Sunday, April 01, 2007

King Triceps: a Billy and Mandy design




Here are some drawings of King Triceps. He was for an episode of The Grim Adventures of Billy and Mandy entitled "Hey, Water You Doing?". It was boarded by Mr. Ian Wasseluk. Ian likes doing spoof jokes, and Triceps was one of those. He's part King Triton from The Little Mermaid and part Macho Man Randy Savage. It was a fun (and difficult) episode to draw. There were a ton of new characters in this one.

Designing on Billy and Mandy was kind of tricky. The show tends to be a mish-mash of design sensibilties. The characters have a lot of very graphic elements, but also tend to be equally fleshy. I was constantly trying to find my balance of those two things. My attempts, successful or not, were always fun to create. And I really credit Maxwell Atoms for trusting his designers, and allowing us to experiment quite a bit on our own.

At times, this made for some of my most confident drawings, and at other times I felt lost in the woods behind the Oakwoods playing with fire crackers.

The nice thing was that I had quite a bit of reference from previous seasons to refer to when I really got stuck.

...this is sort of a tangent, but....

C.H. mentioned on his blog, the difficulties in breaking down his personal style on Chowder so that us designers could use similar theories. This was and will always be a very effective and direct method of getting into the head and hand of the guy that pretty much did the first set of drawings straight from his gut. But hat I find to be the best way to create designs that match the spirit of a new show is to really look at work that may have influenced the creator/designer. So besides trying to look at every scrap of paper with a drop of the Greenblatt magic, we're looking at a lot of Aragones, Coker Jr., Bradfield, Toriyama, and Scarry. It's been a really fun and educational ride.

... off the tangent...

I just realized that I've posted 2 different sets of mermaid designs from B&M, I swear I don't have a mermaid thing.

well... maybe a little bit,
phil

...and a big thanks to Amanda for making me that sweet "Uncle Phil" stamp you see on those designs.

20 comments:

Unknown said...

Your King Triceps kicks butt! Cool stamp too.

Unknown said...

Those triceps remind me of Gregg Valentino
http://www.greggvalentino.net/
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O8IGA3O_pDg

Rade said...

Very Cool Merman!

Mukpuddy said...

Cool post dude, love the pic and very informative at the same time!!

ALBERT PARDO said...

---I WAS GONNA SAY THAT THE STAMP WAS BY FAR MY FAVORITE PART OF THE DESIGNS....


...(jack-ass...)...

Mr Harte said...

"Merman Dad, Mer-MAN!"
Nice!

SteveLambe said...

Very cool stuffs, Phil. That Ian guy is all kinds of crazy.

Glad to hear you decided to research some Jolly Roger Bradfield later. Most of his book are pretty amazing.

Justin Roth said...

hah, this is great phil! really funny stuff!

mikecarloooyeah said...

These are super nice drawings Phil. The structure is tight, but the character isn't still at all. I think you have a nice combination of graphic designs and organic magic happening.

IZA said...

Great Stuff Phil! (this is Robert Iza btw) Thanks again for all the tips and stuff for me and my friends. you can see my blog at:
http://brokenghost.blogspot.com

Daniel Stones:
http://itcamefromspace.blogspot.com

Jess Keys:
http://mewbot.blogspot.com/

Seriously, really appreciate it all, and hope to see you guys around more!

the clownninja said...

i like the dimensionality. He looks like he'd be a blast to animate.

Unknown said...

slick design!
your stuff is a lot of fun!

Jess K! said...

Woo, off topic, but thank you for being so nice to me. :D

wolfboy said...

I thought I already posted; but guess not:

You just keep getting better and better, Phil--you are officially SCARY-good, and a threat to us all. You must be stopped.

Chris George said...

Nice one, Phil!

SHANE PRIGMORE said...

HA HAAAAAAA!!! That squid fanny pack is so gross! Awsome. THe triceps are hilarious. Awsome man!

Fawn said...

ooooo...
I love the muscles

lol

Unknown said...

Yo Phil, I lost your e-mail address in a boating accident! Maybe it's the bad karma I've been spreading for this Mother's Day! check out my recent post... http://bcthree.blogspot.com/2007/04/mothers-day.html

david said...

hhhahaha coolxl

COMPLIFENT said...

My pants are a little wetter now. I really dig your work man.