The ABC's of Pro Wrestling - B is for Bodyslam
Hiya kids!
It's Bill Main here with another installment of your favorite Rat Fink-y, weirdo, pro wrestling, t-shirty, ABC booky fantastic-ness!
Whew...that was a mouthful.
When thinking about what piece of wrestling terminology or move might best encapsulate the letter B, I wanted to go super classic. Even people with a passing knowledge of pro wrestling will be aware of the friggin' BODY SLAM! Say it with me now folks, "Baaaaaaahhhhhhdeeeeee Slllllllaaaaaaaaaammmmmmmm!"
Ahhhhhh. Thanks for indulging me in that. What are these illustrations gonna end up as? Definitely a book, hopefully some t-shirts. Got any other ideas for things you might like to see these bad boys and girls as? Let me know in the comment section!
Check out my illustration for the letter A here
It's Bill Main here with another installment of your favorite Rat Fink-y, weirdo, pro wrestling, t-shirty, ABC booky fantastic-ness!
Whew...that was a mouthful.
When thinking about what piece of wrestling terminology or move might best encapsulate the letter B, I wanted to go super classic. Even people with a passing knowledge of pro wrestling will be aware of the friggin' BODY SLAM! Say it with me now folks, "Baaaaaaahhhhhhdeeeeee Slllllllaaaaaaaaaammmmmmmm!"
Ahhhhhh. Thanks for indulging me in that. What are these illustrations gonna end up as? Definitely a book, hopefully some t-shirts. Got any other ideas for things you might like to see these bad boys and girls as? Let me know in the comment section!
Check out my illustration for the letter A here
ABC's of Pro Wrestling - A is for Atomic Drop
Hey there everybody!
I'm hoping today finds you feeling good in your respective neighborhoods. Respect to Applebee's. I think that's an Applebee's slogan- maybe not. Either way, even though the answer is literally a few finger presses away- that will have to stay the way it is. Time is of the essence here folks.
All Applebee's aside, I started a new project! I'm making a children's book (of sorts). I probably won't be reading this to my kid till he's able to decide not to pile drive his schoolmates for fun buuuuuuut maybe your kid has more self control than I perceive mine will have. I digress.
The project is a collection of illustrations in the style of an alphabet book! Ultimately, I'd like to have it printed and bound and hopefully, have T-shirts made as well.
I loved going to the Pomona Swap Meet with my dad as a kid. When we'd go, I'd walk up and down the aisles of used car parts, checking out old carburetors, beat up fenders and lenses for headlights that no one makes anymore. Yet by far, my favorite thing about going would be when we would turn a corner and see good ol' Bert "The Shirt" Grimm slangin' Ed Roth's Rat Fink T-shirts! My dad would always buy me one (they were really fairly priced and Bert is an awesome salesman) and it started my love and obsession for all things Roth.
I bring you the first illustration from The ABC's of Pro Wrestling.
I'm hoping today finds you feeling good in your respective neighborhoods. Respect to Applebee's. I think that's an Applebee's slogan- maybe not. Either way, even though the answer is literally a few finger presses away- that will have to stay the way it is. Time is of the essence here folks.
All Applebee's aside, I started a new project! I'm making a children's book (of sorts). I probably won't be reading this to my kid till he's able to decide not to pile drive his schoolmates for fun buuuuuuut maybe your kid has more self control than I perceive mine will have. I digress.
The project is a collection of illustrations in the style of an alphabet book! Ultimately, I'd like to have it printed and bound and hopefully, have T-shirts made as well.
I loved going to the Pomona Swap Meet with my dad as a kid. When we'd go, I'd walk up and down the aisles of used car parts, checking out old carburetors, beat up fenders and lenses for headlights that no one makes anymore. Yet by far, my favorite thing about going would be when we would turn a corner and see good ol' Bert "The Shirt" Grimm slangin' Ed Roth's Rat Fink T-shirts! My dad would always buy me one (they were really fairly priced and Bert is an awesome salesman) and it started my love and obsession for all things Roth.
I bring you the first illustration from The ABC's of Pro Wrestling.
Conan O'Brien and his mad monster party
I posted a little sketch for the Twitter account @sketch_dailies yesterday. The prompt was #CONANHAIR so we had to hook it up with anything and everything as long as it had Conan's famous coif. Here's mine:
Wolf in Sheep's Clothing
Oh hi there!
*insert apology for never posting to blog*
Yup, I'm back. It's been a while for sure but not for lack of busyness. That's busy-ness, not to be confused with business. But that's not a bad thing. We (my lovely wife and I) have been reevaluating our priorities as of late and it's been a time of good growth. So, that's about as transparent or deep into my private life as I get on my blog. Meet me in real life and we'll talk deeper, how about that huh?
Anywho, on the way home from Trader Joe's one day, I was listening to the song Way of the Wolf by the band Dynasty. It's a song that comments on the biblical Devil, the way he works and spreads lies- his modus operandi. The part that really stuck was how the wolf doesn't just flat-out lie in an easy-to-distinguish way, he spreads a counterfeit truth that sounds good. I had heard the song so many times but it hadn't hit me the same way. I started to think of visual ways to represent the ideas in the song that would not only be fitting to the meaning but also kind of fit the look of the music scene it came from. Dynasty is a hardcore band hailing for Los Angeles *represent* and so their aesthetic is going to look a lot different from how I'd approach the same idea if it were going to be in a conservative magazine article...although I'd probably still push that my way a bit. ;)
*insert apology for never posting to blog*
Yup, I'm back. It's been a while for sure but not for lack of busyness. That's busy-ness, not to be confused with business. But that's not a bad thing. We (my lovely wife and I) have been reevaluating our priorities as of late and it's been a time of good growth. So, that's about as transparent or deep into my private life as I get on my blog. Meet me in real life and we'll talk deeper, how about that huh?
Anywho, on the way home from Trader Joe's one day, I was listening to the song Way of the Wolf by the band Dynasty. It's a song that comments on the biblical Devil, the way he works and spreads lies- his modus operandi. The part that really stuck was how the wolf doesn't just flat-out lie in an easy-to-distinguish way, he spreads a counterfeit truth that sounds good. I had heard the song so many times but it hadn't hit me the same way. I started to think of visual ways to represent the ideas in the song that would not only be fitting to the meaning but also kind of fit the look of the music scene it came from. Dynasty is a hardcore band hailing for Los Angeles *represent* and so their aesthetic is going to look a lot different from how I'd approach the same idea if it were going to be in a conservative magazine article...although I'd probably still push that my way a bit. ;)
I dressed the wolf up in a sheep's skin but even under that he wears the robes of the clergy. Throughout history, the name of Jesus has been used by people to commit horrible acts. These men and women fleeced (in some situations, still fleecing) their flocks in order to get a little dishonest gain while purposefully misinterpreting or even ignoring the Scripture that one would assume they professed. Laid on top of a blanket of Scripture from the bible that warns against false teachers coming into the brand new group of Christians, the wolf holds a chalice of blood. Lots of good folks died because of some bad people. If you call yourself a Christian, know the bible. It's what our faith is built on and God will correct our always-going-the-wrong-way hearts through it.
Banzai Pipeline
Heavy waves with a shallow, super sharp reef break. The Pipeline break is treacherous in Hawaii.
According to the great and powerful Wikipedia: "it got its name in December 1961, when surfing movie producer Bruce Brown was driving the North Shore with California surfers Phil Edwards and Mike Diffenderfer. Brown stopped at the then-unnamed site to film Edwards catching several waves. At the time, there was a construction project on an underground pipeline on adjacent Kamehameha Highway, and Diffenderfer made the suggestion to name the break "Pipeline". The name was first used in Brown's movie Surfing Hollow Days."
By the way, Surfing Hollow Days is highly recommended viewing material!
Here's a Hawaiian warrior, charging Pipeline with no fear in his eyes.
I've been thinking about the 60's and 70's Ed Roth and Roth industries T-shirts that my dad started buying for me as a kid and how that look definitely informed my decisions when drawing characters or even designing. For better or worse, I love drawing this way.
According to the great and powerful Wikipedia: "it got its name in December 1961, when surfing movie producer Bruce Brown was driving the North Shore with California surfers Phil Edwards and Mike Diffenderfer. Brown stopped at the then-unnamed site to film Edwards catching several waves. At the time, there was a construction project on an underground pipeline on adjacent Kamehameha Highway, and Diffenderfer made the suggestion to name the break "Pipeline". The name was first used in Brown's movie Surfing Hollow Days."
By the way, Surfing Hollow Days is highly recommended viewing material!
Here's a Hawaiian warrior, charging Pipeline with no fear in his eyes.
I've been thinking about the 60's and 70's Ed Roth and Roth industries T-shirts that my dad started buying for me as a kid and how that look definitely informed my decisions when drawing characters or even designing. For better or worse, I love drawing this way.
Finished up an old sketch
Cleaned up that Undertaker sketch I posted a little while ago. I've decided I'd like to put together a character design portfolio. I'm not sure where that'll be hosted. Any ideas? I'm leaning toward my Behance portfolio but am open to suggestions.
Swing your arms from side to side...
...c'mon it's time to go do the Mario!
Oh hey there, whatcha doooin'?
Anywho, I just painted the brothers Mario for PaletteSwap!
While painting this illustration, I was thinking a lot about what it would be like for two Brooklyn-based, Italian plumbers to get transported into the Mushroom Kingdom. These two guys (brothers) know nothing of the crazy, upside down world they've just found themselves in. There's evil mushrooms, dragons that fly in mechanical clown heads, and mutant fire-spitting plants- and the only thing to make it any better is all the gold lying (or floating) around. But there's no store to buy stuff, so you can't do anything with it! You just get to try again if you happen to fall into a bottomless pit. Yay you!
So in terms of the Mario brothers' posture, there's a bit of irritation and unhappiness there. I figure that my brothers and I would probably be pretty irritated with our new home rather than go around joyfully stomping the life out of evil mushroom people.
It's been a while since I made a painting for PaletteSwap (here is a link to my old PSwaps). This time I wanted to go for a classic! Super Mario World was and continues to be one of my favorite SNES games. I love so much about it: the explorable, ever changing world map, the secret ways of beating levels, the art and the adventure. I remember playing it with my own brothers and just poring over different ways of beating the levels...I played it consistently years later with my (now) wife. It's a go-to classic and I can't wait to play it with my kids. Although their built-in cranial micro processors may not be backwards compatible. Gaaahh technology...FOILING MY PLANS AGAIN!!
Ahem, sorry about that. Here's my PaletteSwap:
Oh hey there, whatcha doooin'?
Anywho, I just painted the brothers Mario for PaletteSwap!
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| Here's the uncropped version of the painting. |
So in terms of the Mario brothers' posture, there's a bit of irritation and unhappiness there. I figure that my brothers and I would probably be pretty irritated with our new home rather than go around joyfully stomping the life out of evil mushroom people.
It's been a while since I made a painting for PaletteSwap (here is a link to my old PSwaps). This time I wanted to go for a classic! Super Mario World was and continues to be one of my favorite SNES games. I love so much about it: the explorable, ever changing world map, the secret ways of beating levels, the art and the adventure. I remember playing it with my own brothers and just poring over different ways of beating the levels...I played it consistently years later with my (now) wife. It's a go-to classic and I can't wait to play it with my kids. Although their built-in cranial micro processors may not be backwards compatible. Gaaahh technology...FOILING MY PLANS AGAIN!!
Ahem, sorry about that. Here's my PaletteSwap:
I found a really nice, clean, high resolution image of the original SNES box sold in the states and mussed it up a little with the powers of Photoshop to give it an older feel. Enjoy!
Super Mario was created by Shigeru Miyamoto and Takashi Tezuka
Super Mario Bros. and all related material is copyright Nintendo
Some Etsy custom orders
I recently had a pretty cool Etsy order from a very cool girlfriend who has a very lucky boyfriend. She wanted to surprise her man for his birthday and she had seen an old wooden cutout of Randy Savage that I made long ago. Asking if I could make another AND a Ric Flair was like asking a if I'd like like another cinnamon roll cake for my birthday....yes I would like that very much thank you.
If you're wanting to order some custom wrestlers, why don't you head over to my Etsy and send me a conversation?
Process shots:
These are hand cut, hand painted, ready to be hung on the wall original pieces of art. They are painted on 1/4" birch panels and they're fun to have staring at you. Albeit, I only get to see them staring at me for a couple days before I send them off.
Laser Cats at Gallery 1988
I had the distinct honor and
privilege to participate in the Grand Opening show for the new location of Gallery 1988
West this past Friday. The show; titled,” Is This Thing On? #2”
was a secret blackout show. Specifically, that means that people had
no real idea of what the show's theme would be until the doors were
opened that night! Of course, the artists were aware ahead of time and so we
had some decisions to make. The theme was Saturday Night Live- any
era, any characters, anything.
It was a fantastically broad area to
work within but was so rich with fun imagery and story -so I was really
excited.
I made a ton of sketches from a bunch of
different skits. I really liked what was going on with the sketches I got from the digital short I chose. Ahem, this may be the only time I ever paint nine cats
into the same painting. Ok, then again, it may not be. At any rate,
cats with lasers shooting out of their mouths happened all over this
painting.
If you have no idea what I'm talking about, I chose Laser Cats. The boys from the Lonely
Island (Jorma Taccone, Akiva Schaffer, and Andy Samberg) have put
together one of my favorite series of short films in SNL history so I
thought it fitting to pay a little homage to them through this.
Gathering reference for the painting
was super fun since I got to go back through and watch all the shorts
over again. You can find them on the Lonely Island website, NBC.com
and Hulu if you'd like a quick refresh.
I've always loved 70's and 80's movie
poster art so I used one of the greats from that era of genre of
illustration, Frank
McCarthy, as reference. Here you go:
Hey I've got a new blog!
Hello there fine friends, welcome to the new hub of my online existence!
As of now I have just transferred some of my older blog entries over here from but I'll soon be creating a bunch of new content. So be sure to follow me here by bookmarking, using the subscribe feature or even by mailing yourself a reminder to check my blog every week. I recommend USPS First Class mail for the latter. You won't be sorry.
Illustration Friday- ZOOM
Illustration Friday- ZOOM
For whatever reason, I thought of Rear Window and I wanted to paint Jimmy Stewart with googly eyes. Remember kids, you can never go wrong with googly eyes. Never.
Ikari Warriors arcade game art
So when I heard that the Summer theme for PaletteSwap was golden age arcade games I was like, “Whaaaaaaaaaat gurl?” What was weird was that there was no girl there, just my cat Mustachio and she looked at me like I was going to give her pets. I was like,”No Mustachio, this is my time. Go do cat things.” Then my wife came into the room and we started breakdancing. 15% of that story is true. I will let you decide which parts.
Alas, the PaletteSwap theme WAS Golden Age arcade games. I was and am still stoked.
I grew up in San Pedro, California. Why is this important? Because that means I was only a hop, skip and a jump away from Torrance and in Torrance resided the Del Amo Mall. What was in the Del Amo Mall you ask? A Game Stop? No! Game Stop wasn’t even a twinkle in the eye of a tiny nerdboy yet. What lived in a dark and greasy corner of the mall was far better.
Aladdin’s Castle
photo from snk-capcom.com
I actually just found out it was the testing center for new Neo Geo games too. Thanks internet!
Aladdins castle was a real video game arcade. As soon as you walked in your senses were going coo coo crazy. Your nose was greeted with sour b.o. as soon as your feet crossed the threshold. You cant keep a good nerd from sweating profusely when he’s playing Rushin’ Attack. Ears were met with the cacophonous sound of a hundred different games blasting at full volume and your eyes were full to the brim of colors, lights, and a huge array of multicultural nerdfare.
Of all those games I played back then I think Ikari Warriors was my chosen illustration this time because it most fits what I really like about the eighties, which take up the bulk of the Golden Age of arcade. I like, nay LOVE, eighties action movies. I actually can’t separate myself from the notion that Arnold Schwarzenegger is the best actor ever. I won’t attempt to justify that. I just lost some of you. I know that but it doesn’t matter. At any rate, Ikari Warriors celebrates the idea of two dudes taking down a whole army, armed with nothing more than a machine gun and a couple grenades. It was super fun and SUPER hard. I chose to model my characters after Arnold Schwarzenegger and Chuck Norris and what came of it is a poster for the greatest eighties movie never made.
Here are some shots of the original game:
photo from flyers.arcade-museum.com
photo from gamasutra.com
Did I mention that you only had a limited amount of bullets? What? Ridiculously hard game.
PaletteSwap’s Tumblr is here.
Ok so I must say that while I was making the illustration, I also decided that I wanted to push it a little farther. I’ve never actually made any papercraft toys before but I saw a couple papercraft arcade cabinets pop up when I was searching for the game screenshots. I have always kind of admired the idea of making tiny versions of bigger things and I wanted to play with it. After following a couple directions from other papercraft sites on how to make an arcade cabinet, I decided to mock up my own version. I wanted the thing to be able to print large but not so that you’d have to get any wonky sized paper or use a larger format printer. The plans ended up printing on two 8.5″x11″ pieces of paper. I used a couple sheets of 110 lb. card stock because I wanted to make sure it stuck around for a while. I made the plans available at my Etsy shop for a nominal fee. The PaletteSwap blog is a non-comissioned art blog so we as artists don’t make any money directly from it. We just love what we are doing. However, I thought it wouldn’t be such a bad idea to make this thing multi task for me as I put a bit more effort than just an illustration.
Anywho, these things look super cool on your desktop and if you spray them lightly with some varnish, they’ll last a long time.
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| Notice, the quarter stacked in the little gutter under the game screen. In arcade language, this means you've held your place for the next game. |
Ron Swanson Approves of This Message
What can I possibly say about Ronald Ulysses Swanson that hasn’t been said more eloquently in the hallowed halls of the Interwebs before? Nick Offerman’s portrayal of manly man Ron Swanson is just great to my wife and I. There aren’t many TV shows we watch now that we don’t serve the cable gods anymore. However, we do Hulu the proverbial crap out of Parks and Recreation.
Perhaps I can’t say it in words but I sure can try with some paint. I kept looking at this blank spot on our dining room wall and I decided that we needed some food related art.
Undoubtedly, Ron Swanson’s culinary leanings tend toward the meaty side of life. Whether its meat burgers made of meat, Meat Tornado burritos, or just a good old fashioned cookout, Duke Silver is a carnivore to the core. I thought it fitting to have him grace our walls with his semi-inspirational slogan for his signature dish, theTurf & Turf. It consists of one 16 oz. Rib-eye steak, one 24 oz. Porterhouse, a cigar and a glass of whiskey. By the way, although commonly thought to be the same, Rib-eyes and Porterhouse steaksare different. I did some research. I’d tell you the specifics but you should really look into the matter for yourself. You know, teach a man to fish…(for sport only, fish meat is practically a vegetable.)
Perhaps I can’t say it in words but I sure can try with some paint. I kept looking at this blank spot on our dining room wall and I decided that we needed some food related art.
Undoubtedly, Ron Swanson’s culinary leanings tend toward the meaty side of life. Whether its meat burgers made of meat, Meat Tornado burritos, or just a good old fashioned cookout, Duke Silver is a carnivore to the core. I thought it fitting to have him grace our walls with his semi-inspirational slogan for his signature dish, theTurf & Turf. It consists of one 16 oz. Rib-eye steak, one 24 oz. Porterhouse, a cigar and a glass of whiskey. By the way, although commonly thought to be the same, Rib-eyes and Porterhouse steaksare different. I did some research. I’d tell you the specifics but you should really look into the matter for yourself. You know, teach a man to fish…(for sport only, fish meat is practically a vegetable.)
I worked up a little print of this painting over at my Etsy shop. You can buy it here…because you are a free American. Unless you’re not. Then just buy it because you’re awesome.
Bullet in the Brain - Tobias Wolff
I was feeling a little stuck in a rut so I enlisted the talents of a good friend and former instructor Jeffrey Smith. He acted as Art Director on this and sent me on a little tour of short stories about the extraordinary within the mundane. This story, written by Tobias Wolff, is called Bullet in the Brain. You can read the story here. Synoptically speaking, its about an older cantankerous book critic standing in a line at the bank. Bank robbers come in, the book critic mouths off to them and he receives a bullet in the brain. The real bulk of story actually occurs in the microsecond that the bullet hits the brain and travels through his head. It delivers a shock of memory as his life passes before his eyes.
I’ve found myself wondering from time to time if a person’s life does indeed, “flash before their eyes” if they are killed with no warning.
For the image, I set the scene in a bank. I cropped Anders’ head so it was more of a framing device. Because I chose to use the moment of action as the image, I felt like if the viewer’s eye was panned out too far to see the gun’s muzzle flash , Anders’ bodily reaction to the gunshot, and the masked robber it would be a little heavy handed. (At least the way I kept drawing it.) For color, I kept the "present" in monochrome, as I feel that Anders had lost his zest for the life he was living. It is telling of his nature that he doesn’t think of classic, pivotal moments that one might remember in their last moments. Anders keeps this interaction with his childhood peers deep in his psyche. He feels the heat, smells the air, and sees the yellow summer grass on the baseball field. So, instead of having this meaty, bloody spray shooting out of this gentleman’s head,(as I initially drew) I kept working until I saw something a bit more visually interesting and ethereal. I like the play between the figures in color and the cropped out figure in B&W. For myself, memories are often triggered by something I see right in front of me, so I wanted a little play between the “then” and the “now.”
I started with a simple line drawing with a wash. I used a #6 sable round just to get my major shapes in order without having to fuss later on.
From here, I just started dropping in tone and color. Its kind of an intuitive process when it comes to color choice. There are certain colors that don’t make natural sense to go a certain place but I’ll put them there just because I like how it reacts with the color next to it. I like this stage. Its like a patchwork at this point and I can decide what to leave out and what to push a little further. Now is when I reassess my initial thoughts on where I want to lead the eye, value and which colors to bring out more.
I add a little more focus on the “memory” part of the image and call it done. Last image is the final image.
For the image, I set the scene in a bank. I cropped Anders’ head so it was more of a framing device. Because I chose to use the moment of action as the image, I felt like if the viewer’s eye was panned out too far to see the gun’s muzzle flash , Anders’ bodily reaction to the gunshot, and the masked robber it would be a little heavy handed. (At least the way I kept drawing it.) For color, I kept the "present" in monochrome, as I feel that Anders had lost his zest for the life he was living. It is telling of his nature that he doesn’t think of classic, pivotal moments that one might remember in their last moments. Anders keeps this interaction with his childhood peers deep in his psyche. He feels the heat, smells the air, and sees the yellow summer grass on the baseball field. So, instead of having this meaty, bloody spray shooting out of this gentleman’s head,(as I initially drew) I kept working until I saw something a bit more visually interesting and ethereal. I like the play between the figures in color and the cropped out figure in B&W. For myself, memories are often triggered by something I see right in front of me, so I wanted a little play between the “then” and the “now.”
I started with a simple line drawing with a wash. I used a #6 sable round just to get my major shapes in order without having to fuss later on.
From here, I just started dropping in tone and color. Its kind of an intuitive process when it comes to color choice. There are certain colors that don’t make natural sense to go a certain place but I’ll put them there just because I like how it reacts with the color next to it. I like this stage. Its like a patchwork at this point and I can decide what to leave out and what to push a little further. Now is when I reassess my initial thoughts on where I want to lead the eye, value and which colors to bring out more.
I add a little more focus on the “memory” part of the image and call it done. Last image is the final image.