My entry for the secondary "Play-At-Home" cover contest being held by and over at the IDW boards. The PAH entrants got to choose their Spotlight character from three different assignments, rather than having the assignment given to us in secret.

Honestly, I chose Chip Chase's ( [link] ) cover almost immediately. I really think he's a truly under-appreciated character, and i wanted to try and give him some love. Little did I know how much hell I'd be putting myself through with the setting given in the assignment >_>

I am referring, of course, to the Eiffel Tower.

Speaking as a critic and editor, my perspective past the base of the tower is way off. I didn't narrow enough as it got closer to the top of the page, which is something I really didn't notice until after I was done. I drew the entire thing in Photoshop Elements 3 with my tablet, so I did a LOT of zooming in and basically screwed myself on the perspective from the get-go. Add to this that the upper portion of the tower just looks really sloppy.

I'm kicking myself now, but without a scanner available I didn't have much choice if I wanted to enter.

As far as Astrotrain (or as called him, "Standy-bot") is concerned, I was supposed to keep him as close to the style of the animation model of the original cartoon as possible, but I just couldn't take trying to draw him with Sunbow's famous "we are made of rubber" look they gave to the cartoon bots. So, as a compromise, I gave him a few minor modifications and *GASP* working joints in his elbows, knees, shoulders, and thighs/hips. He's a little stiff and not very dynamic, but in the end I still like how he turned out. After the fact, I can see a few more things I could've done to make him MUCH cooler.

I sort of cheated with Blitzwing (the jet). I tried and tried, but I could not make Blitzwing's robot mode look convincing. Again, I have a few ideas after it's too late. D'oh!

And now we come to my favorite part: Chip! Holy cow, I love this kid so much XD At first, every idea that came to me involved Chip dangling from girders/Decepticon hands or trying to crawl away (made more difficult by dead legs), but in the end I decided Chip needed to live up to his (oft-mocked) motto: "Nobody's ever really disabled as long as they have courage!" So, usually-show-in-peril Chip Chase became an image of determination, and aside from some distortion due to Photoshop Elements 3's shitty layer-resizing I am VERY proud of how he turned out. That wheelchair was a pain in the ass and I missed a few details here and there, but the combination of chair and occupant just ended up looking great to me. I don't care if I sound arrogant or anything like that, I totally kicked ass at drawing Chip Chase XD

I'm still not sure how voting and the like will turn out, but like last round I don't care much if i win anything or not at this point. I'm improving my skillz, meeting new people, and having a great time.

"COURAGE!"

Chip Chase, Astrotrain, & Blitzwing © Hasbro/Takara
Artwork © Sarabeth Collins, 2008