lightning in a bottle, but it's lightning that im sure I can catch again with no problem.

Theodore Roosevelt

Being on a ship for 7 month can drive someone nuts. I spent that time as a sailor for the navy from 2008-2009, but also spent that time working on my artwork. I had a limited amount of reference sources. When we would get to port, I would photograph as much as possible and take as much source materials that would interest me. (The best was England of coarse) Since I was a graphic designer on the Ship USS Theodore Roosevelt (CVN 71) working with journalists, photographers and pretty much welcome wagon to guests on the ship, I got to know and see ol' Teddy A LOT. I even got these portraits of good ol' "Teddy Ruxpin" done
The first one was just a quickie I did and became a poster for our print-shop, sort of a way to show what can be done there.

This was probably the most popular one on the ship and was used on the cruise book, kind of a ship's year book for that 6-9 month cruise.

This one was my favorite one, but wouldn't you know it, no one else really liked it. My theories are that the sketchiness of it made people think it was unfinished. Also that most people in the military aren't artists and only want things to be hi-tech, new and "perfect."