Thursday, November 18, 2010

Retro Cats & Dogs

I really enjoyed doing this one. Done on February 2, 2009, this collection of retro-style cartoon cats & dogs was inspired by Dakin's Dream Pets toy collection from 1957 to 1972. (Dream Pets were originally from Japan. They were these colorful velveteen stuffed animal figures. Dakin ordered a train set from Japan, and the Japanese company secured them with velveteen dolls, which ended up getting more attention than the train sets! There have been 2,000 Dream Pets made from 1957 to 1972. 24 of them were reissued in 2004.)

This was done while on vacation in the Outer Banks (needless to say, just days after my Grandma's passing). I did a pencil sketch first on New Year's Day, and then traced it over with Crayola colored pencils. I was really pleased with how it came out! I'd love to do more like this.

Below is my life drawing of Dream Pet Lucy Lamb, which I did a day later. I originally featured it in my older Fan Art on Parade post.

Wednesday, November 17, 2010

The Mighty Bee and... the Mighty Pee!?!

Two fanarts of The Mighty B! I did for fun last year!
The above, finished on September 17, 2009 (and colored in Photoshop just tonight), is a drawing of Bessie Higgenbottom's imaginary alter-ego, the Mighty Bee. According to Honeybee Girl Scouts legend, whoever earns all 5,000 Honeybee badges will become a superhero called the Mighty Bee!

Below, two days later, I had fun creating an original character... sort of.

Yeah, the above image is kinda' dark, isn't it? :)

This is an original concept drawing for the Mighty Bee's arch-enemy, the Mighty Pee, drawn on September 19, 2009, and colored two nights ago. Yes, I indeed said the Mighty Pee! Here's my own concept for the character:

Portia Gibbons, as she appears in Nickelodeon's The Mighty B!

Imagine Bessie getting all 5,000 badges to become the Mighty Bee. Bessie's fellow scout/frenemy Portia Gibbons steals all of her badges somehow, and while she absorbs powers from them, the result is horribly wrong; It turns out that perhaps Bessie was destined all along to be the Mighty Bee, one reason being that Bessie's name begins with the letter "B", as in "bee." But Portia abused the power of the badges, and because her name begins with "P," she becomes whatever begins with "P" that rhymes with "bee!" So, Portia undergoes a horrible transformation (much like An American Werewolf in London), as she melts into a smelly puddle of pee (leaving her clothes in a wet pile), and the puddle congeals into a solid mass, in the form of a muscular, translucent-yellow creature known as the Mighty Pee! Besides the "drippy" theme of parts of her body (the hair, earlobes, six-pack, fingers, foot tip, etc.), she has swirls in her eyes which suggest a maniacal violent streak (not to mention a toilet flush)! As the Mighty Pee, power-crazed Portia wreaks havoc in San Francisco, until Bessie has to find all of her badges again to become the Mighty Bee, and then stop the Mighty Pee once and for all (but without harming Portia)! But there's only one problem... they're both of equal strength!

If the above scenario were done as an actual episode (which would obviously be titled "The Mighty P!"), it would be a great series finale, considering the badge angle, but as just a special episode, perhaps it would all be a dream sequence! I'd be fine with whatever works. :)

Sunday, November 14, 2010

THE MIGHTY B! - A year ago next Wednesday...

Last year, early in the Christmas season, I was still downright despondent over the cancellation of Nickelodeon's The Mighty B! on November 24 that time. (Needless to say, at this writing, Nicktoons is finally starting to give the rest of Season 2!!!) On Nicktoons, I watched the Christmas episode of Ren & Stimpy ("A Scooter for Yaksmas," which was the original series' final episode), and thought it was hilarious, especially the over-the-top, earth-shattering drama from Stimpy (which, as the series does, parodies classic Hollywood drama)! I thought it'd be funny to draw Bessie Higgenbottom, The Mighty B!'s heroine, reenacting the moment where Stimpy made a spectacle of himself over not getting the scooter he wanted for Yaksmas (R&S' version of Christmas)! But along the way of drawing this, I was still depressed over B!'s cancellation, so I decided to make a subtle reference to that in the punchline of this pencil drawing, finished on December 18, 2009. I could one day make a better version of this drawing, fully colored, but I like this anyway. :)


More Mighty B! fanart to come!