PAINTED PROTOTYPE - Batman DCAU for Diamond Select Toys
Painted prototype of Batman TAS L3D for DST/Gentle Giant.
This was a fun project, and I really liked working on this line. Unfortunately DST no longer has the DC license, so after this run of Batman, Joker, Wonderwoman, and Harley Quinn, no more will be made. But licenses come and go, and I don't doubt that one day in the future this line will be continued again.
I tried to copy the art style of the original Batman TAS cartoon. The show was notorious for it's beautiful backgrounds, made from pastel on black paper, with the stark lines of cel-shaded characters. It also had that distinct look you get with old cartoons, where colors tend to have different colored edges. I think that's from how they hand painted the cel's back in the day.
So I did the base in the pastel shaded look of the backgrounds, the cape with the stark linework, and added some of that soft shading into the suit. I added a little more color into his skin tone, just because it was looking a little boring, which was inspired by some TAS concept art I had been given as reference. It may look like a lighting effect, but it's gentle airbrushing on the sides of his face. I don't think they kept it in production, which is understandable.
Overall I think the factories did a really good job with the production run, and this remains a bright memory of my work at DST.
Close up of base. It's design was based off the batcave matte paintings for the show, I tried to incorporate the colors from the computer and the lighting on the cave walls and floor.
Close up of cape. Here I copied the clean cel shading they'd use on the character. The art direction is usually just, "make it look cool", so it was up to my judgement how to paint the blue design.
Close up of face. I don't think they kept it in production, but I added slight differences in color in his face, particularly to emphasize the side angles. The idea came from the concept art, and I wanted to add some dimension.
Close up of chest.