Free the Bandicoot !!!

Tobor the 8 Man

I think the original title was "8 Man" but was changed to "8th Man" when the series was aired in America. I always preferred the straight up 8. Are you familiar with the cartoon? Early TV anime. Felt like doing a simple homage to Tobor which is "robot" spelled backwards. So here it is...

Spyro time

Cheer up Crash

Samson

I've been thinking about this character lately and wanted to give him my own visual rendition as I continue to practice digital illustration with Photoshop. Samson is the legendary strongman from the Bible story. He was of the Hebrew tribe of Dan and I looked to give him that kind of feel. Almost like from an ancient biker gang. He had his long hair in locks or braids and I attempted to reflect that in his appearance. A lot of fun and the practice is good.

Pretty Girl practice

It's been a while since I got into color and recently I'm determined to shake out the cobwebs and get some practice with painting in Photoshop. Here's what I did today. I drew each girl separately in digital black line and went into the compositions to work up the color. Then I combined them into one picture.

Feel like a werewolf

Playing with Photoshop looking to create. There's a blue moon tonight...

Crash - Portrait of the Bandicoot

A couple of months ago I started a class demo and thought I'd use Crash as the subject. I was working with acrylics on illustration board emphasizing how the mastering of traditional skills is beneficial even if you work digitally. This is as far as I got with the underpainting phase during that session...

With some free time last night I completed the composition in Photoshop using the same technique as I would have with acrylics. Turned out to look pretty much like what the analog results would've been. It was fun doing this and I hope you enjoy the art.   

Crash gettin' jumpy

A couple of recent sketches

I managed to get these drawings out in the past few days. Nothing spectacular but it's better than nothing at all. They came about as demos while working with students in class. Both were created with ball point pen. Lesson being that a non-erasable medium helps to build confidence in one's draftsmanship skills. Also some guidance in tonal rendering and a little Photoshop color on the second one to liven things up. I'm determined to get back to creating on more of a full time schedule. Hopefully that day will come soon.