Nothing to report today, but here’s a sketch of our three heroes. Note that I didn’t have their anatomy quite right yet when I drew this.
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Archive for June, 2011
13 results.
As we’ve mentioned before, Ellie could be seen everywhere and on everything back when she launched into space so long ago. So it’s a no-brainer that she would have been seen in PEZ form!
Ray Robinson is a collector of first day of issue covers – stamps that have been cancelled on an envelope on their first day of issue. What makes the ones he collects special is that he combines them with his other hobby of collecting comic character sketches. I was thrilled when he asked for Ellie on an envelope with this really cool Project Mercury stamp from 1962. I was also scared to death that I’d mess up and ruin it. I mean, this stamp is older than I am!
Here’s a closer look at the stamp which commemorates the program that launched John Glenn as the first American to orbit the Earth.
You can see more of Ray’s First Day of Issue Covers, featuring some really amazing artists, at his blog comicfdc.blogspot.com.
Thanks for the honor, Ray!
UPDATED:
Ellie reader Carsten wanted to know if there were any stamps with our favorite robotic explorer on them from back when she was launched, and if we could see any of them. It took me a bit to find one, but voila!
I’m pretty sure there were several more.
Denver Brubaker, creator of Tales of a Checkered Man, is one superlative guy! Not once, but twice did he send Ellie on Planet X some lovin’ in the form of shout outs. First, on the TGT Webcomics podcast, at about the 1:18:40 mark, he bestows some high praise by including Ellie in with some other fine comics. And then…AND THEN, while Denver was sitting in on the Comics Coast To Coast podcast, he suggested they choose Ellie on Planet X as the Webcomic Pick Of The Week. You can hear that blurb at the 27 minute mark.
So, do us at Ellie Mission Control a favor by visiting Denver’s comic, Tales of a Checkered Man! And visit the two podcast links above to listen to more interviews with other outstanding comics creators.
Thanks Denver (isn’t Denver Brubaker like the coolest sounding name? Like a Colorado version of Indiana Jones? Denver Brubaker and the Mystery of the Golden Retriever, or something. I’d go see that)!
Another fine example of Planet X-ian wildlife. This is a Lemon Drop Flutterby, a relative of the Cellophane Wing Flutterby.
The Viking Mars Lander touched down on the surface of Mars on June 19, 1976. I remember watching the first picture appear, line by line, on our neighbors’ TV. It doesn’t look like much, but this was the first photo I’d seen from the surface of another planet! Not counting the moon, of course (it being a moon).
Photo courtesy of Wikipedia.
Happy Friday! Here’s an old design for Ellie from way back in the day for you to enjoy.
Just this last Monday, the Astronomy Picture of the Day website posted this really cool time lapse video of images from the Cassini probe orbiting Saturn. Check it out!
My lovely girlfriend Azucena and I took a visit to the Detroit Institute of Arts a while back, and I discovered a sculpture I’d never seen before. For all I know it’s been sitting there all along, but the museum has recently gone through a major redo so it’s very likely it was brought out of storage. It reminded me of Popeye, and since the figure was a rigger, he could very well be considered a sailor man too.
The Rigger
1917 Bronze
Mahonri Mackintosh Young
American, 1877 – 1957
I also saw this painting for the first time. It reminded me of a drawing I did of my grandmother when I was four or five years old. She was holding a little bird on her finger. My mother said the eyes would follow you around the room. Alas, it was lost when my grandmother died. But I sure love this one.
Girl With Yellow Bird
1945 Oil on Canvas
Hale Woodruff
American, 1900 – 1980
A while ago I bought some gouache (kind of a thick water color paint) to experiment with. One of the paintings I did was of Lian, a character in Tom Dell’Aringa’s comic Marooned. Here’s a glimpse of her, but go to the Marooned website to see the rest and read Tom’s great comics!
And if you haven’t seen it yet (or even if you have), scroll down to the Ellie on Planet X Dance-O-Scope, before it moves off of the front page of the blog. We wouldn’t want you to miss out or anything.