rascal_father
15-06-2005, 08:51 AM
Move over, Robots In Disguise.
Renowned comic artist Ashley Wood (Uncanny X-Men, Metal Gear Solid, Spawn, Automatic Kafka, PopBot, Lore) and HyperChild’s Casey Lau are set to officially launch WBR: World’s Best Robots, a new line of comics/graphic novels (to be published by IDW Publishing), and deluxe edition statues at the San Diego Comic-Con next month.
http://www.newsarama.com/IDW/WBR/1web.jpg
WBR will be the first in a series of artist-driven limited edition products from HyperChild following on the success of The Deviants and Garbage Robots. “WBR is basically a Robot factory that manufactures robots to handle different situations,” Ashley Wood explained. “So it’s not me saying, these are the world’s best robots and such. It’s the name of the factory. It orbits [the] earth and [is] run by 100 female engineers and one male mechanic. Robots such as Brambleton, Leon, The Square, BambaLad, Kid Rex and others, it will all be revealed in the books and toys. They make the world’s best robots!
http://www.newsarama.com/IDW/WBR/bramblt_beta_low.jpg
“My role in the production of these is pretty much everything, bar the sculpting, but I did get to tweak them at the final stages. So, I pretty much design everything, from start to end, with help in various ways from Casey concerning the production of the WBR.
http://www.newsarama.com/IDW/WBR/wbr_book13.jpg
“I hope to achieve a cast of cool toys and some fun books that make me happy, and if anyone else enjoys them, well that’s a bonus.”
Wood and HyperChild’s Casey Lau are longtime friends. They had earlier met at the San Diego Comic-Con way back in 1998. “Ashley and I have known each other for a long time and we have always wanted to work together,” Lau recalled. “I started HyperChild in 2001 as a creative imaginarium – a place where we’d dream up new ideas as well as do products and all kinds of neat stuff, you may have heard of The Deviants which is our first project and we launched that in 2003 and have been working on an animation deal and get lots of emails to do more products with the characters which we will. Our background in comics, animation and licensed products pretty much pulled us full circle into this and for 2005 and into 2006, we are really getting aggressive with what we want to do and a lot of the new stuff will be announced soon.”
http://www.newsarama.com/IDW/WBR/brambly_back_box.jpg
Ashley Wood: “I love robots and sci-fi, can’t get enough [of them] really. Industrial design, old metal, the movies Silent Running, Forbidden Planet, Darkstar, great ideas and model kits like Mashcinen Krieger. My childhood dreams… mmm… well, they’re pretty much the same today. I was thinking how cool it would be to make a line of oversized, heavy bulky robots. Then I had an idea for a story and it pretty much went from there.”
While the artist is known for his work in comics, designing and creating toys is not something foreign to him. “When I worked for Todd McFarlane, a lot of the time spent was around the toys. I helped in the design of some, and some were made from my artwork. I think this helped forge a love for the production of toys and the making of them. I worked on Hasbro toy lines early in my career. I also designed with Sideshow Collectibles the PopBot statue and [the] upcoming Lady Sham statue and I’m working with MediCom Toys on some exclusive products that they will announce shortly. So yeah, I have spent some time with toy making over the years.”
The current plan is to release a new WBR every quarter, with the figures and the books. “You’ll be getting a new kind of experience – it’s a collector’s piece, it’s an art piece and it’s a story piece all rolled into one,” Lau said. “I think that the way we’ve set this up is that it’s an experience in a box. Ashley’s artwork will transport you to the world of the WBR and the statue will keep the world in your mind as you gaze at it on your desk or bookshelf or wherever. I feel I’m in a bit of a dream when I look at Ash’s paintings so this is the effect I want to introduce to collectors of this product.
“You will discover each robot individually through the product and through the graphic novels and online where the experience will be deepened.
“We’re debuting them at the San Diego Comic-Con and then will have them available through Diamond and Marz and other hobby and specialty locations – and we’ll also have them online through our e-commerce website where we will have a bunch of Ashley’s WBR art and special edition figures available.”
“I plan, with Casey, to keep releasing the robots, basically until we can’t,” Wood added. “I want to create a large selection, we have many ideas. I want to release single books, one-shots, graphic novels, call them what you will. I have a very cool writer from the animation world lined up. I want them to be special. There will be 8"x8" books with each toy, with a back story to help flesh out the history of the robots.”
credits to Newsarama for article and pictures
Renowned comic artist Ashley Wood (Uncanny X-Men, Metal Gear Solid, Spawn, Automatic Kafka, PopBot, Lore) and HyperChild’s Casey Lau are set to officially launch WBR: World’s Best Robots, a new line of comics/graphic novels (to be published by IDW Publishing), and deluxe edition statues at the San Diego Comic-Con next month.
http://www.newsarama.com/IDW/WBR/1web.jpg
WBR will be the first in a series of artist-driven limited edition products from HyperChild following on the success of The Deviants and Garbage Robots. “WBR is basically a Robot factory that manufactures robots to handle different situations,” Ashley Wood explained. “So it’s not me saying, these are the world’s best robots and such. It’s the name of the factory. It orbits [the] earth and [is] run by 100 female engineers and one male mechanic. Robots such as Brambleton, Leon, The Square, BambaLad, Kid Rex and others, it will all be revealed in the books and toys. They make the world’s best robots!
http://www.newsarama.com/IDW/WBR/bramblt_beta_low.jpg
“My role in the production of these is pretty much everything, bar the sculpting, but I did get to tweak them at the final stages. So, I pretty much design everything, from start to end, with help in various ways from Casey concerning the production of the WBR.
http://www.newsarama.com/IDW/WBR/wbr_book13.jpg
“I hope to achieve a cast of cool toys and some fun books that make me happy, and if anyone else enjoys them, well that’s a bonus.”
Wood and HyperChild’s Casey Lau are longtime friends. They had earlier met at the San Diego Comic-Con way back in 1998. “Ashley and I have known each other for a long time and we have always wanted to work together,” Lau recalled. “I started HyperChild in 2001 as a creative imaginarium – a place where we’d dream up new ideas as well as do products and all kinds of neat stuff, you may have heard of The Deviants which is our first project and we launched that in 2003 and have been working on an animation deal and get lots of emails to do more products with the characters which we will. Our background in comics, animation and licensed products pretty much pulled us full circle into this and for 2005 and into 2006, we are really getting aggressive with what we want to do and a lot of the new stuff will be announced soon.”
http://www.newsarama.com/IDW/WBR/brambly_back_box.jpg
Ashley Wood: “I love robots and sci-fi, can’t get enough [of them] really. Industrial design, old metal, the movies Silent Running, Forbidden Planet, Darkstar, great ideas and model kits like Mashcinen Krieger. My childhood dreams… mmm… well, they’re pretty much the same today. I was thinking how cool it would be to make a line of oversized, heavy bulky robots. Then I had an idea for a story and it pretty much went from there.”
While the artist is known for his work in comics, designing and creating toys is not something foreign to him. “When I worked for Todd McFarlane, a lot of the time spent was around the toys. I helped in the design of some, and some were made from my artwork. I think this helped forge a love for the production of toys and the making of them. I worked on Hasbro toy lines early in my career. I also designed with Sideshow Collectibles the PopBot statue and [the] upcoming Lady Sham statue and I’m working with MediCom Toys on some exclusive products that they will announce shortly. So yeah, I have spent some time with toy making over the years.”
The current plan is to release a new WBR every quarter, with the figures and the books. “You’ll be getting a new kind of experience – it’s a collector’s piece, it’s an art piece and it’s a story piece all rolled into one,” Lau said. “I think that the way we’ve set this up is that it’s an experience in a box. Ashley’s artwork will transport you to the world of the WBR and the statue will keep the world in your mind as you gaze at it on your desk or bookshelf or wherever. I feel I’m in a bit of a dream when I look at Ash’s paintings so this is the effect I want to introduce to collectors of this product.
“You will discover each robot individually through the product and through the graphic novels and online where the experience will be deepened.
“We’re debuting them at the San Diego Comic-Con and then will have them available through Diamond and Marz and other hobby and specialty locations – and we’ll also have them online through our e-commerce website where we will have a bunch of Ashley’s WBR art and special edition figures available.”
“I plan, with Casey, to keep releasing the robots, basically until we can’t,” Wood added. “I want to create a large selection, we have many ideas. I want to release single books, one-shots, graphic novels, call them what you will. I have a very cool writer from the animation world lined up. I want them to be special. There will be 8"x8" books with each toy, with a back story to help flesh out the history of the robots.”
credits to Newsarama for article and pictures