Holy Something Something, Batman

What if Batman, Scott Pilgrim, a basketball player and a bear started a band? THIS IS WHAT.

This is a commission I drew a little while ago - see, the "draw whatever you want" offer wasn't just talk! Huge thanks to Tim Sismey who commissioned this and gave me the opportunity to draw such a randomly awesome thing, and for giving me permission to repost it here. And a belated happy birthday to Tim's friend Chris, the b-ballin' recipient/star of this piece himself.

I think I might take the commission offer down from my shop soon, as I've got a ton of work on at the moment and am pretty much at full capacity. Aargh, but on the other hand, I do like getting paid money to draw stupid awesome things. Tell you what, I'll leave it up there for another week or two, and then that's that. Get in quick if you want one!

/shill

B is for... Blanka and Batman Blissfully Bicycling through Beautiful Blossoms

Here is today's picture in the A-Z of Awesome Japan!

• Blanka is a character from Capcom's popular videogame fighting series Street Fighter.
  
• Batman is a masked vigilante crimefighter character created by Bob Kane and published by DC Comics. In 1966, he was the star of a series of manga produced by Jiro Kuwata to tie in with the launch of the Adam West Batman TV series. You can read more about that here. And also here.
  

Today's picture was a combination of a couple of suggestions from KDBryan on twitter. Only I threw in Batman. Because I wanted to draw Batman. I hope KDBryan does not have a problem with this.

(I think Batman is my yardstick for including western characters in this A-Z; where a character has appeared in a Japanese-orginated version, where they are are sufficiently popular in Japan or generally seem to be part of the Japanese pop-cultural universe, then they are fair game for inclusion. I realise this is not very precise, and I am by no means an authority on these things, but it seems like a good rule of thumb to me.)

'C's picture coming on Monday! If you would like to suggest a topic for future letters, you can do so via Facebook, Twitter, or right here in the comments on this blog. And you can of course sponsor me at my JustGiving page - all proceeds to the Japan Earthquake & Tsunami Relief Fund.

Batman VS Carrots

Here is another recent commission - this time of the Caped Crusader himself, harvesting carrots. Drawn for a customer of great taste and discretion, who apparently likes Batman, and gardening.

A companion piece depicted Spider-Man, knitting a nice scarf. I think this is a fine way to come up with a subject for commissions. Want a piece of original artwork, but not sure what the subject should be? Use this simple formula:

Your Favourite Superhero

+

A Hobby That You Enjoy

=

A Drawing That Would
Totally Be Awesome On Your Wall

By this reasoning, if I was ever to order a commission from myself, it would be of... hmmm. Kitty Pryde from the X-Men... watching Masterchef while eating yoghurt? Yes, that sounds about right. And now I think I need to draw that.