Final Round!

Two posts in a row with exclamation points in the post title, things are happening all over the place...

Geek-Art.net invited me to take part in the Final Round show it's hosting at Made in Asia Convention being held in Bruxelles, Belgium this weekend. So it may be a bit late for you to go to the show, but you should if you can, I mean drop what you are doing and go to Belgium if you are truly a good person... but no worries because not only is this for the show it will be available as a limited run 16"x24" print on the geek-art store complete with a signed certificate of authenticity to make it official.  

I'm so excited about this one, and it's been difficult just sitting on it waiting to post it. It's a huge print and there's a lot of subtle touches that just get lost here. And I mean, c'mon, it's Zelda. 

There is all sorts of stuff going on over at Geek-Art.net and more about the show so check it out. If you think there's a staggering amount of exclamation marks going down here, you should see it over there. It's a punctuation screaming match. 

http://www.geek-art.net/geek-art-made-in-asia-convention-bruxelles/

English translation in the second paragraph

Pokemon Battle Royale!

The amazing folks over at Light Grey Art Lab decided to put together a show based on the original 151 Pokemon and crazily decided to get an artist for every single one. And they did it. The show opening is on the 20th with the show hanging from April 16th - May 11th. Head over to the Pokemon Battle Royale site for more info on that.

Pokemon personally was a love/hate thing in regards to my 5th grade self. I've openly declared on here before my hate for all things turn-based, but back then I still loved the art and the characters so I collected the cards and toys even though I didn't play the card-game or the video game. I went out and bought it and I tried to force myself to like the game, but it never clicked. But I 100% have a soft spot for those original ones because it definitely influenced what I drew back then, which transformed into how I draw now.

I originally was champing at the bit pretty hard for Hypno and at the time he appeared to be an open choice on the original list, but alas he was taken. Luckily I got golem who I thought was one of the cooler ones. The show filled up with a roster of artists so fast, and that was before Kotaku plugged it.

So here's one more re-imagining to add to the pile. If you are in the Minneapolis area you better get to that show because not only is it going to be an awesome show looking at the other pieces, Light Grey Art Lab deserves it.

http://pokemonbattleroyale.blogspot.com/
http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/paperbicycle/light-grey-art-lab

 

and Two Dragons...

For a tiny bit I took part in a weekly theme based drawing club and the week Dragons popped up I just felt like changing the style up a bit. I really liked how these turned out, especially since they were just sketches really. It's such a relief when I switch to a more cartoony style. Mainly because it's much easier and quicker by comparison to more realistic affairs, but also because there's just that "no rules" mentality about it. If I want to bend that line, I will, and it just won't matter. I think the only downside is I don't think I would learn as much in the process.

The entire time I did these I was listening to the "How to Train Your Dragon" OST. So good.

Two More Character Portraits

I did both of these for friends who play Neverwinter Nights. They each gave me a brief description of what sort of weapons they use and some traits and let me just go crazy on it. The only really specific detail was that the wizard looked and behaved pretty much like Benedict Cumberbatch on the BBC Sherlock. So I pretty much just painted his face on there. I didn't get too detail crazy because they were going to be shrunken down to the size they needed.

At this point I'm thinking I need to rename this blog to "character shots" or something along those lines. I just always seem to gravitate to doing some sort of character when I'm just painting independently. I have some normal, non-conceptual, illustrations coming at least pretty soon. I think a lot of that is that I just have never found painting scenes all that enticing. Especially when there aren't people or creatures in them. If I just let myself do whatever I'd probably end up drawing nothing but faces.

So I think it's time to force myself into some more environmental sketches and such.

Edit: Updated version of the woman.

Steampunk Western Sniper

Here is a sketch that got slightly out of hand. After it was done though I was so pleased and just had to throw it up on here. It's probably the first thing in a long, long while that I've painted without any sort of photo-manipulation techniques or any added textures after the fact. I just... well, I just painted. So much fun and a bit refreshing to get away from my normal process.

Dry Bones - SotD 149

This one was definitely highly requested. It seems like Dry Bones has a much higher fan following than I would have ever imagined. Although he was definitely one of my personal favorites as well, even though he was sometimes irritating to deal with. He may hold the spot of the only skeleton based enemy I actually like in video games.

While I was painting this out my buddy chimed in that maybe I should paint him reforming after he's been struck down by the mighty Mario, but I was far too into it to restart. Sort of regret that, but no one would probably be able to tell who it was if I had. I've been sort of putting this one off for the same reasons that I haven't done more of the koopa variants. Jumping around gives me a better variety and with these ones I feel like I have to keep it more consistent. Although while doing this, for the first time, I had the urge to tackle someone like Bowser even though it would go against the spirit of the series.

I hope everyone is having a great holiday. Happy New Years!

Reznor - SotD 149

Reznor was another one that was requested quite a bit, and he's mostly known for being a boss in Super Mario World. Imagine this guy on a platform, attached to some monstrosity of a wooden ferris wheel, and 3 more of the exact type all spitting fire balls at you. Hopefully that strikes up the memory. 

I never really realized just how many dinosaurs there were in Mario. I mean it's rather obvious in retrospect, pretty sure  I even remember a "Dinosaur Land" or something being thrown around as a stage or world. Maybe it wasn't a meteor that wiped out all the dinosaurs. Maybe it was Mario. That crazy jerk ran around cracking necks under his boot like it was his calling in life and he was sworn to adhere to it. 

"But what about Yoshi? They were best buds..."

Were they best buds when he kicked Yoshi away into oblivion to make that extra long jump? I'm pretty sure putting Yoshi to work as a steed immediately after he hatched violates some sort of child labor law. I'm doing Mario enemies here... but I think Mario is the biggest enemy of all...

Nintendo Power

After I was plugged on Kotaku, Nintendo Power contacted me about putting some of the Mario Enemies into a feature. The thing about this project was that it really tapped into my nostaglia about running through Mario World 3 or struggling through Mario World 2. So getting contacted by one of Nintendo's journalists for a small feature in the backspace just made me absolutely giddy. I used to get the magazine back in the SNES days, mostly for walkthroughs and cheats as I used to beg Mom and Dad to take me to Blockbuster so I could peruse the SNES isle and grab whatever I thought had the coolest cover... Nintendo Power got me through quite a few of these games. I had a really bad habit of not writing down level codes and Nintendo Power would come to the rescue. And I feel I've come full circle here somehow. Not sure what that circle is, since my metaphor circle logic is incredibly weak, but I have that feeling anyway. Feels good. There's not a whole lot of ways I ever saw myself getting into that magazine, if ever.

Thanks for the article Nintendo Power.

So go check it out, it's a pretty good issue covering their biggest franchises and most importantly Skyward Sword, and the small article on me and my art is right in the back. I would have plugged it earlier, but I didn't know what exactly they had written about me until today and I was a bit nervous about it. Actually turned out to be a 2 page spread instead of the one I was told it would be. The article was written by Andrew Hayward, so you should check him out too.

Belome - SotD 148

Again I have found myself feeling a bit guilty about using the "Sketch-of-the-Day" moniker in the title, since some of you may have noticed... Not so daily. Hopefully, I shall be back on the wagon here and goin' since I got way side-tracked and while I've been makin' stuff, I just haven't been posting it. 

But finally, here is a new Mario enemy for the series. Personally I wasn't familiar with this one at first, and I think anyone who isn't a die-hard mario fan won't get it... but MAN was he requested by a lot of people and I promised this one right in the beginning. Belome is a big four eyed fat cat out of Super Mario RPG for the SNES. He seems to be a predominant memory for players since the second time you meet him in the game he's a pretty tough dude that can eat a teammate, clone him, and then turn the clone against them in battle. It all sounds rather... not Mario. But I looked it up, saw a video, and it turns out that it is EXACTLY Mario. Plus it's a cat with 4 eyes and a huge tongue. There really wasn't any question whether or not I'd try to tackle it. 

Anyone who knows me knows I don't do turn-based anything in games so I passed this one up during my childhood. I rented it... I tried it... and I thought it was crap that I just had to stand there while the enemy did damage to me. So I hated it. That thought process is still mostly intact for all things turn-based today. Probably gonna catch some flak for throwing that out there... but after seeing some videos of Belome in action... I may just try it.

Zombocalypse

I was asked to make some menu and intro art by Ironzilla Media for this very awesome flash game. It went up on Armor Games this morning and I can't imagine it disappointing anyone who plays it. I was given pretty free reign by the creator to put my spin on the characters. Really was awesome, and it's nice that it's free and I can share it you all.

So you should play it... go on... play...

http://armorgames.com/play/12294/zombocalypse

Ghast - SotD 147

Here is something Minecraft related I never posted. One of those, "I'll be sure to post it tommorrow" sort of deals. I have a creeper and a skeleton somewhere on this blog as well.

I'm only sort of looking forward to the 1.8 update of Minecraft. Minecraft has been my sort of go to stress reliever. If I was worried, or needed to settle down, Minecraft would soothe me pretty quickly. And I'm not sure how fond I am of it becoming more of a real game... or other people inhabiting the world besides my solitary character. I will admit now that I've experienced the multiplayer side of things, I feel like I really have to give myself tasks to stay interested. Whereas in the single it somehow oozes a certain mood to me that I could much easier get lost in.

Minecraft to me has never been explicitly fun, but it's always been relaxing in a weird way. Why does it feel like 1.8 threatens that?

Another Hellboy - SotD 146

Had a sleepless night, so I decided to doodle a bit and get away from some projects. The result was this quick Hellboy portrait.

Feels good to post again. Bit too tired to write out anything more coherent and lengthy at the moment.

Just checkin' in...

I'm still around. Still continuing the Mario characters, but with all the internet attention it's made me quite a bit busier. I felt weird not updating in so long again, so this is that update. I'm trying to make some time to sit down and broadcast one but it doesn't seem to be happening. Soon though. Soon.

And I'm trying REAL hard to mean that.

Birdo - SotD 145

It's been an interesting few days. Some really cool stuff is happening. I'll have some more news later. But I've been really trying to get a storefront up to sell the prints on. The prints are ready, but my original plan for selling them fell through, and I'll found an alternative, but I imagine it may be a few days longer as I now put up a legit personal store that isn't so much as going through a third party. Cannot wait to be done with it. I don't want to read anymore Terms of Service and Copyright contracts. You never, ever read one and be like, didn't mind that... I don't know how lawyers do it.

So I put the store  aside and pumped out another Mario Enemy for you guys that have been checking in. Hope you dig it. I think this one came out rather well. I didn't stray so far from the original that I don't think people won't get it. If anything I imagine Birdo and timing the jump on top of those eggs haunted most of us as kids. Until I started doing these I didn't actually realize how brilliant mario 2 was. It was sort fo a strange leap to make from Mario as far as game mechanics went. It always had that different feel.

Well... Hello Kotaku.. - News

When I first started the Mario things I was like. "Hey, wouldn't it be cool if these got plugged on kotaku?" As a daily reader I must say, I just about spit coffee everywhere when I scrolled down and saw my art on such a huge site. So you can bet I'll have an extra skip in my step today. I'm I so happy and nervous about the sheer amount of people that will see those today.

Prints are still coming. Possibly latter today. Fingers crossed.

http://kotaku.com/5821124/the-horror-of-marios-enemies/gallery/1

Bullet Bill - SotD 144

Woo... sorry guys.. got a late start and this took way longer than expected. Took so long getting the perspective down. Then of course I sat here and wept as I blurred it all.

Definite favorite here personally... The mechanical ones take so long. Like the bob-omb... most of that was spent on getting the perspective on those darn feet right. This one was spent getting the nose right becuase for some reason I was dead set on a hollow point tip.

Boo - SotD 143

Revisted boo today. Much much happier with it. May tweak it later but it's definitely done for now.

I have to say that, I have to be so careful right now... because so many awesome tv shows are starting up again. C'mon entertainment industry... not cool... New Top Gear, new Curb Your Enthusiam, Breaking Bad is starting up, the truly awful True Blood is going, new Jon Benjamin has a Van, Penn and Teller Fool Us is going (sucker for magic shows), new Louie eps... just so much amazing entertainment. I just went two months with a no tv rule, and now that this stuff is back I just keep losing huge chunks of time and I don't really realize it. Thank goodness for being able to multi task with a dual monitor set-up. Anyway, this is just a giant lead-in so I can just express how excited I am for new Breaking Bad episodes. Look forward to that as much as Dexter episodes.

In the next day or two I'll be streaming. So keep an eye posted on the twitter.

Boo: Outtake - SotD 142

Well I promised when I started up the Sketch of the Day thing again that I'd be posting with a bit of transparency. Today is one of those days. This is today's mario enemy. I do not like it. It is not finished. And I'm taking another whack at it tomorrow. I'm just not crazy about the design I went with. I was really distracted while I was making it, and it just got away from me. Being that these are just sketches I don't spend a lot of time perfecting things... I just slap down some quick lines and go... so before I spent triple the amount of time fixing this thing I'm just gonna redo it.

So expect another boo tomorrow... maybe two if I end up being crazy productive.

It would seem... - News post

It would seem that the Mario Enemy series has gone a tiny bit viral. It's being featured on quite a few website all over the world, and I'm suddenly getting new twitter/blog followers. First, very flattered that people are digging them. Most artists are modest, but they still love to hear nice feedback, even if they don't know how to react back to it. So let me just say thanks.

Also, a few things:

1. Prints are definitely coming very, very soon. I wanted to get my new portfolio site up before that, but the response to these has been quite overwhelming, so for the safety of myself and people buying prints I will have a storefront up where you can purchase prints and original artwork.

2. I'm still going to be continuing the series. I have maybe 7 more left I intend to do, and 2 full illustrations. So stay tuned. Next monday I will be resuming my update schedule of every M,T,W,Th, F... so keep on checking back.

3. I'm also going to continue streaming while I paint. So if that interests you, follow me on twitter at:

http://twitter.com/mpuncekar

And you'll be notified of when I start the stream, and you can watch me paint.

Again thank you, it truly is flattering if not also a bit surreal.

Intermission: Pirates - SotD 140, 141

Been a slow day and if I get around to the next mario enemy it won't be for awhile longer tonight. So here's some quicker paintings I did in the last few days as warm-ups and just for fun off the top of my head for the most part.