Vintage art: customego box art

I've revealed before that I used to create custom Mego action figures. It started in 1998 after I completed my vintage Mego collecting and I wanted to add the "essential" characters. I'd say realistically, that would have been Green Lantern, Flash (as true Mego oversights) and Black Canary and Scarlet Witch as "you need a better M/F balance."

The list of essentials grew and grew... I made and re-made them as I got better... JLA... JSA...Teen Titans... X-Men... Avengers... villains... obscure characters... it was really addictive. At first I would pull art from comic books for the custom boxes I made. But then I converted fully to my own art.

It was early days for me... still figuring out scanning, coloring, printing. Since the boxes are roughly 3" x 10", the "canvas" is set and since the art is supposed to show basically the character in a pose, it was fun  basic drawing. Here are among my earliest box art renditions of my customs.

Teen Titans '10—sort of

Fish-philes know my penchant for late '60s-early '70s Teen Titans. So my foray into the Titans of today is very much a cautious toe-dipping into the pool.

The sketch session starts off with the non-modern version Betty Kane Bat-Girl flipping a would-be attacker, before I am inspired to draw the Cassie Sandsmark Wonder Girl.

Cassie wears a TIGHT red top with either an eagle or W, and originally jeans and later TIGHT red pants. At first I thought the idea of a super-hero wearing jeans was pretty silly. But drawing her, I warmed up to it. Here, I give her the loose top a la Donna Troy in the mid-'60s with stylized eagle, but showing the midriff. Then I imagined her sewing on the stars wrapping around her hip and leg. Kinda blending Donna's first look with her second in a retro-hippy chick version of Cassie. Now I like her.

I proceed to draw Cassie along with a more modern version of Robin (probably Tim Drake) and some version of Kid Flash (is Impulse now KF? Is that Bart Allen? I can't keep up), fighting the grow-one of the Sizematic Twins.

Admitting Wonder Girl, Robin, and Kid Flash aren't terribly "modern" I proceeded to draw Kid Devil and Rose Wilson astonished by the shrink-one of the Sizematic Twins. Perhaps he broke into the Titans' HQ. I did read about Rose on Wikipedia. I assume in my version, the serum granting her super strength and reflexes is out of her system, rendering her more along the lines of Lilith with ESP as contribution to the cause. I'm guessing with that serum out of her system, she'll have less if no psychotic episodes. Maybe the eye she gauged out will grow back. Dunno.

Titans time—

But, not really.

I get lots of sketch requests, and I turn down many because I am too distracted with the day job and keeping on top of stuff. But I still mindlessly churn out Titans circa 1973 sketches!

My work on the Cavalcade re-print is just about ready to send to the printer, and after that, I really need to start my Bonnie N. Collide guesties for Monica Gallagher. I promised they would be ready to run in September. That's but 2 weeks away!

Fortunately, my loft space is now in great shape for me to start creative work again. It was a long 4-month haul (still far from "done" but in a very live-able state), but it'll feel good to get to some comics again.

Draw, monkey, draw!

Teen Titans '73

I've been doing a lot of super-hero sketching lately. A number have been Teen Titans. There was a publication gap from 1973-1976, and these sketches are meant to be from that era.

On this page you get Wondergirl, sexy cave-boy Gnaark, Lilith, the original Bat-Girl, Kid Flash, and some zombies for them to fight. Many fans hate this era, but I actually like it. There weren't super-villains, but they were always getting mixed up in strange goings-on. They were a bit more age-appropriate as well... not the 19 year olds going on 45 a la the 1980s incarnation. That was way too serious for my taste.

Plus, there was no hot cave-boy. I just loved it when Gnaark became super-smart in a short-lived attempt to make him a viable character. I've added to the post a drawing I did of Gnaark in 2002, in color. At the time, I was creating a lot of custom action figures, with packaging. This was the art for the packing... I never did make a Gnaark action figure though! He's wearing the standard-issue jumpsuits worn by some of the Titans of this era, except he's so buff, he can barely fit into it.