Pooh & Friends

Yes, more 'fanart'. Some sketches I did in December. Not planned, just suddenly had the urge to draw some Winnie the Pooh characters in a style using certain shapes. Piglet was the first drawn where this is most apparent, and I also wanted to make him look quite unlike his usual 'sweet' self. As a whole it became the Pooh characters in a varied style; not necessarily particular shapes. I'd say it's based on variations of the Disney version, but with the original A. A. Milne drawings in mind. It was a fun bit of doodling and I enjoyed colouring it, using a rough shade and highlight addition that I haven't done in a while. I find it can enhance pictures so much.

I took the line away and was pleased how Tigger looked without it, so thought it worth showing, too. I've found this with other pictures as well, they can look very nice without a line, if the colour is built up a certain way.

I had fun; I hope they're liked!

In The Vampire Hall Of Fame - Yeah!

A quick colour job on a picture I sketched out in April of last year. I am quite pleased it got left until recently, though, as now it can serve as a kind of tribute to the Cosgrove Hall co-founder Mark Hall, who died last November.

Cosgrove Hall has existed as an animation company in Manchester, England, to some extent since the late '60s when fellow art students, Brian Cosgrove and Mark Hall teamed up. To cut to the main point of my paragraph: the studio created a popular cartoon series in the '80s, entitled 'Danger Mouse' and it was from one episode that the idea for the cartoon 'Count Duckula' spawned. Unfortunately the studio started flagging in the late 1990s, and as can be guessed at with the British animation situation of the past years, it was a lot to do with lack of funds. Sadder yet, as Wikipedia moreorless explains, the down-sized company has now been absorbed into ITV.

That is just a brief account, but basically Cosgrove Hall is/was an important animation company to note in the history of British animation. Count Duckula has to be my favourite series to come out of the studio for its clever script and fun characters. If you haven't seen it, it's definitely worth it. So here is my picture of the Count; however he is acting quite unlike himself... almost like a vampire who would enjoy sucking the blood of other people! (NB: Count Duckula in the series was a vegetarian!)