The New Mad is Out…this Wednesday!!

Just a quick post here to let folks know the latest issue of MAD is out (503),  and I have a couple of pages in the issue (who cares?) that POSSIBLY make light of the marital problems of Tiger Woods.  I MIGHT be a smartass and post this cover each day, all week, until sales increase so dramatically, that newsstand magazines roar right back and kick the internet into oblivion.  Yeah, that’s going to happen.  Until then, that’s the cover, it’s on sale this Wednesday, seek it out, buy it, and go HA HA HA.

Ty the Guy

MARVEL ARTWORK YOU’VE NEVER SEEN

In honour of the fact that I’m doing some comics illustratin’ for Marvel at the moment (no telling you what it is yet, but it’s fun, fun, fun!), I figured I’d dig through the library all this week, to find some Marvel work I’ve done, that you guys have likely NEVER seen.  I’m not talking about comics  (Spidey-Torch, Mad Dog, Avengers, Ren & Stimpy and others) but things I’ve done for their toy department, licenses, special projects and other sundry items that fill an illustrator’s time.  All Marvel, All Week!  Collect them ALL!

Up above is the cover to a Fantastic Four DVD that collected up episodes of their cartoon from the mid-nineties, I think it only came out in Europe, as I’ve never been sent a copy, nor seen a colour version of the artwork.   Nevertheless, it was my first time drawing the famous first family (professionally, I mean…I must have drawn the Thing a zillion times as a child) and it was a little disappointing that I couldn’t draw Ben in his more familiar Kirby design…but the client wanted him “on model” for the look of the series.

Next , the first of MANY X-Men video boxes I did for the animated show that ran on FOX TV in the nineties.  I was a little ticked that they threw the title card over top of Wolverine’s arm for the first one, which mucked up the image a bit in my opinion (you’ll notice I figured out to work around it on the next two…), but I couldn’t have been happier with the colours that Paul Mounts put overtop of all three.  Somewhere in the house, I have Paul’s original colour pieces for these, done in gorgeous dyes, with a real airbrush!  Oh, the labour we artists had to put in, back in the primitive 20th Century!  Paul was nice enough to trade me all the colour art for one of the black and white pieces.  Hell of a trade on my end.

As I said, I did tons of art for the X-Men series, including designing the official jackets for the cast, with a fairly cool Wolverine patch on the back (that you can see a bit of in the corner of the video boxes, that little Wolvie is from the patch).  I may not be able to find the original art for that, but worst-case-scenario, I’ll find someone to model the jacket for ya.

Doing these covers was a lovely stretching exercise for my art brain, as I was doing them at the same time as Batman Adventures stuff in the late nineties.  Some days it took a few hours to shake the Bruce Timm out of my hands, and try to channel the more illustrative look of the Marvel house style.  At first I expected they wanted me to make the covers resemble the show designs, but they insisted I do nothing of the sort, and said “Draw it in your own style”.  Something I’m not sure I have any more.  But these are close to it, I suppose.

Tune in tomorrow for some Marvel 2099 artwork you’re not expecting, a couple of Moon Knight pages you’ve never seen, and plenty more X-Men…and then on Nepotism Thursday, my wife’s first ever coloring job for Marvel…and how it nearly ended the marriage!   And yes, it was all my fault, dear.  (She’s reading this, gotta be cool, gotta be cool…)

Ty the Guy

Doing these covers was a lovely stretching exercise for my art brain, as I was doing them at the same time

Madly Mine, and now Yours.

When I first got into the funnybook business, well over sixty years ago…back in what we used to call “The Golden Age”, I had one dream and one dream only:  to someday work for Mad Magazine.  Of course, sixty years ago, Mad would have been two years in the future, but I was nothing if not precocious, and forward thinking.

So, just to show off, I’m running some of my Mad artwork on da homeblog, from time to time, and perhaps one or two of my strips from the late, lamented National Lampoon.  Today we see some more of the GREATEST COMICS OF THE DECADE covers, created for Mad’s San Diego Comic Convention promo of last year.   (I wish I could run the entire article, which was written by Evan Dorkin, but copyright issues prevent me!).   Here’s the rough work, and the final art on two more of these…

The rough was meant to look like an old Superman annual cover,  with captions suggesting how dull all of it was to see again and again.  The editor eventually opted for one image, and I wrote some cover copy to go with it.  Below is the final.

And here’s the rough work, and then final art for the X-Men cover for the same article.  I thought the casual body language of the characters sitting around the kitchen came off fairly well for so small a drawing (The originals for all of these are about eight inches tall, and the sketch itself is probably only three inches high!)  That’s probably size-as for the upload to the right.  I often find that drawing the rough sketch so tiny is the best way to make sure everything “reads” when it’s printed down at the small size in the final article.    Down below is the final, coloured version of the faux cover.  See you later with a few more of these…

Ty the Guy

Wow, I was clearly the reference for the busty babe in the Superman cover–right, honey?  Right?

Keiren

WildC.A.T.S. Adventures Redux

The cover of Issue #1, pencilled and inked by Ty Templeton

WildC.A.T.S. Adventures

From the dark and distant past, from the bowels of Ty’s studio…comes pages from WildC.A.T.S. Adventures. Yes, children, briefly–oh so briefly– in the mid90’s Ty,  that crazy Stig’s Inferno guy, was an artist at Image Comics.

The comic was to promote the cartoon from Nelvana Studios…the cartoon lasted thirteen episodes (we knew it was in trouble when not one of our 8 year old son’s friends had seen it or had an interest in it), and the comic book lasted ten issues.  Ty lasted four-ish.  Maybe it was three. This was back in the days when he could draw superheroes…but what he really wanted to do was write and be funny.

Check out the work…I don’t think the blood, sweat and tears show up on the pages, so they should be fairly hygienic.

Keiren

Next Appearance is

on Sunday at Toronto ComiCon.  Check out the details, as blogged by Kevin Boyd over at www.joeshusterawards.com.

Ty will be signing, sketching, looking at portfolios, telling tales, and accepting cold Cokes.  There will be pages for sale…I’m going to put together a pile.  If there are particular Ty pages you’re hoping to see (everyone asks for Batman covers–they’re gone, people, gone!  Ask for interior art!), drop me a line at tytempletonart@gmail.com, and I’ll see what I find hiding in his studio.

Keiren

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New Pages!

starting now…

first up, a couple more of Spidey/Torch, including a Gwen Stacey page.

A video box cover from the 90s X-Men series.

And a couple from the story Ty did for the GLXmas Special Ty did Dan Slott.  (Grasshopper–will he die or won’t he?)

And, pages from one of Ty’s favourite projects:  Mad Dog!

HOVERBOY FRIDAY

As one of the curators of the Hoverboy museum, it’s my weekly pleasure to unearth another piece of collectible fun featuring the “Floating Fighter of Crime”.  As regular readers know, Hoverboy was a somewhat popular superhero character, star of comics, radio shows and cartoons from the mid-thirties to early eighties, when, sadly, a video game inspired killing spree from one of his co-creators put an end to his fictional adventures.

This week, it’s the very rare “Nude Cover” from the seventies that briefly  inspired a weird fad wherein nudists would wear buckets on their heads, to hide both their identity and their ability to see other naked people.  Only in America, huh?

I apologize for the condition of this scan, I’ve spent years looking for a copy in better condition, but this is my personal copy (well read since I was a teenager) and I can’t seem to find a better scan anywhere online, including the Grand Comics Database, which seems to have a bias against old Hoverboy comics, perhaps because of the tragic events of 1981, and the aforementioned killing spree.

To see more, visit the online Hoverboy museum at:  www.hoverboy.com

Hoverboy Fridays!

HOVERBOY VERSUS THE DOCTOR DEATH!

The cover of a Hoverboy comic from Fall 1957.

Hoverboy Away!

New Pages

Ty spent a bit of time scanning yesterday, so I’m adding pages throughout the week.  So far, some new stuff in Batman (animated), Justice League (animated) and Spidey/Torch, all for $75.

Here’s the much-seen picture of Barack Obama in front of Superman, in Metropolis, Illinois.  This is the statue Ty did a drawing of  for the Illinois Bureau of Tourism posters; the original drawing is on the Superman page.  I’m still trying to find an image of the final poster:  the posters were bus-shelter ad sized, so we can’t scan any of our copies!