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The Evolution of The Mouse

Needless to say there have been many, many books over the years (official and otherwise) showing you how to draw your favorite characters from Disney Animation. This latest book from the famous Walter Foster art how-to series takes a little different tack: How the look of Mickey Mouse and some of the most well-known Disney characters has evolved over time since they were first created. “A collection of vintage artwork from the Disney archives reveals early designs, sketches, and poses of Mickey Mouse as well as other classic characters such as Minnie Mouse and Donald Duck. Learn to Draw Mickey Mouse & Friends Through the Decades creates the opportunity for an artistic celebration of the world’s most beloved mouse, by bringing together a collection of step-by-step projects and inspirational illustrations for rendering these timeless characters as they originally appeared. Featuring 128 pages of art instruction material, this title makes a covetable collector’s item for any loyal Disney enthusiast or aspiring artists interested in learning to draw in classic cartoon style.” Learn to Draw Mickey Mouse & Friends Through the Decades (whew, long title!) is coming next year to Amazon and other sellers.

image c. 2014 Walter Foster Publishing

image c. 2014 Walter Foster Publishing

Just Give Him Your Socks And Everything’s Fine

Ndbag is a boogeyman, but not the scary people-eating kind. No, he’d much rather eat one of your dirty socks — usually the left one. Ndbag the Boogeyman lives in the closet clothes hamper of a little girl named Mylene. He’s made friends with her favorite plushie: A panda named Pandaman. They get along so well that Ndbag created his very own panda costume which he calls Pandabag. The little blue boogeyman is also “frenemies” with ZK, a fluffy dryer goblin who much prefers clean socks and munching on lint. Are you getting all of this? It all comes from the mind of Austrian artist E.F. Gludovacz, and you can find out more in the first Ndbag the Boogeyman book as well as the regularly-updated web comic… all at the official web site.

image c. 2014 by E.F. Gludovacz

image c. 2014 by E.F. Gludovacz

Pictures Coming At You!

We’ll let Lyla Warren tell it herself: ” Recently relocated to Portland (from San Francisco via Denver) Lyla Warren is a self-taught freelance artist. Her education was forged by late nights in the halls of the animation industry and by wonderful mentors. Through her career, she’s worked for a variety of clients such as Disney, Cartoon Network, Sony, Mattel, Zynga, Laika, and Leap Frog, to name a few. These days she is focused on sculpture, character design and personal art work.” And what sculpture! Her leaping-out-of-the frame 3D pictures of various Disney and Pixar characters have been featured at the Disneyland Wonderground Gallery, and her other works have drawn from many sources. She even found time to create her own 2D animated short film, Beaver vs. Platypus, as well as shorts for the Happy Tree Friends series. Take a look at her web site to see all that and more.

image c. 2014 by Lyla Warren

image c. 2014 by Lyla Warren

Fine Turtle Art

Albert Nguyen is a fine artist and illustrator who has created works for online games, children’s books, pet portraits, and people portraits — among other things. After he completed a popular graphic-arts-style series of illustrations from the Star Wars universe, he set about creating a series of portraits of the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles in a historical samurai style. Visit his web site, KnewWhen.com (get it?) to see more of his works both furry and not-furry.

image c. 2014 by Albert Nguyen

image c. 2014 by Albert Nguyen

Out of Roomies

Andrew Dickman is a professional storyboard artist in the field of animation. He is also, in his copious spare time, the creator of the on-line anthropomorphic comic called Roomies. Actually, of late he hasn’t had much spare time while he’s working multiple animation jobs, so it’s been a while since Roomies has been updated. Which means now might be a good time to catch up with Andy, Swain, and Mary, the anthropomorphic college-age room-mates who inhabit this fair comic. Visit Andrew’s web page to find out what we mean. Andrew has said that he hopes to bring this comic back to life some day, so make sure to keep checking back!

image c. 2014 Andrew Dickman

image c. 2014 Andrew Dickman

Beasts Invade the Rain Forest

It might seem like an age ago, but earlier this year the animated sensation of the moment was Rio 2. Now that we’ve moved on to the summer, Paperkutz have announced a new tie-in graphic novel, carrying on after the events of that film. “While recording bird calls, Linda loses her new digital recorder, but when Blu finds it, it’s full of strange and horrifying growls! Is some sort of new predator on the loose in the sanctuary? Before the gang can solve the mystery themselves, monster-hunters and reality shows invade, turning their quiet jungle home into pandemonium. ” Rio 2: The Creature from Blu’s Lagoon is written by Arie Kaplan and illustrated by James Silvani. The full-color trade paperback is available for pre-ordering; otherwise look for it in stores this fall.

image c. 2014 Paperkutz

image c. 2014 Paperkutz

The FIRST Foul-Mouthed Teddy?

Word is spreading fast that the creators of the Ursa-Major-nominated film Ted are facing a lawsuit. “The creators of web series about a foul-mouthed teddy bear with a penchant for drinking, smoking and prostitutes have filed a copyright infringement suit against Seth MacFarlane, Universal Pictures and the producers of Ted, the 2012 film about a foul-mouthed teddy bear with a penchant for drinking, smoking and prostitutes. Bengal Mangle Productions claims that Ted ‘is an unlawful copy’ of its own animated teddy, who was featured in two different web series, Charlie The Abusive Teddy and Acting School Academy. The suit, filed today in U.S. District Court in Los Angeles, states that those web series aired in 2009 and 2010 on You Tube, FunnyOrDie.com and other streaming websites.” Any merit to this? So far the targets of the lawsuit haven’t responded, but you can visit Charlie’s official web site and check things out for yourself.

image c. 2014 Universal Pictures

image c. 2014 Universal Pictures

Power Bunny

More 80’s furry comic nostalgia! Captain Carrot and His Amazing Zoo Crew was, of course, DC Comics jumping head-first into the growing funny animal scene with a Warner Brothers meets Superheroes pastiche created by Scott Shaw! and Roy Thomas. Now DC have brought together the original full-color issue #1 through #20 of CC in a new trade paperback, Showcase Presents: Captain Carrot and His Amazing Zoo Crew. The collection also features a team-up with the original Teen Titans, as well as the special and little-seen 3-issue Oz/Wonderland War mini-series (which the Super Rabbit and his cohorts had a large part in). It’s available for order now, and hits the shelves this August.

image c. 2014 DC Comics

image c. 2014 DC Comics

One Scared Little Bird

Lauri and Jaakko Ahonen created an Indiegogo campaign for their darkly comic full-color graphic novel Jaybird. Evidently it was quite successful, as now it’s been published! “Little Jaybird lives in a very large house alone with his bedridden mother. Portraits of dignified ancestors look down upon him from dusty walls. At times also a curious spider peeks from between the cobwebs. Even though it’s safe inside the house, with its doors barred and windows boarded up, reality can’t be shut outside forever.” It’s available now for download (complete with original soundtrack music), and this September Dark Horse Press will release it in a hardcover book edition.

image c. 2014 Dark Horse Press

image c. 2014 Dark Horse Press