Nate Baertsch Illustration

Four Horsemen 2010 poster!

2010-07-27T07:42:00.000-07:00

The guys asked me, or did I ask them... anyway we did this poster, of the four properties the Four Horsemen have designed on their own. Symbiotech, Seventh Kingdom, Magma CORPS and Gothitropolis. They had this on display at their booth with AFX at SDCC 2010. All these characters, or most of them anyways, are in either figure form or prototype, soon to be figures. Maybe some of the characters are just teasers of what could be or will be... The Four Horsemen love to surprise! It was a blast to paint, albeit a bit challenging on composition. You can get this poster at www.storehorsemen.com if you'd like it on your wall!

Merry Christmas to all!

2009-12-10T07:41:00.000-08:00

May your Christmas season be full of joy, and good times with family.
And if you're traveling, may you be safe, well, and enjoy the travels.
Merry Christmas!

Masters of the Universe Classics... Merman

2009-11-17T08:41:00.000-08:00

I love the new Masters of the Universe Classics figure line, sculpted by the Four Horsemen, and available exclusively on Matty Collector.com.
Merman is one of my favorites, and as such I did this piece as an update on his old card art that you can see here. Let me know what you think! Enjoy!

What?

2009-09-04T14:25:00.001-07:00

Fast flash lines... Love me them flash lines.

The Allustrious Queen Alexanndraaaaaa!

2009-08-03T07:14:00.000-07:00

Now that SDCC is over, and most people have seen the packaging on the Four Horsemen's Queen figure from the 7th Kingdom, I suppose I could post this.

Part three in the 7th Kingdom series! The mighty Human Kingdom Queen and her warriors!
If you want to learn more about the 7th Kingdom and the Four Horsemen toy design group, go to www.fantasticexclusive.com and be sure to check out they're forums!

Comments are always welocome... Except the ones that are just happy I've posted on my blog again. ;)
(I say that with love, really I do!)

Iz Queen Warrior

2009-04-30T07:22:00.000-07:00

A friend of mine wanted a painting of his wife, as a variant of the Queen Alluxandra, 7th Kingdom figure. Confused? Hey I don't question the clients, I just paint for them. Either way you look at it, it was still a fun little concept. He wanted the style to be like my other 7th Kingdom paintings that I've done for the Four Horsemen. If you've no idea what I'm talking about, head on over to FANtastic Exclusive and check out the forums. ;) That is if you really want to know more... Or if you want to just check out the art, well here you are and there you go! Have a great weekend!

Will there be an actual official Queen painting here in the future? Time will tell! :)

Pelican... Day job stuff.

2009-03-02T12:36:00.000-08:00

I did this a while back. I like pelicans. Done for my day job at Imagine Learning. Nothing more to add other than enjoy! Or slap me with a crit should you desire.

Fuerza-What?!

2009-02-21T16:36:00.000-08:00

As if He-Man and all the characters of the Masters of the Universe weren't wacky enough... There is also a little line called Fuerza-T. What is Fuerza-T? Why haven't you ever heard of it? Well, it's a knock off line that used the old molds of the original Masters figures, but repainted, and re-arranged into new characters. They were available somewhere in South America, if anyone has more info, feel free to leave comments and enlighten us all. Needless to say, this piece, was done for a very good and very patient friend of mine, he's waited a long time for this artwork that depicts the mighty Platino and the ferocious Felinor locked in mortal combat. Poses inspired by Earl Norem's work on Masters, so even this piece of artwork is a knockoff of sorts. Nonetheless, it was great fun to do, and I'm very happy to be done with it. Let me know what you think of these guys! Can you find what character parts from MotU made up these characters from Fuerza-T?

The United...

2009-02-20T14:58:00.001-08:00

A good friend of mine, Mr. Tom Akel, asked me to do a little poster for him for his Heroverse comic team, "The United". If you want to find out more about Heroverse, just check out the site! (clicky the linkies)

Tom is a great guy, and has a lot of fantastic ideas on comics. This was a quickly put together, so please be gentle on the critiques... Bah! Give me heck on it, I needs me some growin. :)

I was for the most part just following the standard costume designs already established on the characters, but there were a few characters Tom let me play with in terms of their look. I was surprised at what he let me get away with! Thanks again Tom!

Oh yeah, almost forgot to mention, he was giving this out at New York Comic Con that was a few weekends ago as posters.

Ahsoka Tano

2008-12-19T07:23:00.000-08:00

My daughter's favorite Jedi, as well as something I put together for a friend. The spunky padawan Miss Ahsoka Tano...

I played with a different rendering method for colors this time. I did the flats, then copied that layer twice, set the original flats layer as the dark shadows, made the medium layer more of the local colors and left them at a medium value, then a light blue tinted layer from her force power. I intentionally didn't show and color casting from her lightsaber onto her to stay true to the movies! Hahaha. (really just lazy.)

The Ahsoka Tano character is trademarked and owned by Lucasfilm.

It's not a very Christmas-y image I know, but nonetheless, I wish you all a happy holiday season, and a Merry Christmas!

Wonder Woman Day III

2008-10-15T06:54:00.000-07:00

This year I was invited to participate in Wonder Woman Day! I was asked to donate some artwork for the auction event that would bring money to some Domestic Violence Shelters. You can read up on it and see other artist's work that also contributed here: Wonder Woman Day III
I contributed one piece to each event, one in Portland Oregon, and the other in Flemington New Jersey. I hope for the best with this great event! And if you live in either area, be sure to stop by and join the fun!

unnamed woman portrait

2008-10-03T15:09:00.000-07:00

Another day, another sketch. The woman is no one in particular, I see a bit of my wife in her, a bit of Marcia Cross? Maybe it's Wonder Woman!? Who knows? Maybe you see someone you know in her too? It's just a sketch.

Yikes!

2008-10-02T15:24:00.001-07:00

Ever feel like this when you wake up? Welcome to my reality every day. (kidding... Sorta.)

Bad-ck Anatomy

2008-10-01T07:54:00.000-07:00

Just a fast study on back anatomy... Not sure it's any good so get a look quick, who knows when a mood swing will hit me, and I'll come to my senses and take this one down. If anything, this sketch reminds me how much I need to keep at it. 10-20min. tops warm-up sketch.

Tiger Sketch

2008-09-30T10:08:00.001-07:00

Sorry I've been quiet lately. Thought I'd post a sketch or two in the next few days.
Tigers are always cool. Always wanted a pet tiger... Not practical with kids though I suppose.

Wildwood

2008-08-08T17:20:00.000-07:00

Someday I'm going to paint up a Graphic Novel. It'll be written by the famous Val Staples of MVCreations. And published by Image Comics.

This is a teaser cover for the book... I can't tell you much of anything about it other than it's to be an all ages fantasy quest!

So consider yourself teased! Hey, if you're not teased... You're not loved. :)

A Great lord of Gothitropolis

2008-07-30T11:32:00.000-07:00

Scarabus is this one's name. He actually is this year's FANtastic Exclusive winner, meaning the fans chose Scarabus out of many very cool Four Horsemen character/figure designs.
Again, you can see the whole process over at The Four Horsemen's FANtastic Exclusive website.

They asked again that I help with the packaging chores by providing an illustration.
Because let's face it... We love seeing cool illustrations of figures on the packaging vs. just a photo of the figure you've already got. Not to totally bag on photos, they absolutely have their place, and we need them. But sometimes I think an illustration puts us into another world a little easier, it gives a sense of a story, let's the imagination run a little faster.

Granted there's not much story here to tell with this illustration. You'll notice that both Scarabus and the Time Keeper look to be more of an old time portrait of the characters, there's a reason for that, and I'll leave that to the Four Horsemen to reveal on their own. One idea might be, whenever you go through an old spooky haunted looking house... It's always that portrait on the wall that makes you wonder who all is there, even if you think you're alone...

I look forward to seeing what Gothitropolis is all about, it sounds like a lot of fun, and Scarabus is, by the look of his character alone, something serious to be reckoned with... A lord of times present and times lost, I'm not revealing anything official there, that's just a thought. I know when I look at the Four Horsemen's work, my imagination starts to wander all over the place, I hope this packaging artwork does the figure and his variants justice.

This artwork was also shown at the San Diego Comic Convention that has now come to a close.
Please let me know what you think!

The Time Keepers!

2008-07-24T08:33:00.001-07:00

It's San Diego Comic Con time of year again!
And the convention is in full swing today!

I've been busy again working for the Four Horsemen. This time it's packaging and advertising artwork for their new FANtastic Exlusive born line: Gothitropolis!

Let me know what you think of this little creepy critter!

And if you are at San Diego right now, and can get into the convention, be sure to stop by the AFX booth and see the Four Horsemen, along with their beautiful work on both of their own lines, the Seventh Kingdom AND Gothitropolis, and pick up three of these little Time Keepers for just $25.00! (All three Time Keepers are different, both in head sculpts and in color schemes!)

I hope everyone is having a great summer, I know I am, even if I'm not at SDCC.

Davy Crockett!

2008-05-22T12:09:00.000-07:00

More fun from my day job! I'm doing illustrations for a book on Davy Crockett.
It will be a mix of two styles... The story gives us facts from his life, which will be painted in this more realistic style, and then it tells of a few of his tall tales... Which will be illustrated in my more cartoony/comic book-ish style. I just started the book, and when I have the cartoony style pages done, I'll be sure to post one here.
This image and text belongs to Imagine Learning. The book is written by Shar Petersen.

Saratoga Springs, 5K race!

2008-05-15T12:08:00.000-07:00

So as I'm working on some really cool things I can't and won't post... Here's something I can.
I did this for our City's 5K race they hold each summer. Yes we live in Utah, but even out here we have Pelicans! Especially around the wetlands that are near our home and around Utah Lake. Beautiful birds... Except when they run! (I figure this one is in the "stagger" category.)

This image is just to go on the t-shirts for the race. Thus it has a VERY simple and clean look compared to say... Xetheus or Ramathorr.

I'm not 100% sold on the font or the placement yet...

EDIT:
So it turns out... Our city bird isn't a Pelican as I had previously believed. It's a Heron! Funny thing is, the good people I was doing this for didn't catch it at first either, and if you ask folks in the street what our city bird is... Well for the most part you can imagine that nobody would really know unless you happened upon a city council member or someone that works for the city.
So funny story short, I changed the Pelican, into a Heron... All in all it also gave me a moment to better the text and having him break the circle shape behind him more proved a better design overall. Leave it to the birds... Funny thing is... had I gone to the city's website... I might have clued in earlier! (note the city logo in the upper left hand corner of the web page.) Hahaha!

Xetheus of the 7th Kingdom!

2008-04-23T13:15:00.000-07:00

The Four Horsemen asked me to do up a painting of Xetheus like I did with Ramathorr for their Seventh Kingdom line of collector's action figures. Of course I was happy to oblige. They wanted this painting to "connect" to the Ramathorr Painting. So as such, I had to adjust the Ramathorr painting to remove the Xetheus silhouette in the background as he now has his own painting with his fellow minotaur warriors to aid the great Animal kingdom in their fierce battle for the Seventh Kingdom! Confused? Bah! It's all great fun, and if you want to know more about the Seventh Kingdom, the Four Horsemen and this year's FANtastic Exclusive, just click the pretty blue links in this paragraph! So above is Xetheus, and here below is a little look at the two "connected".

If you went to the New York Comic Convention this year, and went to the Four Horsemen's booth with AFX, then you might have seen this banner there. ;)

I did that?

2008-04-03T15:35:00.000-07:00

You take the last 20-30 min. of the day and do a quick sketch. Say... a male portrait. And this is what I did?
It's always kinda nice to just let the image happen... With no one to please, no story in mind, just letting the brush madly go wherever it wants.

Zeus!

2008-02-21T12:02:00.000-08:00

What's a Greek Myth without Zeus right?

And why is he swimming in gray cotton candy?

If you know the story of Phaethon... Then you know what's coming to him. If you don't know, then pick up a book and read! And if you want to see more of these pages from this re-telling... Then talk to your kid's school principal and ask them to buy imagine learning's product for their school! That's the only way you'll find out what happens in our telling of Phaethon's Ride. :)

Have a wonderful day!

Phaethon's Ride...

2008-02-13T07:05:00.000-08:00

Since I've not posted since before Christmas, I figure I'd better get something up.
These are pages to a book for my day job at Imagine Learning. I've been trying to do more animated or cartoony designs to my work. I love my job.
Feel free to leave any comments ya like, and have a WONDERFUL day. Pssst Valentines day is tomorrow... Don't forget your loved ones!
(Please respect too that these images belong to Imagine Learning.

What happened to Rudolph?

2007-12-20T15:00:00.001-08:00

Merry Christmas everyone! I hope everybody has a wonderful holiday, and if any of you are traveling, that you are safe and enjoy the time you may have off at this time of year. See you all after the New Year!

Remember JEM and the Holograms?

2007-11-05T08:41:00.000-08:00

Maybe you remeber her... I only do by association. Honestly I never got into the show as a kid... Or as an adult for that matter. But I did do a portrait of her for my good friend James Eatock aka Busta Toons.
This piece is for his Cereal:Geek Magazine, issue #3, due out in January '08!

If you're interested in checking the magazine out, I give a word to the wise... It is not a children's magazine. The demographic this publication shoots for are those of us that were children in the 80's and enjoyed the toons of the 80's, but are now all grown up. It's not an "R" rated magazine per se, but it definitely is more "PG-13". For instance the cover I illustrated for issue #1 depicts She-Ra with a black eye and bloody nose. The intended article explores the idea that she is a Warrior, that goes to War, thus she's bound to get a hit or two. So the cover reflects the two sides to her, half being the beautiful princess of power that she is, the other half depicting what she might look like after a brawl with Hordak and his evil crew. So again, probably not for the kids.

Now back to the JEM piece, much more light hearted, here is JEM showing off her fabulous hairstyle that was "soooo like, IN" durring the 80's.

Enjoy!

FANtastic Exclusive

2007-08-16T14:30:00.000-07:00

As posted below, the Ramathorr figure came about through the FANtastic Exclusive event that the Four Horsemen held throughout this last year.
If you're still curious to know more about the Four Horsemen or the Ramathorr figure, check out this cool new article on the whole thing at Figures.com, including a cool interview with the Four Horsemen themselves and links to reviews on the Ramathorr figure and his variants.

Enjoy!

RAMATHORR!

2007-07-26T05:49:00.000-07:00

I can finally post this!

If you're a fan of the Four Horsemen's work... (2001-2007 He-Man, Mattel's DC Super Heros line. NECA's Nightmare before Christmas figures and MORE!) Then you would also know about their own personal endeavors with the FANtastic Exclusive and the Seventh Kingdom. Well I had the honor of producing artwork to go on the packaging of this year's "Ramathorr, the Elephant Swordsman" 2007 FANtastic Exclusive figure! If you know me, you can imagine my excitement, let alone the fact that I can share this openly now! Here is a look at the artwork I produced:

And here is how it was put together for the card back packaging (Djordje Djakovic did the layout and the rest of the packaging design elements):

A HUGE thanks to the Four Horsemen for letting this FAN be a part of the FANtastic Exclusive experience! It really was a treat and a great experience working with them on this.

ALSO! Just announced at San Diego Comic Con, the Seventh Kingdom, (the line that Ramathorr comes from) Will be it's own action figure line separate from the FANtastic Exclusive, with it's first figure, the Queen Alluxandra coming out in winter 2007/2008!

Check this link out at Figures.com for more information on the FANtastic Exclusive and the Seventh Kingdom from the Fabulous Four Horsemen!

My good friend... Jeff L. Davis...

2007-06-29T10:21:00.001-07:00

Here's an illustration, one of my favorites, from a very good friend of mine, who is also an amazing traditional artist. This guy knows traditional costumes and lovely lady figures like no one else I've seen, and he blends the two in a very innocent and beautiful way to produce amazing images.
He has just started his own blog so what you see there is but a small scrape of the volume of great stuff this guy has done. Keep an eye on his blog as I'm sure it will continue to grow and grow with awesome classical imagery. Here's Jeff's blog... Enjoy!

As to anything more from me? Bah, I've just been a lazy lump for the last three months... Not done a single piece of art at all... And if you believe that... I've got a car to sell you. ;-)

Sorry.

2007-05-21T20:26:00.000-07:00

I just realized it's been over a month since I've posted anything new.

So to add insult to injury, all I can post here is a piece I did four years ago!

It was when Photoshop 7 came out I think and I was playing with the new brushes and the joys of liquify!

This was the result of a bit of play, nothing more, nothing less. Something I would expect to see hanging in some tex mex restaurant... Or something. I think an ingenious thing to title this one would be Frankenstein.

I promise I'll have stuff up as soon as I can, most of what I'm working on right now cannot be posted. It's great fun stuff! And I can't wait for all to see... but for now, it's still under the wraps.

Best!

Nate.

Spring colors

2007-04-19T07:02:00.000-07:00

Just a very quick... 15 - 20 min. memory color and value study of what the sunrise was doing this morning. I wasn't capturing any specific place per se... just trying to remember the colors and values of a scene.

Mr. J.R. Lintstockings...

2007-04-06T15:13:00.000-07:00

Here's a fun little friend. Again, an Imagine Learning Artist's challenge. Pick a name from the 700 hobo's site and go with it.
So I picked #53, J.R. Lintstockings! I did this in Flash and Photoshop. Happy Friday! And Happy Easter! Not that this image pertains to Easter... Or maybe it does? Maybe he made his socks out of the stuffings of an Easter Bunny?

Lady in the lake... sketchin'.

2007-03-28T09:10:00.000-07:00

This is from out artist's challenge... I didn't get very far on it, but it's a start.
Sorry I've not posted in a bit. Have a great day!

Banshee Boo!

2007-03-12T07:20:00.000-07:00

This is my imagine learning artists challenge completed.
Nothing too flashy, but a bit of fun for a Friday afternoon.

A Celtic Beach?

2007-03-09T20:49:00.000-08:00

If you're following the imagine learning artist blog challenge... You know what will soon be haunting this moody beach in the north brittish isles...

I think I hear something, something beautiful, and horrific at the same time...

At the end... and Angellic Queen.

2007-03-06T04:33:00.000-08:00

At the end of this MotU fan art memory lane. I put up my redesign of Queen Angella. Never would I have ever guessed I would ever paint such a barbie, pink and purple character that looks like she should be slapped right onto a Barbie box. And if anyone knows me personally, they probably never would've guessed that I'd illustrate such a piece either. But truth be told the reason I saved this for last and why it IS one of my favorite pieces I've done, is the fact that I'm the proud daddy of two beautiful daughters. This one is for them. In fact, I've redesigned a handful of the Princess of Power characters, you saw some earlier with Scorpia and Catra. I did that for them. Because simply put I love my kids, and as a parent I take interest in their interests, and if I can paint something that they will enjoy, and gain imagination and inspiration from? I won't say no. I have a good stack of ideas that are barely past the sketch stage for the Princess of Power characters, someday, I will complete that stack as a series of stand alone character images like this one. Heck, even this one isn't complete, you can see it's still pretty rough and sketchy in spots. But it conveys very well the look I would give PoP were I in charge of a redesign on the property.

Thanks for following these various MotU and PoP pieces from the past. From here out if I do anything MotU or PoP related it will be either for my kids, or a commission that I still have on my plate that I need to finish... and trust me, there's still a small handful of them to do. (That battle in front of Castle Grayskull for one.)
Thank you for your comments! A la prochaine!

Another Tribute piece.

2007-03-05T05:43:00.000-08:00

This is my cover to the Masters of the Universe Volume 3 #1 he-man.org exclusive cover.

Wow that's a mouthful. Even if it uses the modern designs on the characters, and Skeletor isn't flying the Talon fighter over both He-Man and Teela... This is still a tribute to Alfredo P. Alcala's cover for the record book that came with the vintage Point Dread and the Talon Fighter vehichle/playset for the classic MotU line. This is probably my favorite comic cover I ever did for the He-Man comic run. MVCreations owns this image. You can even still buy this comic from the good folks over at Grahamcrackers Comics. Check it out!

The Green Goddess

2007-03-04T15:57:00.000-08:00

This is the Green Goddess. If you're asking yourself, this is just a green Teela with the Snake Head Dress on... You're pretty much right. A long time ago... years even, I did a sketch of her, and colored her too quickly. And then later, I painted over top of that. There are a lot of things I wish to change about this piece, and the biggest thing would be to pull back a little so we can see her feet. It's just a bad crop there where it is right now. There are also a handfull of anatomy issues and costue tweeks I would like to do. For instance I'd like to push the design closer to what my good friend Tom Tolman (Royalt1us) did for the mini bust that he sculpted of her, also pictured below.

This "Green Teela" appeared only once in the very first minicomic "He-Man and the Power Sword" (Click the link to flip through and read this silly old book!) where she was more or less just an early concept of the Sorceress character.

I was always amazed whenever anyone would reference this image on the he-man.org forums.

After a while I would make a joke of it and post it over and over myself for the silliest of reasons.

She's pretty much become her own character, being drawn by many other great fan artists, and she also has been known to appear in a fan fic or two or five. Some see her as the first sorceress, some see her as some kind of Snake men queen, others as her name would indicate, simply a Goddess diety to the world of Eternia. It would be interesting to think of what would become of her if we gave her an actual name other than "The Green Goddess". LOL!

Below is a picutre of Tom's Green Goddess bust, he sculpted it, as well as created molds and cast it. I then painted it. She comes complete with removable Head Dress and Pony Tail with the use of Magnets. She's a very very cool bust. And now the Four Horsemen own a painted cast of this bust for their own collection. Way to go Tom! :)

Minicomic Madness!

2007-03-03T05:54:00.000-08:00

I loved that the old figures came with little minicomics. These were my first introduction into the world of He-Man way back in late 1981. And my all time favorite minicomics were the very first four illustrated by Alfredo P. Alcala. There was no silly little Orko. No Cringer, the concept that Adam, a silly little prince was the alter ego of He-Man, NONE of that nonsense existed on Eternia, that all came from the cartoon. The first few minicomics showed a world that was maybe a little more edgy, a little more barbaric, mind you it was all still completely safe for kids, I quite enjoyed them. There also existed in these stories the concept of why He-Man and Skeletor have two halves of the same sword. And when that sword was whole, the possessor of the complete Power Sword could enter Castle Grayskull. (A feature found in the toys) Instead of being a prince, He-Man was a great warrior from a primitive jungle tribe that went forth to protect Castle Grayskull from any evils that might wish to overtake the mysterious, sacred Fortress of Power. A little while back a board member named "Jafari Stew" threw out a challenge to do an old minicomic cover using the new updated look designed by the Four Horsemen. I did a combo. The designs of the characters are the Four Horsemen's and I kept the classic color schemes. This particular cover echo's my favorite minicomic "He-Man and the Power Sword". The only MotU story ever to portray the Sorceress as a mysterious Green Goddess... I bet you can guess what my next post will be... :)

Panthor

2007-03-02T06:08:00.000-08:00

I like drawing big cats. This one was done in painter. Not much to say about it other than it's one of my personal favs amonst my MotU art. I tend to like my more loose n' sketchy stuff. This one definately fits into that category. Happy Friday everyone!

Here kitty kitty kitty...

2007-03-01T05:28:00.000-08:00

This one started out as a mindless sketch in a horrific, boring meeting. I remember the meeting was headed by some big jumbo wumbo who wanted to completely change the management of where I used to work. Basically, force creatives to be more coorporate... BAD idea in my opinion. So in retaliation, I didn't pay attention at all and just got lost in this little sketch. I later brought it into photoshop to color as it seemed to have potential, and became what it is. No that meeting is not why I left that company for where I work now... In case you were wondering. Is there something subconscious about that sketch? I wouldn't doubt it. Nor deny it.

More Evil Women

2007-02-28T05:25:00.000-08:00

Here are two Princess of Power redesigns that I had done, and was quite happy with. Catra, and Scorpia. I remember the fans recieved Catra well, but didn't like Scorpia so much. I guess she was maybe a bit TOO monstrous, but I like her as is. They're bad, not all bad females should be pretty in my opinion.

The Pumpkin of Calamity!

2007-02-27T06:02:00.000-08:00

One of the things I love most about the he-man.org community is just that, it feels like a nice friendly community. Fans collect together and share. They share their drawings, their writings, their custom and sculpting work, as well as their general love for all things dealing with Masters of the Universe and Princess of Power. These pieces are from a fun little fan project headed by Sllohcin (Ric Nicholls). The idea was to do a classic Halloween themed battle using the masters, drawn in a style that mimics Mike Mignola's fabulous work. The Evil Lyn sketch below was my first stab at getting a feel for his style for the project. The above is the final piece. Ric did a lot of hard work organizing this thing as well as planning out the look of the whole thing. I helped a little with some background work and some colors as well as the drawings of Evil Lyn. All credits are listed on the piece. It was probably one of the more successful fan projects done. Way to go Ric!

President Washington

2007-02-26T07:08:00.000-08:00

Today is double post day!
I also just finished my Washington portrait for our Imagine Learning Artists challenge. Enjoy this brief break in the MotU madness. And though President's day is long gone now for us Americans. Still nice to reflect on history for but a second.

Teela, Gold

2007-02-26T05:18:00.000-08:00

If this looks a little exagerated and stylized... that was the intent. I was playing in photoshop, I think it was when 7.0 came out, and I was going for some more varied textures. The heavy oils in the border, the gold foil in the center, and a classic painted look on an exagerated Teela. Very wierd piece overall, mostly experimental, but I still keep it around as one of my favorite MotU pieces that I've done over the years. I think if I ever did a print of this, I'd have to play with gold leafing or at least some gold paint on that circle. :)

Man-At-Arms

2007-02-25T06:29:00.000-08:00

I wish I had done this one at a higher resolution, but what you see is what you get. I did this a long time ago, when I was doing a digital sketch a day. I kept the sketches small and fast. I remember I was looking at a lot of Bob Peak's stuff when I did this one, I was more concerned with texture than anything else here if I remember right. I've always liked this piece for how loose and raw it is.

Hordak's Separation Spell

2007-02-24T05:54:00.000-08:00

In the She-Ra post, Hordak is mentioned. He's basically the baddest of the bad. In the new Mike Young Productions Masters of the Universe cartoon, we learn that Eons ago, Hordak tried to split Eternia into two pieces, a good half and an evil half... He almost succeeded. I was working from a cool tutorial on how to illustrate planets in photoshop, and came up with this piece. Kinda fun no? Now honestly... splitting a planet in half? He may be the baddest of the bad... However he's lacking in the brains department methinks... But then, most evil beings are.

She-Ra!

2007-02-23T06:16:00.000-08:00

He-Man's twin sister. They were separated shortly after they were born. The Evil Horde ruler Hordak invaded Eternia and snatched away the infant princess. He raised her as one of his minions. Many years later, after the twins had reached adulthood, the Sorceress of Grayskull summoned He-Man to go to Etheria to find his long lost twin sister and give her the Sword of Protection, that she may also share in the Power of Grayskull and fight evil in the Universe. As the princess was convinced of her wrong affiliation with the Horde, she left with He-Man to be come She-Ra, Princess of Power and leader of the Rebellion against the evil Horde on Etheria. This was a drawing I did shortly after the Four Horsemen sculpt of the character was revealed to be the Mattel exclusive figure for the 2004 Comic Summer Conventions, both San Diego Comic Con and Wizard World Chicago. This design is based on the new exclusive figure. ( The sword is different as at that time I didn't know what the sword was going to look like, it hadn't yet been revealed.)

Castle Grayskull.

2007-02-22T06:58:00.000-08:00

Here is a rare post. Something traditional from me.
I did this way back in 1998 or 1999 when I was working for DSW, an ad agency in SLC.
This was done on tracing paper, with a black and white prismacolor pencil, and some fancy schmancy expensive markers for the color. I then spray mounted it on some black matting. Why? I have no idea. Just for the heck of it I suppose. I remember I wanted to sculpt a little Castle Grayskull to put in my fish tank... Again, Why? I have NO idea. Needless to say, I've not sculpted one yet for the fish tank. Though I did have a mini Merman in there for some time.

Skeletor

2007-02-21T07:07:00.000-08:00

MotU is always about He-Man vs. Skeletor. Skeletor trying to get into Castle Grayskull. We all know that story. Skeletor is an iconic villian, no one can deny that. He ranks up there with Darth Vader, Hitler, the Devil himself... Skeletor holds his own very well against them all.

I love the redesigned Skeletor that the Four Horsemen did in 2001, they really captured a great and very definitive look for ol' bonehead. But there is a side to Skeletor that I see, that is more akin to the early minicomics penciled by Alfredo P. Alcala, something dark, sinister, a creepy goblin kind of look that he captured that I wanted to capture here in this sketchy portrait at best. An essence of gloom and doom and spooky evil. The oposite of our Heroic Warrior He-Man.

He-Man and the Masters of the Universe ala Nate Baertsch

2007-02-20T18:41:00.000-08:00

If you like He-Man and the Masters of the Universe, and She-Ra Princess of Power?
Then don't visit this blog for the next few weeks!
I'm going to be posting some of my favorite fan and professional works for MotU and PoP. It's interesting as I pull my favorites, the different little experimentations I've done over the years with these characters. Most of what will be posted has already been seen on the He-Man.org fan art forum. But here you will get to see some of them at a higher resolution than before. And on a very few, I've retouched some of them up a little nicer than they were before. This little body of work will span about for to five years. With one piece that I did traditionally way back when He-Man.org started sometime in 1998. Let me know what you think of the pieces as they pop up. If you've followed my work over at the .org, then it should bring back some funky memories. By the Power of GRAYSKULL! :)

This first piece was a fast head study of He-Man quickly colored in photoshop. The Four Horsemen recently announced that He-Man will be in Wave 6 of their mini statue line up by Neca. I doubt he'll sport a new hairdo, but I'd love to see him look a little more like this.

Brush strokes...

2007-02-20T07:44:00.000-08:00

Sometimes it's fun to see some of the up close details in a piece.
Not that mine is anything spectacular, but one can still see how I built things up as you look at the brush strokes on this piece. It's really not as tight as one might think.
Hope all my American friends had a great President's day Weekend!

A Great President

2007-02-16T19:16:00.000-08:00

As a part of my Imagine Learning Artist's challenge, we're doing Lincoln or Washington.
Abraham Lincoln is probably one of my favorite Presidents, so I quite enjoyed taking the time, this time of year to remember him, as well as Washington and all the other great men that have served in this capacity for our country. Whether or not you agree or like any particular president of this country. It's still good to pause and respect that person or that office. It's an enormous task to put on any one human being, a very great and respected responsibility.

So I went with a straight forward painted portrait. Pretty boring I know, however for me it felt SOOOOO good to do a face study, and really paint in some detail. I feel like it's been ages since I sat down to do just that, I'm feeling rushed on a lot of things so it was nice to just focus on this for a few moments. It took a total of about five hours, some at work durring training time, and a little at home. It was all done in Painter, using their Oils flats brushes.
You comments are welcome.

Inky Oz

2007-02-13T12:46:00.000-08:00

This is another challenge that we had over at the Imagine Learning Artists challenge.
I didn't get as far on this as I had hoped. And I'm only half satisfied with what I've got! I do hope to finish this sometime, it's been fun living in Oz for a little bit. I hate the Tin man, and I hate some of the poses so there will be some major fixes and revisions next time we see this...
But here it is anyway, sorry I've been away for a spell.

When Men were Men!

2007-01-26T14:47:00.000-08:00

This week's challenge at work was "Cowboy"
So yeah... here's a cowboy! Shoot 'em up! kachow!
Sadly, my Spectrum entry didn't make it.
I'll still finish it though, as the character means something to me.

The Beginning... of the End.

2007-01-24T06:45:00.000-08:00

This is a color/composition sketch that I've had on my plate for years... literally.
It's for a good friend who has been incredibly patient with me. Joe Amaro. He spent a lot of time and hard work on a very cool custom Green Goddess figure for me, and in return, I'm doing this painting of his castle Grayskull in a scene that hopefully harkens back to the origional magic of the the Box and Poster Art for the origional Masters of the Universe line. This will be fully painted when completed that will hopefully pay homage to other fantastic MotU painters like William George and Earl Norem. Your thoughts are welcome!

Devil Woman...

2007-01-19T12:35:00.000-08:00

At a request, I don't do a lot, but this happens to also be a favorite Disney villian of my own as well. The evil Maleficent!
It is what it is... I played with Painter's chalks some more.
Happy Friday!

Mirror mirror on the wall...

2007-01-15T15:36:00.000-08:00

Y'know, I saw a face of some singer on msn.

Started sketchin.

Ended up with this... Go figure!

In color! ... Sorta

2007-01-12T15:03:00.000-08:00

Hey you three guys that visit me!

Here's a progression on my spectrum entry... I don't know if I'm gonna make it, but I'll try. Either way I really want to finish this. I keep telling myself I'm gonna pull it into painter and start rendering in there, but so far this has been a Photoshop only show...

Let me know what you think!

Thundercats... Remember them?

2007-01-05T18:01:00.000-08:00

I found an old sketch of Cheetara today, and for some personal training time at work, I colored her.

I played with a technique where the underpainting so to speak was just a dark gray blue for the shadows, and a light yellow/creme color for the light side, with little blending between the two.

Then with Painter's watercolors, I "washed" some local colors over top, giving a nice watercolory texture. Then I blurred it in photoshop.

Kinda fun. :) Happy Friday everybody! Enjoy the weekend!

Oozor!!!

2007-01-01T10:01:00.000-08:00

This is something I just simply colored. The REAL work was done by the following friends and artists extraordinaire...

The artwork was drawn by Cody Constable (Buffalo-Bill-Man on the he-man.org forums)

The text and logo treatments were done by Ric Nicholls (Sllohcin on the he-man.org forums)

If you want to learn more about Oozor and his uber cool mini statue kit created by Tom Tolman (Royalt1us on the he-man.org forums) then check out this link right here! It's a lengthy thread, be sure to check out all the pages to see Tom's progress on taking the design from Ric and sculpting the finished statue. Oh and not just a cool sculpt, but all the casting and mold making that goes along with it. Tom Rocks!

It's a part of a very cool fan project that Tom put together on he-man.org. Ric Nicholls is the creator of the character Oozor.

How many names can you keep straight now eh?

Happy New Year!

2006-12-30T17:57:00.000-08:00

Happy New Year!

May 2006 leave you peacefully, and may 2007 bring you new adventures and bright hopes fullfilled.

I feel bad I didn't get anything up for my favorite holiday, Christmas. My new years resolution will be to actually do something for Christmas next year. Something big and worth while even.

This is a fun little piece, I took an existing image of Castle Grayskull that I painted, maybe I'll show it here someday... And I wanted to see what that creepy ol' castle would look like with a nice coat of snow.

I was inspired largely by a couple of things, my spectrum entry below takes place in the snow, and also, over the last week I was at my parents house in Monroe Utah, where it dumped nigh unto a foot of snow on us all, leaving the landscape in a beautiful, pure blanket of snow. Magical I tell ya... just plain magical.

Enjoy!

Spectrum entry... WIP

2006-12-22T14:56:00.000-08:00

It's been a bit o' time since my last post. Too much Christmas fun. And Just so it's known, I probably won't post much until after the new year also. But one never knows what a day brings, until the day hits you so...

For our Imagine Learning Artists challenge, we're submitting to Spectrum!

This is a sketchy work in progress on mine... I have yet to figure out half the figure and I still don't know what kind of made up animal next to him.

But I wanted it to be wintery, and again, like that wierd horse creature I posted, this is coming outa my head, a character of mine that hopefully will come to life in a story I have yet to write.

Centuaresse...

2006-12-07T13:53:00.000-08:00

Done! Wow, this ended up a little more "Narnia-ish" that I'd expected.

I did this for our work challenge. Check out the other entries here: http://imaginelearningartists.blogspot.com/

I'm overall happy with how this turned out. But I think the more I worked on it the more frustrated I'd get with it for whatever reason.

I'd love to hear crits on this one!

Have a great Day!

Orko's girlfriend?

2006-12-05T07:46:00.000-08:00

A goofy sketch of a goofy character.

Nothing more, but a bit of fun paint sketchin' this morning.

Centuaress

2006-11-30T13:37:00.000-08:00

I'm back from my break!

But I haven't been able to sketch a whole lot lately, well, I have, but not stuff I can really post here... Yet.

Here's a Centuaress that I intend to paint up for the mythical challenge that my co-workers and I are doing. We plan to have a new challenge every couple of weeks to keep our imagination good n' sharp.

This character is actually a character that a gal named LupaLuna on the he-man.org forums concepted up. As I move forward to paint this, I'll push it a little and make it a little more of my own in color and armor and sword design, as when I first drew this, it was based on her origional concept. Am I making any sense here? Sometimes I wonder... :)

At any rate look for progress on the painting here!

Teela

2006-11-21T07:20:00.000-08:00

If you're coming from he-man.org to see my blog, sorry for the disapointment today as you've probably already seen this. I've not had a lot of time to sketch for myself as of late, so I'll put up another fairly recent piece that I feel turned out okay. I started out doing a reference study and then turned her into Teela. Stranger things have happened.

Have an excellent Thanksgiving! I won't be around to post for the next week or so, as I'm disapearing for a while out into the west.

The Teela character is trademarked and owned by Mattel.

A lady Aayla

2006-11-19T12:06:00.000-08:00

This was a commission that I did for a good friend. It also served a double purpose, in that my daughter also loves this character.

This also took me waaaaay too long to finish.

The Aayla Secura character is trademarked and owned by Lucasfilm.

Good horsey...

2006-11-17T07:08:00.000-08:00

This is what happens when I just sketch what's in my head.

Now creatures as such don't always lurk in there... This particular beast is something I'm toying with for a possible story I've got going on in my head. Someday I'll get it all down on paper, and produce a real painting or two illustrating the story I'd like to tell someday. Again, he's just a dreamt up concept, nothing more at this point in the game.

Happy Friday!

Hello there!

2006-11-16T07:36:00.000-08:00

I've done it. I've jumped on the blog-wagon! I'm now a dirty blogger!

Welcome, this is the place where I will do like many other much greater artists have done, and try to post my artwork, sketches, ideas and such on a somewhat regular basis.

I have no website, haven't found the time to bother with it, but this may give me a chance to get my stuff out there.

Feel free to stop by whenever you like, and if you feel you need to say anything about my artwork, please post! I'm always open to critiques and the like to better myself in my craft.

My first image isn't very indicative of what I do on a regular basis, but something I enjoy very much. This is a speed painting of what the sunrise looked like out here where I live, I just HAD to try to capture it to the best of my abilities, as I didn't have a camera ready.

Enjoy.