RIP Christopher Plummer

“Let us sit upon the ground and tell sad stories of the death of kings.” 

Christopher Plummer passed away a few weeks ago, and last night I finally had a moment to draw an homage to his role as the Klingon General Chang—my favorite Trek villain as featured in my favorite Trek movie, Star Trek VI: The Undiscovered Country. I have literally watched that movie hundreds of times, and I never get tired of his performance. RIP!

METAL OX

Happy Year Of The Metal Ox! 🐮 I decided to interpret metal as heavy metal 🤘 as well as bionic 🦾, and a humanoid ox woman had to be blue like Babe the blue ox 💙, because punny, convoluted, and weird is my jam. FYI the design on the shirt is a stylized archaic form of 牛 (ox). 🤓

It’s just a phase…

Kitty! (and Lockheed!)

Another warm-up/costume redesign! It is probably very obvious by now that I tend to go very traditional and generally more streamlined when it comes to superhero costumes. And ALWAYS add a katana if applicable, of course.

TIGER FEEEEET

IDK a dang thing about fashion, but I do know that when you see a pair of sharp looking tiger feet sneakers for half off, you order those dang shoes! 🐯 I’m super excited for the new kicks to arrive even though I probably won’t be wearing them out until after I get vaccinated sometime this summer. 🙃⏳🗓💉

Mutant Mania

Last year I started doing some quick superhero redesigns as warm ups, and Kwannon was the first, followed quickly by Betsy Braddock. I really like the idea of having both Kwannon and Betsy around. And I like to think Betsy kept up her ninja skills even after being returned to her own body. Honestly you could fill several story arcs just dealing with Betsy and Kwannon’s lives after finally getting their own bodies back!

With superheroes people always debate which version is better, but my answer is always that I just want all of them. Give me Hal AND Kyle, Miles AND Peter, Barry AND Wally AND Jay, and of course Kwannon AND Betsy. And the great thing about superheroes is that you really can have your cake and eat it too! Just that sometimes that cake is another cake in disguise, or a clone, or from an alternate dimension, etc. 😉

The next one is a little off-book… Kwannon and Betsy discover they can temporarily fuse their minds and bodies to transform into the entity known as PSYLOCKE—in this form their existing powers are drastically multiplied, but the fusion can only be maintained for a short period of time. (To be honest, when I drew this I was thinking of Steven Universe style fusions, it didn’t occur to me until I was done that psychic fusions already have a precedent in X-Men comics with Onslaught. 😅)

And here’s a Logan too. Shout out to old school whiskers and smaller ‘ears’!

Eye Spy!

Sneaking in some art before the year is up! My pal Dylan made up a great character named Eye Spy, and as I love weird characters and puns, I thought this devilish rogue would be the ideal subject for an homage to 60’s spy movie posters/lobby cards! 🔫👁 I couldn’t resist including the standard-issue martini and cigarette as accessories, even though I have no idea how he would smoke or drink! 😅🍸🚬

Dupli-cat

Saw an amazing bootleg Thundercat action figure on @scar1321’s page, and decided to turn it into an art challenge with my good pal Dylan, AKA @happymonkeyshoes—hit up his feed to check out his version! We each came up with the cat skull version of the Thundercats logo independently!

Dylan suggested this guy is a space phantom version of Lion-O, and I love the idea that he is to Lion-O what Faker is to He-Man, but with some extra cosmic power! Sooo of course I wrote up a nerdy-ass bio too:

* * *

The evil MUMM-RA harnesses the power of a black hole to create a shadowy clone of the heroic lord of the Thundercats, LION-O! The being that emerges is imbued with potent cosmic power, and has the ability to manifest weapons of pure psychic power that mimic LION-O’s Claw Shield and Sword of Omens. MUMM-RA expects this entity to serve him loyally, but in reality the doppelgänger has a sinister agenda of his own… and woe to all on Third Earth that stand in the way of SHAD-O!

Flight of (a) navigator

Hey remember when it was Star Trek Day last month?? TRICK QUESTION, every day is Star Trek day, ya nerds!!!

Here is a Medusan navigator–her carrier pod is equipped with new exo-limb features as well as a basic sensor array and vocoder. She’s very social, so these developments allow her to interact with her corporeal crewmates (they’re weird, but she likes them anyways). The pod also includes a built in jump-pack which is useful for accessing those hard-to reach Jefferies tubes (as well as tall shelves).

(This design is similar to what I drew for Fleet Captain Pike, likely sharing some engineering lineage.)

O_O

I’ve been sitting on this info for a bit, and I’m so excited I kind of don’t even know how to say it… the TL;DR version: The Starfleet uniform in “Star Trek: Lower Decks” is based on a design by me! When Mike was creating the pitch for the show, he asked me to design some possible uniforms, and so I did. One of those uniforms is like, 96% the basis for the final design that you see in the show! 😱 So naturally, I drew this to commemorate the occasion! 🤓

Additional background for those who enjoy long rambling historical context: Six years ago, before I ever met Mike, his TNG Season 8 Twitter account was already a viral hit. Dafna and I were starting a Star Trek Zine and she had roped him into writing some tweets for the zine, which I would illustrate. 

The zine was a solid hit, Mike and I met and got along thick as thieves—and a few months later, Mike hired me to illustrate the book version of TNG Season 8, which was later titled “Star Trek The Next Generation: WARPED” (availableonamazonforprimeshippingsorrynotsorry). 

Fast forward a few years, and last night I attended the (virtual) premiere of Mike’s show “Star Trek: Lower Decks”! I can’t believe it! (BY THE WAY, the show is hilarious and beautiful, and chock full of Easter Eggs for hardcore Trek fans! I can’t wait for everyone to watch it! ❤️💛💙)

Art Dumppppp

Eek… I haven’t updated in over a year. But it’s never too late! Especially when no one is paying attention! Anywayzzzz…

  • As a kid, scoring a 4-in-1 multi-color pen was like obtaining the Infinity Gauntlet of stationary supplies (before the Infinity Gauntlet was even a thing)! Also, if you can relate to what I just said, you too are an old-ass nerd. ANYWAYSSS here’s an android lady I just made up, equipped with a 4-in-1 multi-tool arm! 😎🖤❤️💙💚🖋
  • Ever since I was a kid I’ve been wondering why BIC’s mascot is SO DAMN TERRIFYING… PS: no one tell this creeper that I was only able to finish this drawing with the aid of a number of non-BIC pens… 🤐

  • Rogue/Ranger specializing in monster photography. 📸
  • Dark Mage on a bargain hunt… 🔮💸💀
  • Gladiator! 💪🐯

  • A totally random smiling shark man from 2014 (yeesh!) that I never got around to posting anywhere. Drawn with red +white color pencils, silver + black markers, and white gel pen on a random cardboard scrap that felt like a good size.
  • Opening panel from the l’il 4-pager (written by my BFF Josh Williamson) for the Adventure Time 2013 Annual! 👑❄️🐧

  • REBEL ALLIANCE 4 LIFE 😤 (I tend to detest photos of myself, but I really liked this photo of me at Star Wars Galaxy’s Edge, so I only did a *slight* drawover. 😎)
  • Remix of an older group shot of the gang…
  • Some old lineart of Kylo Ren with new colors.
  • That feeling when you suddenly realize you can turn in that last bounty and then relax for a few days! (I understand there is some debate about whether Ortolans have 4 limbs or 2—I went with 4, Kenner style! 🤓)

  • Saurian brandy for a Saurian captain. New colors over old lineart.
  • Quick Counselor Troi warm-up. New colors over old lineart.

  • I’ve had GI Joe on the brain recently, and got an idea for a Storm Shadow redesign that I had to draw! (This is actually my second go at it check the Instagram post for a janky video of my previous attempt plus some in-progress views)
  • For the TL;DR crowd, look, it’s Ironhide & Sparkplug! Yay, we like them, right? For lovers of long rambling: this was one of the first things I ever drew on a Cintiq, 5 years ago. It’s a weird artifact because I was using a Cintiq Companion which I never got the hang of (too heavy and too ungainly) and Manga Studio (aka Clip Studio Paint) which I never got the hang of either (because the Cintiq Companion was so awkward). About a year later I got a desktop Cintiq at ye olde dayjobbe, and I took to that much more intuitively. Over the last five years my work has become mostly digital, and I recently got an Apple Pencil and Procreate (which I am really enjoying) so I think that will push me even further into the completely digital world. I just hope this all ends with me living in the world of Tron.
  • I drew this last Fall—an idea for a different way Pretender Monsters could work. 👹🤖

Lastly, here’s a pandemic postcard…✌️💙

It’s my first real go at a finished drawing with Apple Pencil + Procreate. Really happy with these new tools! ✏️📲

And that, should just about catch me up. Phew. More art coming, I’ll try to post more regularly lololololol sighhhhh. 😅