12.31.2008

Instant Sarvos


Big thanks go out to our friend and super talented artist Vince Chui for creating this cool rendition of Sarvos. Vince recorded his process and put together a very cool video of it. It reminds us of a sci-fi Bob Ross... with less afro. Awesome work Vince!

12.23.2008

The Nibbler

Check out this insane custom sent over to us by the infamous Tarantulas of the UK. With 6 access points and a nasty appetite, "The Nibbler" has come to take a chunk out of the Glyos System! Take a look at what The Tarantulas has to say about his latest creation below.

Facts & Illustration Backstory

The Nibbler
Age - Approx 7000
Physical Strength - 3
Special Powers - 9
Weapons - 7

In the abstraction of galactic consciousness the diminutive, gnawing Nibbler increases his physical size a million fold to snack on spicy planetary systems.

Exploiting the infinite potential of thought, mysterious cosmic traveller Pheyden uses the same trick but instead duplicates his material form a million times. Bloated by over indulgence, the Nibbler is overwhelmed by the swarming collective of Pheyden and shrivels to normal size...

Nibbler Rational

If I was to create one new piece for the Glyos system I wanted it to be versatile & have more than one use.. Plus I was into torso-head type characters like Modok and Arnim Zola. I'd noticed that the features of a torso - chest & abdominal muscles could easily represent a face - this was the starting point. The sculpt hopefully works both as the Nibblers head & also as a beefy torso for any Glyos figure, hence double arm holes and a hole in the top of his head. As a companion to the figure I created an artwork showing Pheyden battling the Nibbler.. Since Jack Kirby is both creator of aforementioned 'torso-heads' and a continuing inspiration, I aped his style for the piece.

The Tarantulas

Toward the end of a decade plus at Hasbro I started working as The Tarantulas - now like many others I'm balancing art projects with corporate freelance work. Its a familiar situation but the projects I'm working on currently - from commercial toy work to TV formats to sculpture - are so diverse I feel like I need to focus ! Since leaving Hasbro I've tended to prefer working in 2D - a reaction to designing 3D for so long..but I've recently started playing around with sculpting (thanks to Matt ) so I'm having fun with that. My work is influenced by a lot of the same stuff as everyone else.. Star Wars, Jack Kirby, EC Comics and so many people around today. I think a lot of us are trying to find our own style & shrug off the influence of the 80's. Next for the Tarantulas? More sculpting - hopefully more toy releases & some cash so I can move out again!

Huge thanks to The Tarantulas for sending over such a cool character with so much thought put into the design and execution. We're humbled to have this little guy sitting on our desk.


12.18.2008

Cypser Greetings

Big thanks to Will Cypser for this great Holiday Card.

12.17.2008

In the Air and On the Road

Our friend, JediCreeper, recently took a trip out to Disneyland in California and then Hawaii. While on this great excursion he managed to take some very cool pictures of Dimension Pheyden and Spirico Exellis! We have all been looking at these shots for the past week and wanted to share them with you guys. The Hawaii shots in particular are really wild looking. It actually looks like some of the sets we build over here. Great job on these Mr. Creeper, we really appreciate you taking the time to do this!

11.18.2008

The Junk Shop

This should be kind of a fun option for building up piles of parts. Over the past year and a bit we have been through all kinds of crazy toy producing experiences with the Glyos line. The first figures we had produced showed up covered in nasty, sloppy paint and we had to hand clean thousands of them. It truly sucked. The second round was much better, but still had some paint adhesion issues. So again, we cleaned and fixed everything we sent out to you guys. This is the major reason for long lags in getting orders out. The last few batches got even better, but STILL were not dead on. It took me traveling to China and actually working with the factory -on the assembly line- to finally get things right. The upcoming Buildman (believe it or not he really is almost here) is geared to be our best figure yet. The point of this entry is to bring attention to something new we want to try. As we continue to try to bring the quality even higher and the price even lower, we want to offer everyone a chance at the rather significant pile of figures that did not quite cut the mustard as far as paint and finish go. I call these misfit figures the orphans of the Glyos System. All the parts are totally functional and molded great, they just have kind of uneven final paint syndrome (like when a GI Joe has bad eye paint, but not as overall rough looking as the new Indy figures). Offering these figures at a big discount will make it easier to amass extra building parts at a lower cost. Since part of the Glyos fun is customizing and eventually building bigger stuff, grabbing parts for as cheap as possible is key. Check out the Junk Shop and let us know what you think. All the figures will ship in totally random configurations, but rest assured that every so often something "non junky" will slip into the mix when these little misfits make their way to your homes. Thanks as always to everyone for making this project worth absolutely every long night, we really appreciate the chance to do this together with all of you.


11.12.2008

Craymation


This one's for you, Bryan.

Crayboth Assault II

In the spirit of the upcoming holidays, we have lowered the cost of each Crayboth pack to $6. Thanks to all of our friends for their awesome support and continued interest in our crazy projects.

11.10.2008

Crayboth Assault

Building your army just got a little easier... check the store.

11.08.2008

10.28.2008

MechaSucker

The Sucklord is up to his old tricks and has assembled an arsenal of artists to customize his insane vinyl figure, the Sucklord 600. We turned our version in late, but added some extra juice to bring Sucklord into the Glyos System. Jesse did a killer job on the card art and really brought the whole set together. If you are in the Los Angeles area, go check out what is sure be an awesome show at Munky King on October 30th. Big thanks to the Sucklord!!!

10.11.2008

Warp In

New figures have been added to the store, including the long awaited Sarvos, along with the Craywave colorways. Special Edition versions of the latest figures just might be in a certain area to the right of the screen. Search around for some extra treats. The Wave 5 colorways will be popping up for individual purchase in the store early next week. Working hard to get Buildman and the rest of the new stuff ready to go as fast as possible. Huge thanks to everybody for their patience and support!

10.10.2008

Sarvos is coming...


New stuff will be popping up today and throughout the weekend...

10.08.2008

The Odyssey

It has been a while....Well over the last month and a half tons of things have been going on. We had a new addition to the house with the birth of our second daughter, Cirie Alice Doughty, and I went on a trip to China, Hong Kong and Japan. Sorry for such a spell of silence, but it has taken longer than I had anticipated to get back in the groove. While in China I visited the factories that make the Glyos figures and Beantown Toys. It was wild to see the process first hand. I actually worked on the assembly line while the new Sarvos figures were put together. Working with the factory's QC team was great, a bunch of production problems got solved from just meeting in person. The latest figures that we just had made are by far the best to come straight from the factory. I actually don't have to fix anything on them (which is a first). A Typhoon hit while I was in Hong Kong and I got sick as hell during it. I was on the 25th floor of a hotel in Kowloon in the middle of an insane Typhoon, alone and ill out of my mind. To top that little section of the adventure off, one of the bay windows in the room BLEW OUT and was hanging by a tiny support arm, causing a freaking vortex in the room. It was awesome. And it sucked.

The Japan leg of the journey was absolutely glorious. Massive thanks to Don "Datadub" Kratzer for putting me up and literally being the best damn host in history. Don, I owe you a million. The insanely talented LAMOUR Supreme was also docked at Don's and the three of us went on a toy expedition that was ridiculously mind blowing. We also managed to release the first part of the Shadow Set during our time in Japan. Built a small set and took a series of pics in Don's backyard to chronicle the toys while we were at it. Got to meet a lot of vinyl heroes as well. Mori from Real Head was an incredibly generous person, with his time and his attention- not to mention his amazing toys. The Gargamel and Super 7 crew threw a great party at the Thrash Out Store with tons of US collectors crashing the show. So much activity in such a small time frame, it wiped me out. I'll put up some small blips of info and pics detailing the whole trip over the next few weeks. I'm glad to be back.

Me working the assembly line at the factory in China.

The steel tool mold for Buildman.

The factory at work.

Pile O' Pelvis...

...and feet.

L'amour doing his thing.

L'amour and Mori from Real Head.

Mori, Don and L'amour.

Quick backdrop for Japan shoot.