Speed Racer-The Next Generation

Earlier this year I began doing style guide art for the new Cartoon Network animated series, 'Speed Racer-The Next Generation'. Working alone and in collaboration with some friends we created a number of poses and character art for licensors to use as they needed. These can be used on anything from garments to school supplies to paper plates. IDW Publishing decided to use a couple of my pieces for the covers of their Speed Racer-Next Generation comic. For issue #1 they used some exisiting style guide art, but went with mine on issue #2. There's an ad for the next issue, also using my artwork, in the back. Unfortunately, I didn't get any credit in the individual comic, but I should get a mention in the trade paperback collected edition. The background textures in both were added by someone in the IDW art department, utilizing other style guide art. The leaping Chim Chim was published in IDW's digest sized Speed Racer-The Next Generation Animated, Vol. 1.

Posted here alongside the finished Illustrator files are some of my original pencil drawings and inks for a few of the pieces I did. Most of the art seen here was done this way, with the exception of the Chim Chim ones, where I did all the inking directly in Illustrator. Besides the stuff here, and the Next Generation art that I did in collaboration with friends (they would do the pencils, then I would go in and tighten that up, ink it, and do the final Illustrator art), I also did some classic Speed Racer art, updating old drawings, including two pieces used as life-size standees for display purposes; one of Speed and the Mach 5 and the other of Racer X and the Shooting Star.

All artwork copyright Speed Racer Enterprises.

In With The Old

Pictured here are some pieces I did back in 1990, during my second year at S.VA. These paintings were part of a triptych originally. Unfortunately, the middle pic, of a young kid discovering the gun his older brother has hidden in the sock drawer, was destroyed by the flood I had earlier this year. I played around with the hues in Photoshop for the purple tinted version. Painted in oils on illustration board, the art measures 9" X 12".

Their Uncle

Gouache, Brush Pen and Photoshop. 10" X 15" on Illustration board.

Her Sister

Didn't get to the illustration board this time. This one was done in my sketchbook. Pencil, Brush Pen, Markers, Gouache, Colored Pencil and Photoshop.

His Brother

My first painting (well, sort of) in quite some time...aside from a small experiment or two I might have done in the last few years, this is the first time I've put brush to paint in well over a decade...closer to two. I went to a Dave DeVries painting demo a few days ago at the Kustum Kulture Gallery in Baldwin, NY and I got some inspiration to attempt a painting. I had a piece of some kind of illustration board lying around that I figured I'd test out my gouache paints on. Unfortunately, what I thought was cold press illustration board was actually more like a piece of some kind of backing board, so the paint was really sopped up by it and wasn't working the way I'd have hoped. Still, I was able to move it around somewhat. as for why I say this is a painting 'sort of', it's still got lots of holding lines and only bits of modeling going on here and there....maybe it's more of a 'colored drawing'...if anything, it's an experiment and next time I'll actually get some real illustration board! I added a bit of texture to the background in Photoshop.

Waterlogged Memories

Some friends might remember the flood I had a few months ago, which I have yet to write about either here or on The Collection. A more detailed post about it is due. In brief, the cause was my hot water heater bursting open in the basement. All in all, what could have been a total disaster seemed to turn out relatively well, with only a couple of hundred dollars worth of damage to some not so rare or coveted books and magazines (and a small handful of comics). I got off relatively scott free it seemed.

Recently, I went to look though a large zipped vinyl student art portfolio that had been in the corner where much of the worst damage was done. To my horror and utter shock I discovered that ALL the art in the portfolio had pretty much become fused together, a pile of art around two dozen thick. Sitting for months, soaked through with water, the pages had been reduced to brown mildewy sops with torn stains making up for what was once art, with only slivers along sides remaining of untouched artwork. Thankfully, much of the original art in that portfolio existed in some sort of form, whether it be a stat or newspaper printing, slide or digital scan. Still, a good 5-10 pieces are gone to the winds of time forever. I'll write some more about it on my Collection website, along with photos of some of the beyond repair damaged artwork. It's not a pretty sight and I recommend the faint of heart to look away.

Some of the art that was lost were some of the first art showcaed on this blog back in 2005. Pieces like The Paradox Of Time and No-Meenin' Funnies. A few paintings done for Personality Comics and a science-fiction anthology were lost, along with three pages of an issue of Plasma Baby which I inked over Mitch Waxman's pencils. And then a whole bunch of student pieces, both large and small.

So here, as a last goodbye to this art, are just some of the pieces that were destroyed none of which have made it onto this blog before.




From the top:

The Return Of Captain Democracy-1987
Behind The Wall Of Sleep-1988
Marcos-1988
Salvation-1988
Spacer-1988
Carl-1989/90
Skull-1989/90
Giantess-1989/90
Bobbi-1990

Real Life Superheroes

mostly monsters

some friendly, some not so friendly.

Post Its

A bunch of recent post its and small head sketches...Some of these are done with a brush pen and a dry marker for shading.

More Sketches

Sketches

A few random drawings taking up space on my table here...