justin bieber

Bwana Spoons is an artist from Portland, Oregon. His paintings (which can be viewed at his own grasshut corp ) have a style that is very recognizeable as his own. They are very organic and illustrative. I'm not sure when it happened, but Bwana moved into the world of toy production as well with figures like Steven the Bat and Edward the Gator I assume from his paintings, and then kaiju pieces produced with the help of Gargamel. Bwana has what appears to be a fantastic working relationship with Gargamel as he has released a whole series of figures with his unique coloring style including this figure, the Papastroyer, the Killer whales, Bakobas, the pet of Papa and Eriagun, and all the minis that correspond. I think there is a little story behind the series of Gargamel Hedoran colorways, which was a real drawing point for me. Each figure (except for the mini Pupstroyer) came with a print of an accompanying Bwana painting of the figure. The paintings themselves create characters out o...

A first for my new blog here... someone else's stuff! Board member meczilla on skullbrain.org (Andy Chang) posted this cool little how-to showing a light tent for taking some cool, professional style photos of your toys. I will definitely be making one of these! I will post an update when I get mine set up. Thanks, Andy! Check out some of Andy's photos on his Flickr page I've been looking into taking clean studio-style shots of my toys for a while and everything was pointing me towards a light tent setup. A Smith Victor two light kit runs about 100 bucks. When I added "DIY" to my Google search I found some very practical and extremely cheap ways to get the same effect. I used: -A compact 6.1 megapixel Nikon S1 point-and-shoot camera. - Mini tripod (10 bucks) - You could use a stack of books or boxes too but you'll be restricted to 90 degree angle shots. - A banker's box (Free) - Cut windows out of the sides and top. Cut all the way to the back of the box...

Since I reviewed my new Bemon and drew the BIG BATTEL scene between the Bemon and his arch-nemesis the Gas Bawer (in my mind anyway), I decided to finally review the Bawer figure. I picked up this figure from Super7 a few months ago on a whim and it has remained a focal part of my rapidly changing collection. Like the Bemon, the Gas Bawer is shrouded in mystery for me, as I honestly know very little about him. With the Bemon at least I have some background though the old Smogun header. But as far as I know, the Gas Bawer's only background is that he is a relatively new character created from scratch. It has been speculated that the figure was designed by the same person that designed the Bemon figure, and evidently the Gas Bawer was sold in the same Japanese shop. I would like to verify this! What draws me to him like the others is the pollution aspect. What makes the Gas Bawer unique is that where essentially all pollution themed kaiju are what appear to be mobile piles of sludge,...

I spent way too long on this. I draw like I read... ssssslllllllloooooowwwwwllllllyyyyyyyyyyy

Well, you've seen a few of my drawings of him and he has starred in my fantastic Celga story, so I figure it's time to write about the figure itself. I don't know a lot of the background of this guy, although from what I  have read the figure is actually called KOUGAI KAIJU (something like Pollution Monster... how original) and that the company that maes him is called Bemon. I think Bemon is a bit easier, so until I find something else by the company, I will stick with it. I have had to just piece together information from old message board posts, but I am trying to learn more. This figure is known for its super low production numbers (often 30 or less figures per run) and super crazy paint schemes. Many of the first runs of these were handpainted. With the free flowing sculpt and hand applied paint (that evidently would often be clumpy and textured), the Bemon Pollution Monster has a great do-it-yourself feel and sort of a punk rock feel.  You can see some photos below...

Now this is a figure I didn't see myself ever coming across. Fortunately I came across the right message board thread at the right time, which allowed me to zip over to eBay and pick this monstrosity up. What a blend of kaiju goodness it is! Gogamejiras is a monster from a short series of animations on AnrakuAnsaku's website. I am not positive of the background of the character really, but the animations are pretty funny. He has elements of Godzilla with his overall lizard appearance, Gamera in that his feet fold up into rockets to boost him through the air, and an ugli fruit. Goga seems like a real asshole in them as he just knocks down buildings, blows shit up and covers a man in a giant loogie missile at one point. You can see the animations at the following address: http://www.anrakuansaku.com/gogameji.htm [EDIT: As of June, 2008, this link seems to be broken. I'm not sure if the Anraku site will be coming back online, but I will leave my links to it here just in case i...

Buffaloman is a character from the Kinnikuman series who, like many villains in the series, started off quite evil and ended up being good. In America as part of the M.U.S.C.L.E. line, Buffaloman was one of only two named figures... Terribull. He was the leader of the Cosmic Crunchers I believe and a version of him came with the little joystick-style wrestling ring. In Japan, Buffaloman was first introduced as the leader of the Seven Devil Choujin. He had some pretty cool cohorts such as: -Atlantis, a fish man who was awesome fighting under water -Springman, literally a giant spring man who would coil himself around opponents to crush them to pieces -SteCasse King, a walking tape player who used sound waves to harm opponents -Black Hole, a man with a giant hole in for a face who could swallow others into an alternate dimension -Mr. Kamen, an Egyptian-themed fighter who would mummify his foes and drink their innards with a giant straw -The Mountain, literally a giant rock who would ...