Over at the NECA website (http://www.necaonline.com/article/detail/227), you may have seen the announcement about the 4" x 6" certificate hand-signed by me that will be included with certain NECA TMNT toys. Well, today I finished signing them all... and it took about three and half hours. Here's Donatello posing with the completed pile (I think there are 500 in all):
I drew a small head sketch on each one along with my signature. As a special surprise, I did one Splinter head, one Shredder head, and a full body sketch of a Turtle on four different cards.
I shuffled them into the pile, so hopefully they will be put into the toy packages randomly. Now I'm off to ice my hand... -- PL
I drew a small head sketch on each one along with my signature. As a special surprise, I did one Splinter head, one Shredder head, and a full body sketch of a Turtle on four different cards.
That's so awesome Pete. You don't realize how much fans certainly appreciate that. Especially when you do little things like toss in special variants.
ReplyDeleteI probably won't be picking up one of the NECA sets, but I hope to someday get one of these autograph head sketches. I tried with the last TMNT comic, but alas I was too late.
I'm pleased to hear you keep doing these sort of things and maybe, just maybe someday I'll end up with one.
AWESOME! Thats about all I can say. I love your work...Hopefully the set will somehow be available online (at a price that doesn't feel like rape).
ReplyDeleteLet me ask you this, do you know if these will be inserted in to the package, or come separately? That would be unfortunate if you had to open the box to get them out...but on the plus side it would keep the surprise of which card you got.
That is really really cool!
ReplyDeleteTotal dedication!
The sketches look awesome!
"/-\ [) @ (\/) said...
ReplyDeleteAWESOME! Thats about all I can say. I love your work...Hopefully the set will somehow be available online (at a price that doesn't feel like rape).
Let me ask you this, do you know if these will be inserted in to the package, or come separately? That would be unfortunate if you had to open the box to get them out...but on the plus side it would keep the surprise of which card you got."
I am almost certain that they will be inside the package. -- PL
These are great!
ReplyDeleteI'll definitely be grabbing one of these sets at the Con. Gee, I'm gonna go so broke this year. -_-
Ooooo Cool!! I think it's cool to do the little surprises, I hope I get one of them. Either way, I'm just glad I'll have the chance to get one of the sets!
ReplyDeleteEeeek, those are so great!!! Hope your hand is OK! And I'm like Rose, I'm gonna go broke at San D! :D
ReplyDeleteVery nice indeed I love that you keep drawing More Peter I can't say enough how badly I wish you'd come back and draw TMNT again :)
ReplyDeleteI've got a question for you though and I can't remember if I asked you before, but whatever happened to the Commandosaurs series of yours? Is it something that just got lost in the shuffle when TMNT really hit it big?
What ever the case I'm very interested in this what with all the dino talk as of late.
off topics but -
ReplyDeletethought I'd share something way cool -
last night coming home from dinner we're beside a SUV with a video screen, being nosy I was trying to figure out what was the kiddos watching. At the angle i could barely make it out, looking from the side of the image but something caught my attention. Looked like some lady in a yellow jumpsuit...a moment later we moved behind the SUV....then I saw the Technodrome.
How cool is that?
Little kiddos today watching the original series and most likely the parents watched it when they were kids!
" Vaughn Michael said...
ReplyDeleteVery nice indeed I love that you keep drawing More Peter I can't say enough how badly I wish you'd come back and draw TMNT again :)
I've got a question for you though and I can't remember if I asked you before, but whatever happened to the Commandosaurs series of yours? Is it something that just got lost in the shuffle when TMNT really hit it big?
What ever the case I'm very interested in this what with all the dino talk as of late."
I just realized that I came up with the original idea for COMMANDOSAURS during an airplane flight, so it had to be at least 19 years ago. Wow.
COMMANDOSAURS has had a rocky development history. Originally, it was a toy concept created by me during the early days of the TMNT licensing success. I drew up about six or seven different characters (basically anthorpomorphic dinosaurs with guns), and showed it to Mark Freedman (our licensing agent at the time). He thought it had potential, and actually got one toy company (if memory serves, I think it was a company called Diamond Toys) interested enough to whip up several prototype sculpts and rough packaging and display them in their showroom at Toy Fair in New York. (I have an old VHS-C tape I shot of that stuff somewhere.) There wasn't enough interest from buyers, so that never went anywhere.
Shortly after that, I was discussing the COMMANDOSAURS concept with Steve Bissette (renowned dino buff and author of the comic book TYRANT), and he got interested. We collaborated on a re-think of the concept, and he brought in not only his awesome talent at drawing dinosaurs, but some cool ideas as well. We decided that we would do a comic book miniseries -- I think we were going to do four issues -- in black and white. Steve started penciling the first issue, but only completed a few pages. I can't remember exactly why, but the project lost steam and died. We ended up later doing some little mini-comics, which were fun but also went nowhere (I don't think we even tried to sell them).
Years later, I enlisted the help of Jim Lawson to redraw those minis, and I did a really limited print run of them (I think something like ten copies of each), mostly for my own amusement. Around that time I commissioned Mike Dooney to do sculpts of all of the COMMANDOSAURS with the intention of both using them as sales tools, and also to sell them as very limited edition resin model kits. Mike produced some fantastic pieces, and even arranged to have the resin kits made, but again, nothing happened. I have to take a lot of the blame for that -- for whatever reason (probably just being too busy with Turtle stuff and a certain amount of laziness), I never got around to trying to sell them. I did try my hand at putting together a packaging mock-up for one of the kits, and Craig Farley even painted some box art, but it didn't go anywhere.
So that's where it stands right now. I'd love to see them made into toys someday, but I'm not holding my breath. -- PL
What dedication!
ReplyDeleteAnd I hope I get one, as I'll be at SDCC, and will be buying the San Diego special stuff.
And by "What dedication!" I mean the three and a half hours of drawing and signing! I'd be so impatient with that kind of thing. I get impatient when doing report cards, and we've switched to online rather than the old-fashioned way of doing them by hand.
ReplyDeleteWow, those sketches are awesome! You've got a lot of dedication to do sketches on all those cards! ^_^
ReplyDelete-->> O ' F # ♥ ☻ !!
ReplyDelete//
Would we ever see a reprint of tHE COMMANDOSAUR stories ??
>v<
Could some of the commandosaur sculpts be given to playmates to use as random characters in the current toy line, similar to the alien hunters Dooney did as well?
ReplyDelete-->> Damm i like Paul's idea !!
ReplyDelete>v<
"~ tOkKa said...
ReplyDelete-->> O ' F # ♥ ☻ !!
Would we ever see a reprint of tHE COMMANDOSAUR stories ?? "
Possibly. I haven't really thought much about them in the last few years, but discussing it here makes me wonder if it might be fun to dig them out and put them into print. I will think about it more. -- PL
"Ectopaul said...
ReplyDeleteCould some of the commandosaur sculpts be given to playmates to use as random characters in the current toy line, similar to the alien hunters Dooney did as well?"
Hmm, interesting... I know that Playmates is aware of the COMMANDOSAURS -- I tried to get them interested in the property as a separate toy line years ago, but they declined. I've always tried to keep the two properties separate, but it might be worth considering. -- PL
I have a friend that is going to SDACC I hope he will be able to pick me up one of the 4 packs and the Mousers exclusive up for me. It really is great seeing you draw the turtles more and more. It would be great if you drew at least one full issue in the future. Keep up the good work Pete and keep that drawing hand iced.
ReplyDeleteI thought I was the only one that owned a VHS-C camera. I remember waiting for the Commandosaur stuff. Bissette's work is always amazing.
ReplyDelete