Category: Character Sketches

Seeing how I was on a creative streak with these characters back in the day, I wanted to make a villain team as well to do battle with my heroes.

The yellow character was the main leader, Metal Man, who was pretty much an evil robot. Going clockwise: Glass Girl, Acid Man, Plastic Woman, Paint Woman, Cement Man, Steel Man, and Digital Man.

I can’t let have Rosco have all the fun. Conroy here is just as theatrical as Rosco in the emotion department. This is straight from my sketchbook, so I really had no need to label what emotion he was portraying. Hopefully they are obvious to the common eye.

Here’s my official model sheet for Globber-Man. The great thing about these are that once you show them to others, they see and understand how you draw characters in your specific style.

Globber Man started out simply as this, a green glob blob with two eyes, a stubby nose, and 2 form-able two boxing glove type hands.

Globber Man’s personality was the typical eager young hero wanting to see where his life would take him. Since he was made out of whatever glob was, he wondered if he would ever be a part of the Elemental Agents and thought of himself as an outsider. The time came for him to prove that his element was a practical one, and with that, saved the day and became a full fledged member of the Elemental Agents.

As the series got a bit more flushed out, I came up with a grounded philosophy for my little characters. I thought, “Well, this doesn’t make him much of a man.” So I came up with the idea of having him have 2 forms. A simple travel size form, and a powered up humanized form.

When in this “up-graded” form, he would be known as the true Globber Man. While in this form, he gained new abilities, but would have to sacrifice some old ones. As his “Man” form he advanced his fighting techniques with stronger arms (which are now amply loaded with blob globs to shoot from), and spawned some powerful legs enabling him to be more agile and acrobatic. He is still able to stretch in ways, but in this form he loses his defensive ability of turning into an unstoppable ball.

Here’s a character from the MatTOON archives: Globber Man! (The little green dude at the top) and the rest of the Element Agents.

Rosco is a scarecrow of many emotions. He’s one of the few characters I have that has the simplest head design most expressive faces.

Rosco is a scarecrow who hates his job. He has greater ambitions for a better career, but he can’t come to the reality that he is and always will be, a scarecrow, (or Aves Fright Engineer as he likes to professionally call it). As a scarecrow, you may assume that he doesn’t have a brain, but he does. AN EVIL ONE! This is one scarecrow that knows what it takes to get the job done. He’s persistent in his scaring tactics and is hard to loose in a chase. Shovels, rakes, mallets, bats and any other tool he can get his hands on are his last resort to “shoo” away birds. He sometimes carries a shotgun with him in case things get out of hand, proving that he his the perfect foil for Conroy. In general, Rosco is strict, low, mean, and devilish that will stop at nothing to make sure his employee’s gardens are pest free. All ordinary crows fear his name.

I wanted to have him look very ragtag. Straw hat, patched jacket and pants, both of which used of course, and a face that reminds you of a jack o lantern. As a scarecrow, he has no organs or bones whatso ever, so I can really do anything to him regarding slapstick and physical humor. He’s designed from the simple idea of a hobo and an evil version of the Scarecrow from Wizard of Oz.

Conroy can be defined as “the bravest crow in these here parts”. For a country bumpkin, he has a high IQ in street smarts that enable him to get out of any jam and predicament with ease. He’s very resourceful and will use his surroundings to enhance his chances of victory. When pushed, this bird pushes back harder in order to show that his small size is nothing to mock. Conroy is a tough little guy with a big heart of gold.

Conroy was a lot of fun to come up with. I did a lot of research on crows and quite frankly, crows are the perfect animals to make into cartoons. Here’s some fun crow facts that helped me conjure up this cartoon crow:

– Crows and Ravens are the smartest of all birds.

-They have a great memory. In fact, they might be the only birds that know how to count.

-Love corn, but will eat anything.

-They are accused for eating crops, but in some cases, they just eat the insects, ergo saving the crops!

-A flock of crows are called a ‘Gang’ or a ‘Mob’

-Very brave! They will face other birds bigger than them if needed (Owls and Hawks)

-Very resourceful. Crows have grown accustomed to our human environment.

-Crows live in tight families. Often they will band together and help each other steal food from larger stronger birds, whether they are in the same ‘Gang’ or not.

As a lad, I played outside a lot. A typical weekend afternoon adventure consisted of riding my mountain bike down the dirt country roads. Living around corn fields may not sound like a blast, but I always tried to make a game out of what I had. I believe that’s when the inspiration hit me.

I noticed a scarecrow, in the guardian of the field. I also noticed a crow, standing there at the scarecrow’s feet, eating a fallen ear of corn, somehow immune to the scarecrow’s power of fright. It made me laugh. This must have been the bravest crow I had ever seen. Other crows were in the safety of the high powerlines, looking down at this crow as if he was on a suicide mission. The whole situation was quite funny in my eyes as well as ironic. I knew at some point I would have to draw a cartoon series that was, in fact, a true story.

I had always enjoyed watching Looney Tunes as a kid, and still do today. It was great comedic writing, comedic timing, colorful stories, and above all, memorable characters that made the experience of watching them all worth while. In a way, Conroy and Rosco is my strict dedication and homage to the great era in motion picture entertainment.

In the eyes of some art experts, the animation and cartoon field is very remedial. By today’s standards, a doodle of a character experiencing weird, uncommon situations (Spongebob, Chowder, Misadventures of Flapjack) or mature, low brow spoofs (Simpsons, Family Guy, South Park) can pass as entertainment. This cartoon is for those who will enjoy a good laugh through classic physical slap stick comedy, not for those who theorize the intentions of the tortured artist.

The art of the anvil, TNT, laws of physics, inter dimensional black novelty holes, and shot guns that only leave one’s face stained with gun powder are not dead in this cartoon series!