Krang's Frankenstein Monster

Here's my design for Krang. Along with my final inks, I've included a page from my sketchbook, so you can kind of see how the design evolved. Looking through my roughs, there were certainly more interesting poses I could have gone with, but I decided to keep the robot dormant, and move the focus to Krang himself, as he prepares to fire up his newly-created body for the first time.




Looking forward to coloring him. On a side note, I've heard that since the Twitter explosion, blogs are being updated less frequently. Mine is no exception. I'll keep posting art here, of course, but I've grown to really appreciate the simplicity and instant gratification of Twitter, particularly for sharing doodles and sketches that might not be considered "blog-worthy," as well as those off-the-cuff thoughts on comics, animation, and whatever else. If you do the Twitter thing, you can follow me at @alexdeligiannis (there's a link in the sidebar on the right). I'm also on DeviantArt now, so if you're a DA user, I'm at alexdeligiannis.deviantart.com.

Morning Train Sketches

A few sketches from my train rides in to work the past couple of mornings. I want to put my own spin on Krang, but without totally abandoning the campy 80's design. They're quick and dirty, just laying lines down in search of the right shapes.

Wishology!

Last year, to wrap up season 6 of Fairly Odd Parents, we put together an insanely large special called Wishology. The show consisted of 3 one-hour acts, amounting to a whopping 3 hour trilogy in which we spoofed a bunch of classic movie trilogies (including Star Wars, Lord Of The Rings, Terminator, and The Matrix, among others). It seemed like an unending undertaking at the time, but it was a lot of fun to work on. The designs were done by our superbly-talented character designers (Gordon Hammond, Ernie Gilbert, and Mike Dougherty) and colored by me.

Filo Train Sketches

A few quick sketches I did on the train ride to the studio this morning. Nothing fancy to look at; most are pretty raw, actually. I'm just trying to nail down the head shape for a character my brother created years ago. I've been pressuring him to tighten up the story he wrote for this lil' guy, because I'm itching to draw another comic. Anyway, none of these are exactly what I'm looking for, but there are a couple in there that evoke something I like.



Incidentally, this is what he looked like when I first drew him in 2004.

2009 Comic-Con Rocked.

In 2006, I had the coolest Comic-con moment of my life when Matt Groening came up to our booth, bought a copy of our book, and asked us to sign it for him. I thought that was the ultimate, but this year’s Con once again reached insane levels of awesome for me. 

On Friday night, the wife and I ditched our entourage and hit up House Of Blues to see Bear McCreary and his orchestra perform their eargasmic score from Battlestar Galactica.  Yes, I'll wear the badge of "nerd" proudly:  It wasn't Bone Thugs or John Legend, but this was, without a shred of doubt, the best concert I've ever attended in my life.  Really.  And what we thought would be a night of great music ended up being so much more; it became an evening of partying with virtually the entire cast of the show, including Admiral Adama (the incomparable Edward James Olmos), Col. Tigh and Anders (for both of whom I had the honor of purchasing an ice cold Blue Moon), Boomer/Athena (who was already so toasted she declined a drink, but did dance with my wife), Tom Zerek (Richard Hatch, the original Apollo), Admiral Caine, Callie, and Gaius Baltar.  I'm not one to get star-stuck, ever... but if you watch this show, you understand why this night was an exception.  It was simply beyond cool.

But that's not all. This year, I had the extreme honor of meeting a gang of guys that - and I say this with complete honesty - were instrumental in inspiring a young fat kid to pursue his artistic dreams. The Mirage Studios gang, the guys behind the Ninja Turtles, made their triumphant return to San Diego for the 25th anniversary of the TMNT, and while it's a shame that it took me almost two decades worth of Comic-Cons to finally meet them, it was an incredible treat nonetheless.  Every one of them - Dan Berger, Eric Talbot, Jim Lawson, Michael Dooney, Steve Lavigne, and Tristan Jones - were beyond gracious, even in the face of my obvious fanboyness (which, I hope, wasn't too overbearing).  It's one thing to meet people whose work you've long admired; it's a completely different thing to find them to be outright warm, kind and welcoming (even though Steve did call me out for posting too many pictures of my puppy and not enough artwork). Maybe it seems silly, but meeting these guys means a lot to me (even more than meeting the cast of BSG), and it will go down as one of my greatest SDCC memories ever. My only regret is that I didn't bug them one last time to get a group photo with them all.  Thanks to all of them for indulging this guy.

Next Stop, San Diego.

Ok, last reminder. Here's my little contribution to all the goodies we'll have at Booth 1034. See you in San Diego!

Comic-Con Next Week.

I'll be at Booth 1034 next week during Comic-Con, so come by. In addition to the new "Art Of Hard 8" book (featuring a ton of beautiful pin-ups and art by some very talented folks), my good friend Eric "The Gute" Gonzalez will have some awesome stuff for sale, and I'll be offering a couple of prints as well. Here's a snapshot of one that I was tweaking up last night.... hope to see ya at booth 1034!