Masters Of The Universe Origins Art Cards Part 9! (sneak peak!)

After a far too long a hiatus...  "Masters Of The Universe Origins Art Cards" are back!!  Here is a sneak peak of the first of 5 new additions featuring none other than 2013 fan poll vote winner She-Ra!  Based on 1 of her many Filmation concept designs, in "my" story line for this interpretation, She-Ra is not related to He-Man, & is the daughter of Queen Hera. The Princess has flown in with her rebel Valkyries from the far off Crystal Castle to Monarch to stop a new foreign invader with a formidable army named General Hordak. Beautiful, smart, & powerful, she carries the sword of protection which was gifted to her by the Sorceress.
2015 is the 30th year anniversary of She-Ra, & I can't think of a better way to celebrate the Princess of Power for me than with some new art for her!

Some designer notes: The spear is based on one of Chap Mei's "Savage Warrior: Beast Raider" weapons. Her color scheme is influenced by both She-Ra and Andromeda of "Wrath Of The Titans."

Masters Of The Universe Art Cards Part 6!

TORNADO (aka SY-KLONE): Based on 1 of Sy-Klone's early drafts in the P&HF Vol.1 art book as well as his appearance in the mini-comic "Spikor Strikes!" "Tornado" was one of Sy-Klone's early working names. I decided to make Tornado darker because I wanted him to be like a storm. Dark, cold, & gloomy. Also as a cyborg almost to have a painted-metal-type feel. The club is based on the one that Sy-Klone takes from Spikor in the mini-comic "Spikor Strikes!" I wanted him to have a more aggressive weapon in this series rather than his trade mark shield & this seemed to be the right fit! He was originally planned for later in the series but I bumped him up to now!

SOLARA: Thinking outside of the box & into MOTU inspired lines comes SOLARA from the unproduced "Wonder Woman & Th Star Riders" line. This line was meant to compete with Sailor Moon in the 90's, & was even going to use some POP accessories & steeds. It's loose ties to POP & interesting characters led me to include the fiery Solara in my Origins Art Cards collection!  Originally I was going to do "Ice" in this series, but figured with "Frosta" already being a true MOTU character I would change that idea. "Solara" is a little more unique for MOTU as she is a fire girl & there is no true designated heroic fire girl in MOTU. Plus she is Latina, which I though helped to add some diversity to the line. The original character from Mattel was so pink that when I started coloring her it was like...pink overkill & I need to diversify the colors some more, yet still keep it to the original designs intentions. She was also planned for much later the line but I decided to include her now!  She has a fire wand based loosely on Hebrew elemental cultures.

 
PRINCE IZOR: A very obscure character that was uniquely created for the bootleg MOTU Modeltrem line, Prince Izor was also planned for late in this series but I decided to include him now after my friend Ricardo posted some great photos of the original figure!  It is unknown whether this character was good or evil in the Modeltrem line, but some fans like to think of him as evil because the Modeltrem line is so heavily packed with Heroic characters. In this case since his allegiance is unknown I decided to make him on a neutral alliance colored card.  My friend Rory made a comparison of him to Sean Connery (aka Zardoz) which I liked, as I wanted to give him a slightly more rugged yet distinguished appeal & thought it was a great comparison! Like Gorgone, it's great to represent the Brazilian influence on MOTU over the years!

VARIABLE CASTASPELLA

Hi! Those of you who are familar with my art here on the Blog or past & present MOTU sites know that much like Mattel (& Hasbro), I love to do variant color versions of my works. So I thought I would go all 4H "7th Kingdom" on my recent CASTASPELLA re-design, & came up with 5 new (+1 the original) different color varients! Here's a little info on each of the color concepts...

~Filmation Version:

Just like the title implies, the "Filmation version" is based on the blue & yellow scheme Filmation used to portray the "Barbarella" look-a-like sorceress in the original POP animated series. This scheme looks very 1990's X-Men to me (blue/yellow)... not that there is anything wrong with that! ^_- So far over on the Org this seems to be the most popular color design, probably due to the nostalgia factor, or the complimentary colors. This was the 2nd most obvious recolor for me, & the 1st one executed after the original in the series. Makes good sense seeing that the original toy & Filmation version's colors differed so greatly, that this scheme would make a perfect repaint. With it's seeming popularity over the other varient colors, it makes me wonder how this version would have placed if THIS was my "original entry" in the contest? ...hmmm. ^_-

***of note***: this is the first retooled design as I changed the side mid-drift openings to become solid with the leotard.

~Julianne Hough version (aka Dance version):

This scheme was my 2nd conception for the color variation as my original Castaspella was based on DWTS fan-favorite (and Chris favorite) Julianne Hough as an inspiration & model! I had always planned on doing this recolor in some shape or form since Julianne so strongly influenced the original. Not only for her stunning looks, but also the 2-time DWTS champ's "Cha Cha Cha" dress for Season 5 as a basis for the outfit's design. I have plenty of references for the dancing angel in photographs & have been anxious to do an interpretation of her in my art (and will be...). For furthur realism & practice on capturing her beauty for myself, I used her features, body, & costuming to give a certain realism to my Casta's redesign... she's is the hottest girl on the planet for me in 2007, so it only seemed natural to gravitate towards her for some real-life inspiration! One of my reference pictures for the art is shown below...

***of note***this was the 1st version retooled to have the legs changed to match Julianne's bare legs & feature no leggings that the original had. In the end it's prolly my favorite version!

~Christmas Special version:

The Filmation "He-Man & She-Ra X-mas Special" will always be one of the most memorable for me in the 2 series history. It featured alot of the new toys & also was a stand-alone hit that for me... seemed to really end the series. Alot of these versions I come up with when my mind wonders at work... so thinking of possible varients for the series, coupled with the X-mas Season vastly approaching, & most importantly, the X-mas special, I came up with this "Holiday Flavored" coloration that is kind of like when Prince Adam is in the Santa outfit complete with white hair. She is exactly the same as the "Filmation version" with different colors & the 3rd of the series, 4th overall.

~Horde Gothic version:

This was another version I came up with while daydreaming at work... what if Castaspella was Evil? Had gone to The Horde? Or became a Zombie? Or just decided to get her "Goth" on. LOL! I figured the design around her center jewel would easily transcribe to a faux Horde symbol given the right colors, the leotard could become a corset, & I could modify her leggings to become a hot set of tight red pants that a girl had on at our X-mas party @ work, only this time make them "blood red'... I also though the white skin & red eyes would furthur the effect of being Gothic/Evil/Vampyric...& I think it was pretty successful... Hordak inspired colors... friends watching me work on this model seemed to lean towards it, & overall I thought the "dark take" might end up being the most popular of the recolors on the Boards... but that "Filmation" version seems to be the reigning Queen!

~Magician version:

My brother Brian gave me this idea while watching me create the "Horde Gothic" version. He had mentioned that he would have liked the Horde version to have leggings, like a Magician's Assistant... this made sense to me when I thought about it the next day. The Horde version was going to be the last in the series, but I also wanted an even number as that would better replacate the (many versions) I was trying to imply, like would be seen in the 200X Devilman Fewture figures or with the aforementioned 4H "7th Kingdom" having many varients.
I came up with a "Zatanna" (the female magician from Batman) inspired version based on the 1990's animated series. Different enough from the Horde version, & this one still featured the black hair, but no leggings/pants & (a 1st) no shoulder straps. In the end I think it has a nice modern Magician/Assistant or Superheroine feel, & one of the most original in the series... Although, I may take a stab at this version again someday, as when I showed the finished design to Brian who had conceived it in the 1st place, he said "that's not what I meant at all." ...LOL!

~Original Toy version:

I talked in great detail about the influences & why I chose my design based on the toy version of Castapella for this contest in the previous blog entry. Here is the original drawing, in it's original toy-inspired colors, & I am happy to say, still remains one of the most popular of the seires!! Hope you enjoyed this little insight into my creative process, & as always there will be more to come... ^_-

CASTASPELLA (Character Design)

BLACK FRIDAY... Black Magic Friday? White Magic Friday? Anyway you look at it today is Black Friday & I decided to cook something MAGICAL up for my pal Predabot's hosted "MOTU redesign challange #78" over on HE-MAN.ORG since he was nice enough to ask me to participate. Although the charcter on the classic Filmation POP series had an odd vocal styling, I always thought both the animation & toy design had a nice & pretty feel to it.. Almost like something from the cult-camp classic "Barbarella." My design is heavily based on the actual 80's toy. I used 2 models for it, most notibably my all-star favorite celebrity dancer Julianne Hough, as she just might be the hottest chick on the planet for me right now, with her adorable face & atheletic build, ^_- as well as a nude model for some of the upper torso posing. To imitate the "circle structure" on her back I devised a more anime-inspired hexagram, to immitate the look of the clunky toy version to something more soft & delicate ...& fashioned her costume to be something more like a dancer would wear.. So her face, hair-style, revealing dress-style, & legs are all based on Julianne Hough from DWTS. But her upper body build is based on the other model. I am hoping to do well in this contest & I appreciated the opportunity. Bio for Castaspella is in the "stylized hypnotic" card format I did the illustration in. All in all I think I acheived a fresh look for the mage, made her a bit younger in my take, & still captured a retro element so she would fit into the MOTU/POP universe. Feedback is always welcomed.

photobucket link:
http://s24.photobucket.com/albums/c44/teelamotu/?action=view&current=Castaspellacharadesign72.jpg

***UPDATE***: My entry placed 1st in her division & 3rd in the Finals! Thanks Orgers!!

ALSO... He-Man.Org member "HORDAKS HENCHMAN" plans on doing a custom figure of my CASTASPELLA design!! ^_^ (He was also the one who created that cool CATRA custom off my design shown here on the blog), I will keep the site updated with pics & info as this custom figure progresses!!

CATRA concept

In January 2006, one of the most participated art contests of all time at He-man.Org was the CATRA (from POP) redesign thread. The goal was to update CATRA for the 200X line and see who had the best design which was voted on by fans/forum members. Seeing the calibur of artists that entered this contest, even being a newbie at the time, I could not resist! Redesigning the top SHE-RA villian was a great challenge! The end result was 20 amazing artist entries!!! I enetred the challenge on January 17th & placed in the top 5 with a 3 part voting system on this entry which is highly based on the classic 80's toy (rather than the cartoon) with my own personal touch.


The image proved more popular than I thought!!! I had recieved a request from expert fan-customizer "Hordaks Henchman" to create a figure based on my design! In order give a fellow artist a hand, I designed a "Character design sheet" for Catra featuring her front & back designs & help feature my "true vision" of the character... I made some minor tweeks here & there, and came up with this character sheet featured here:

The final toy has been customized by Hordak's Henchmen, here's a picture!!



The design has been commented on positively many times by fans and will even be featured in the current 2006 remake comic of "Secret Of The Sword!!!"