Snaked

Snaked is a new series coming from IDW at the end of the year, very cool stuff by Cliff Meth and Rufus Dayglo. Im doing the covers but dont let that turn you away !

ZRA

Zombies v Robots v Amazons will be out soon, see attached frontis piece from issue 1. Yes, I like to leave the whiteout and shit, I think it has more character an interest etc. Imperfection is radically more interesting than slick perfection !!!.

A painting

HALO 3 !

Halo 3 is released today, awesome game !!!

I was lucky to be part of the legend in a very small way, one of them is the art on the back of the controller scheme poster.

Back Home

And back to art !

Thanks to everyone who checked out the blog over the last few days, I'm glad I don't pay for Blogger bandwidth !

Medicom

A trip to Japan is not complete without a visit to our good friends at Medicom. Ash spent some time with the of the owners and producers at Medicom yesterday and took some pictures of their office interior, a veritable wonderland for fans of Medicom Toys. We ourselves have been huge Medicom fans for many years and we will definitely be working with them again in the near future.

Thank You

We would just like to say a quick thank you to the overwhelming response to this blog over the last couple of days. We've had an incredible amount of hits and our URL has been included on nearly every major gaming site with links to MGS.

For those of you who are MGS fans and have visited for the first time and have maybe yet to subscribe, we encourage you to do so. For more info you can also check out Hideo Kojima's own blog and Ryan Patons's Team Kojima pod casts.

MGS4 Booklet

Ash has several copies of the MGS4 booklet which is not widely available outside of TGS. He has indicated that he may give his extra copies away to MGS fans who read this blog, stay tuned.

Daily Sketches Ash, Tokyo Sketchbook

Finished Sketch Shinkawa-San

Jamming with Shinkawa-San

Ash caught up with Shinkawa-San in the bar last night while waiting for dinner. What followed was an east/west jam session, both artists carry their sketchbooks wherever they go. Ash always says that Shinkawa-San is inspirational to watch sketch and draw and was blown away to have a Shinkawa-San edition to his sketchbook. The following photos are the results of a sketchbook and pen swap that took place, they both use different kinds of pens and paper and so they decided to try each others preferred materials out.

The first 3 photos from top to bottom are of Shinkawa-San sketching in Ash's book. The last photo is of the sketch Ash made in Shinkawa San's book.

The Inner Sanctum - Team Kojima

From left to right: Kojima-San (creator of MGS and living legend), Sato-San (General Manager European Div for Konami Japan), Shinkawa-San (amazing artist and visionary) and Ken-San (MGS4 Producer). This photo was taken at dinner where the crew celebrated in style over a long conversation, plates heaped with fine food and bottles of Dom Perignon.

Meet the Fellas

The following pic is of Ryan Payton, (the western face of Team Kojima) and Okamura-san (Producer for Konami Japan and one of the classics!) Okamura-san brought you MPO (one of many productions he's worked on) and Ryan Payton (who also worked on MPO) is widely known for his Team Kojima Pod Casts.

JEA

Meet the best agents in Japan. Rick and Yumiko from JEA in Tokyo. (Nay in the World!) We pride ourselves on working with only the best people. It takes a team to make this kind of magic.

The second photo here was taken backstage after appearing on stage with Kojima-San.

Halo 3 Sneak Peek

A Busy Day at TGS

Here are some random snaps of the Tokyo Game Show taken Thursday 20/09

The show floor photo should give you all some idea of the scope and size of some of the multimedia displays on view.

We have no idea what the fuzzy things on the stage are but they looked interesting.

Konami Update

Ash appeared on stage today at the TGS with Hideo Kojima and the pair discussed working on MPO 2 together.

Also in other Konami news, for those of you who are going to be purchasing the MGS DGN (digital graphic novel) #2, I am told with some certainty that it will come bundled with MGS DGN #1 (complete with voice acting). This is really good news as many people email us every week asking where they can purchase #1 as it is rather hard to find due to strong sales.

Here is the link to the Team Kojima site if you haven't already checked it out:

http://www.konami.jp/kojima_pro/event2007/

More photos and news to come soon - including Konami related pics.

And we're off...

Hotel lobby at the Ritz...

Gearing up for a big day in Tokyo!

Here is the view from Ash's hotel window. Today he will hit the floor at the Tokyo Gameshow for the first time. All the guests are readying themselves for a huge day. More photos and updates coming soon...

Come Fly With Me...

Yup started out at 4:30 am this morning, it was dark, cold, there were no taxis to speak of and so we drove, downhill all the way to the airport, successfully negotiated three consecutive police speed traps and made it to the plane on time... or did we? The smaller flight was a-okay. The larger Tokyo bound plane was an unexpected one and half hours late. The delay prompted
Ash to consider that he might have been travelling a little too much lately as he had already read all of the half decent magazines currently on sale from cover to cover.

The photo is a view from out the window of the international terminal.

TGS blog starts here!

The Tokyo Game Show is nearly underway. We will start blogging the experience with photos, updates, text and sketchbooks from tomorrow onwards. Ash started a new sketchbook for the occassion and here is the first page.

Update : Album, Paris signing.

The signing at Album in Paris has been changed from it's original date and will now take place one day earlier on the 20th of November. Don't forget.

OH YEA!

Some have asked, where is the start of the painting, well here is how I started, I prelim in my handy dandy prelim book, then a really loose marker jobby on board, then see my first post today... Well there was stage that I was just blocking in color, but the photo sucked.....

And more...

This is where I got to today... Onto some glazing tomorrow ...

Team Zombie French Invasion

We're happy to announce that Chris Ryall is now joining the crew for our November French invasion!
Yes, the Eisner losing team of Ryall and Wood are set to unleash their signing (and sketching) hands at Valenciennes France on the 18th and 19th of November.

Now we have looked this place up and it's within driving distance of a lot of major jumping off points for both fans and francophiles alike from the UK. So if you're a fan from the UK and you feel like paying the crew a visit and behaving like a complete Le Ros Bif! for the weekend - start planning now!

For those of you who are too posh to leave Paris - please come and see Ash, Chris Ryall, Ben Templesmith and all the crew at Album in Paris. The signing starts at 3pm on the 21st of November.

For more information log onto: http://omega5.skyrock.com/

Bambaland

Bambaland is currently closed and not accepting new orders for the time being. The shop is still up on the domain but is temporarily on holiday as we are about to undergo a major re-fit. We will be coming back shortly with a whole slew of new and exciting stock, so stay tuned. New stock will include prints, new T-Shirts and new publications, we're also switching to a new e-fulfillment company for faster (and cheaper) shipping.

it continues..

Myabe you can see the change...slowy getting there...

An new painting started

The start of a new ZvRvA cover...

The Twang

Ahhhh, thanks to a kind chap who pointed me in the direction of the band "The Twang", cool stuff if you dig some Manchester sound with added spice circa 87-90. I dig it...

Cat-Rabbit Part 2

Due to the overwhelming interest in the Cat-Rabbit we posted on this blog a few weeks ago we have decided to post further contact details for it's creator Catherine, (Queen of all Cat-Rabbits), if you would like to commission your own Cat-Rabbit you can contact the artist at: cat.rabbit.is.fun@gmail.com

All of the Cat-Rabbits are meticulously handmade and they're addictive once you start collecting them. Cat-Rabbits are also available from Pocket Space, a really cool designer toy store in Hobart, Tasmania, they can be contacted at pocketspace@bigpond.com

We're expanding:)

Thank you for all the well wishes we have already received. Ash and I are proud to officially announce that we are expecting a new bamba-baby in early 2008!

Tokyo Game Show

Stay tuned to this blog throughout next week as from Wednesday onwards we will be blogging from the Tokyo Game Show. Ash is scheduled to appear live on stage at TGS with MGS maestro Hideo Kojima on the 20th of September and readers of this blog will get to hear about all the goings on, complete with pics of the trip as we go. In tribute to Kojima-San and his food photo antics, Ash promises to take a pic of at least one meal to post right here for you all to see, (the excitement never ends!). No doubt Ash'll also post some fabulous pics of the vibrant city of Tokyo as well. Be prepared to view a shopping list of cool stuff along the way.

A spread

From "The Sallylanders"

A painting

I did tonight...

A drawing

I did today...

Prelims etc

A Blog viewer asked if I kept a sketchbook etc, the only sketchbook type thing I keep is a painting sketchbook, I try and do a quick painting in it everyday. You will notice my homage to mike mcmahon in the top left of the image. Mcmahon is absolutely one of the greatest comic artists ever, EVER. I personally have a great fondness for his series Muto Maniacs, it was in the first 6-7 issues of Toxic. I look at the artwork and still marvel at the composition and design.... Im in awe....

Zombies v Robots v Amazons

A cover for ZRA I started yesterday. oil on board, 18"x 28".