Once again apologies for the long delay between posting, and responding to email. I’ve finally freed up some time and space to start posting again, so lets jump right then…

Above sits a wonderful cross section of art, illustration and design, not the work of an agency, collective or duo but in fact products of just one individual, Sydney based artist and designer Johnathan Zawada. I first came across Jonathan’s work whilst perusing the phenomenal inspiration repository that is butdoesitfloat.com (macro mode). As you will know the quality of the curation there is exceedingly high, each feature generally astonishing, however I was particularly drawn to the spectacular, otherworldly iridescence of Jonathan’s ‘Over Time’ series. This lead me back to his home site Exhibition and Commercial portfolios, where I researched and selected samples for presentation here.

Top & 2nd top: ‘Notes n Tokes’ and ‘Populations’. An exhibition of large scale drawings and oil paintings at Prism Gallery, Los Angeles from December 16, 2010 – February 28, 2011. The landscape topographies were derived from graph data (displayed as printed mirrors on accompanying plinths), modeled in 3D and then oil paintings created from those 3D renders. To see more check: http://zawada.com.au/2010/12/over-time/

3rd top: From Johnathan’s commercial portfolio a cover illustration on the the theme of ‘purple’ for Japanese creative magazine Brain.

4th top ‘Vallery 2011′ a photograph of part of Jonathan’s ‘Free Dumb’ exhibition, more on that here: http://zawada.com.au/2011/05/free-dumb/. I think the twisted jet is an F16 Falcon by the way…

5th top: A poster design to celebrate the premiere of Jean-Baptiste de Laubier’s film ‘It Was On Earth That I Knew Joy’, a 35 min science fiction film. Watch it on vimeo http://vimeo.com/9183277

6th top: An optical illusion rendered in a retro-tech fashion. Another inspired design, this time for the French clothing label Six Pack http://www.sixpack.fr/

Bottom: Signing off with this cheeky Disney adaption ‘Gunboat Willy’ an Identity design for a mens’ shoe label. Love it!

For further reading, if you haven’t already do visit Johnathan’s home site http://zawada.com.au or follow him through Flickr http://www.flickr.com/photos/jonathanzawada/.

Here’s a continuation of one of the more popular features I ran last year ‘The Art of the Arcade Marque‘ with a further selection of 12 primary coloured beauties. First of all a quick refresh on what an Arcade Marquee actually is, basically it’s the flat, often illuminated panel at the top of an Arcade Cabinet. The above examples date from the late 70′s through to the early 90′s, essentially this was the golden age of Arcade / Coin-op games, this era faded quickly as the power and playability of Home Console/PC gaming began to catch up and supersede the majority of the arcade experience. When you think back even the full on 3D Games of the Mid 90′s such as Sega Rally or Ridge Racer are now well into their respective teens, an eon in terms graphics and processing technology.

Fast forward to 2011 and the ‘Age of the App Icon’. With potentially 100′s of games on just your phone alone the concept of giant power hungry cabinet capable of playing just one game over and over seems pretty antiquated, leaving most cabinets to exist today as retro curiosities, often long forgotten. But though the bright neon days of the 80′s may have dimmed, retro culture plus legions of devoted fans and collectors empower that the magic still lives on. As a total ex-arcade nerd myself I’m doing my bit here to bring a bit of past graphical wizardry back to the fore.

Right then, before I start with the run down of each of the featured examples I’ll just point out a couple of valuable resources and where I’ve actually collected the artwork from. First up is KLOV or ‘Killer List Of Video Games’ essentially this is Wikipedia for Coin-Op’s, it’s amazing. Secondly I’ve also heavily referenced Emdkay.net who specialise in ‘Authentic & Reproduction Arcade Artwork, Arcade & Mame Marquees, and Home Arcade Bartop Cabinets’. If your after purchasing any of this artwork then Emdkay might be the best place to start.

Here’s the notes on the images, from top to bottom.

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Space Odyssey (Sega/Gremlin) 1981.
An early vertical Shoot-Em’-Up that looks like it alternates and also plays horizontally, for the time probably something of a novelty. KLOV ranks is it as scare, and I confess that I’ve never heard nor seen it… The monochrome red marquee with it’s spindly space ship and black hole is fab though, so It gets a special mention here!

http://www.arcade-museum.com/game_detail.php?game_id=9675

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Space Invaders (Taito / Bally-Midway) 1978.
From a rarity to the game the started it all, Tomihiro Nishikado’s Space Invaders caused a temporary shortage of 100-yen coins upon it’s release in Japan and Guiness World Records still ranks it as the top arcade game ever. This marquee, from the US Bally Midway version will surely jog you memory as to what the cabinet looks like, I’ve never been too sure where exactly the Yeti type alien appears exactly in the actual game but as it’s earned Taito over $500 million dollars in the last 32 years or so, it’s hardly my place to be picking holes!

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Space_Invaders

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Super Qix (Taito) 1987
A fairly common fantasy themed puzzle game from 1987, not one I’ve seen myself but the graphic is certainly striking and slots in here’s nicely next to the other dragon themed marquees.

http://www.arcade-museum.com/game_detail.php?game_id=9933

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King of Dragons (Capcom) 1991
This scrolling swords &s ocery beat-em-up is one I do remember playing, basically a more sophisticated Golden Axe type game which supported up to 3 players. Another lovely graphic, reminiscent of Gauntlet but sadly missing a scantily clad, amazonian type warrior babe.

http://www.arcade-museum.com/game_detail.php?game_id=8313

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Castle of Dragon (Seta) 1989.
A side scrolling platform fighter, this is another one I’d not heard of till researching this post, and judging by the scarcity rating on KLOV, It’s not just me that missed it. In truth it looks pretty average, and I wonder if it even made it’s way to distant British Shores. Marquee’s cool though.

http://www.arcade-museum.com/game_detail.php?game_id=7292

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Bubble Bobble (Taito) 1986
Another massive Taito classic that was ported across the board to pretty much all systems of the time. Bub & Bob (as featured here) are actually twin ‘Bubble Dragons’ there in game mission; to save there girlfriends from monsters… Is it me or does that sound somewhat familiar?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bubble_Bobble

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Outrun (Sega) 1986
Whilst 1986 saw the release of the immensely playable Bubble Bobble amongst others, nothing made jaws drop like Outrun, an Audio/Visual feast delivered with the help of pioneering sprite scaling technology that gives a real sense of speed. Despite now being 25 years old IMHO even today it’s a driving game that still looks and plays fantastic. Quick note on the marquee itself, whilst it’s obviously an instantly recognizable classic, but I’m wondering, is the perspective ever so slightly out? the truck looks a little too elongated.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Out_Run

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Galaxy Force (Sega) 1988.
Another Sega game to employ Outrun’s sprite scaling technology was Galaxy Force, a pseudo 3d space shoot-em-up very similar to Afterburner, though far less common. This is one that used to fascinate me, not because of amazing playability (in retrospect it was more of a tech demo) but rather just because of the sheer size of the moving cabinet! have a look over at at KLOV…

http://www.arcade-museum.com/game_detail.php?game_id=7891

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Warp Warp (Rock-Ola Mfg Corp) 1981
One more game I was completely unfamiliar with till composing this article, Warp Warp looks as if it plays as a hybrid of the more popular game types of it’s time, though since I don’t have Mame installed I can’t confirm. The marquee is interesting in that it kinda reminds me of the work of Ian Anderson’s Designer’s Republic though it predates there formation by at least 5 years, still I wonder if Ian ever saw this?

http://www.arcade-museum.com/game_detail.php?game_id=10407

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Nemesis (Konami) 1985
Nemesis was an immensly playable side scrolling shoot-em-up which featured (for it’s time) a revolutionairy weapon’s power up system, again as with Outrun it’s something that still plays great today. A further note on something that’s always slightly confused me, the game is better known ‘Gradius’ not quite sure why the name swap happened for different regions, anyone know why?

http://www.arcade-museum.com/game_detail.php?game_id=8842

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Life Force (Konami) 1986
More name swapping trickery here from Konami, Life Force is also known as Salamader it’s an indirect sequal to Gradius/Nemesis apperently set in ‘the same universe’. The game features one of those great lost in translation arcade moments, the second playable craft is known as “Lord British” but due to ambiguity of Japanese-to-English romanization is often referred to as “Road British”.

http://www.arcade-museum.com/game_detail.php?game_id=8427

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Splatterhouse (Namco) 1988
Though predating by approximately 8 years ‘Splatterhourse’ is undoubtedly a spiritual precursor to the Resident Evil series, It’s a horror themed linear side scrolling beat-em-up featuring some fairly gory graphics and somewhat questionable content. When ported to home consoles the game featured a ‘parental advisory warning’ on the box art. The marque itself is rendered in a classic B-Movie esque style.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Splatterhouse

Once again apologies for the brief pause in posting, and the slow response to emails, going to try and catch up this week/weekend. Actually part of the last month’s break has involved work on a Sci-Fi-O-Rama spin off project with Dan McPharlin, more on that in a moment, first here’s the lowdown on this article…

Kind of a quick post this one whilst I’m prepping some more wholesome material, I had intented to run this on the 29th of March as that was in fact Sci-Fi-O-Rama’s 3rd birthday, but alas didn’t get time! Anyway so for no particular reason other than it was at the top of the stack here’s another hyper-real selection of Hajime Sorayama’s masterful, airbrush craftsmanship. A few notes:

First of I’m embarssed to say I’m actually not sure of the titles here as these images are via the Hungarian Fantasy/Erotic Art bunker known as http://www.net-cafe.hu/ I do own a Sorayama book, but it’s in storage, so if you know how any are named please let me know. I’ll ad-lib then…

Top Image: This sultry vixen, adorned in glimmering chrome and gold crested armour is typical Sorayama subject material. If your your familiar with this strain of Sorayama’s work you’ll know how far he veers into fetishistic porno, by his standards this example only vaguely hint’s at eroticism. What I love about this piece is not just the flawless, impeciable rendering but more so the suit’s detailing, look closer and you’ll see many of Hajime’s familiar trademarks such as the venting on her inner left thigh, and the tiny winglets on the left forearm. It’s as complicated and fussy a design as a modern F1 car, and every bit as amazing (no doubt better too watch too)…

Middle: Although it’s what he’s most renowned for not all Sorayama’s work revolves around scantliy clad females undergoing robotic metamorphism, on a more advertising/commercial tip he also prouduced a series of metallic animals of which this dinosaur creature is one. Again check the beautiful detailing, such as the ever so spindly chromed hydraulics.

Bottom: This final example features one of Sorayama’s famous ‘Gynoid’ creations which I posted a little more about way back in September 2008. Something so quintessentially 80′s about not just this one but all three examples here – love them!

To check out more on Hajime Sorayama visit his official site – be warned there’s explicit content! http://hajimesorayama.com/. Also of interest I featured a post on British Illustrator Jasper Goodall who admits to being a fan, if you missed that it’s definitely worth a look check it here.

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Finally a quick one regarding the aforementioned Sci-Fi-O-Rama spin off project. I’ve managed to tie in my day job to the blog and with the help of Kieran Gutteridge and Dan McPharlin am currently developing a special Sci-Fi-O-Rama quiz game coming very soon to iOS… In fact if any iPad owners out there would like to take part in the Beta trial please get in touch via Twitter – send me a Direct Message with your iPad’s UDID cheers, Kie.

Still in movie poster mode and continuing on from Mondo here’s short but sweet entry focusing on another of my personal favorites that I’d filed for posting and then – as is often the case – completely forgotten about.

The art in question is this Bob Peak example of fantastical, illustrative master craftsmanship, produced for the 1966 big screen musical adaption of Arthurian myth and legend. Despite starring possibly one of Ireland’s finest ever exports, the late, great Richard Harris and Vanessa Redgrave I’m not sure the movies really regarded as a classic, however the promotional artwork with it’s strong Gustav Klimt overtones almost certainly is!

Renowned American Illustrator Bob Peak (May 30, 1927 – August 1, 1992) made a name for himself after working on the poster for the classic 1961 musical West Side Story and upon this initial success Peak’s career took flight eventually spanning 25 years and more… Within this time frame Peak became pretty much the Hollywood’s default first choice, responsible for creating iconic artwork for classics like Rollerball and Apocalypse Now, so then it’s pretty much fair to say he also redefined the genre along the way.

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Star Trek fans will also be familiar with Peak’s work for it was he that created all promotional art for the first 6 Star Trek Movies, James White AKA signalnoise.com ran a post on those over on his always excellent blog, check that post out here: http://blog.signalnoise.com/2009/12/10/star-trek-movie-poster-artwork/

I’ll run a further posts on Bob soon, as I’m very much of fan of his Excalibur Artwork, in the meantime you can read a little more about his career here on Wikipedia or for a much broader selection of art and info check out his official site http://bobpeak.net/

A final note – the Image comes via the art and design blog BurningSettlersCabin.com curated by by Sean Adams. There’s another great article here on the Camelot Poster Artwork and Leo & Diane Dillon’s “The Fox” which I’ve also featured… Anyway do check out the full article: http://www.burningsettlerscabin.com/?p=5081

Ok so this is something of a re-post lifted from the excellent designboom.com. Re-posting content in such verbatim fashion is something In which I tend to shy away from, but since it concerns quite possibly the worlds premier Sci-Fi Illustrator I’ve made an exception! We are of course talking of French comic artist/legend Jean Giraud, better known as Moebius and this article relates to his current exhibition “Transe-Forme” which is running now at Fondation Cartier in Paris until Saturday the 13th March, 2011. So as of time posting you have roughly a month too experience it.

Read the full article over at DesignBoom with a much larger selection of images of this simply stunning exhibition.

Many thanks to Manchester based Illustrator/Designer Ben Lamb for originally pointing me towards the article…

*** Quick amend thanks to Micheal Van

Official Home page of exhibition: http://www.moebius-transe-forme.com/

Check these videos from/of Moebius for exhibition http://dai.ly/e86lED

Happy New Year! here’s the first post of 2011 on Sci-Fi-O-Rama. Before I start regular readers may notice some minor aesthetic changes, I’ve altered the design slightly to make use of a header menu as to optimize space. I’ve also added (fixed) a google ad to the bottom of the sidebar – I hope this isn’t too obtrusive – it’s there just to help cover the cost of the bandwidth. So then on with the post and here’s a selection of psychedelic edged female portraiture from the late American artist Frank Kelly Freas (Aug 1922 – Jan 2005).

Frank Kelly Freas (also just Kelly Freas) enjoyed a career over 50 years working at the pinnacle of Sci-Fi and Fantasy Art, including providing countless covers for the magazines and books, such as Astounding Science Fiction/Analog, Mad, DAW, Signet, Ballantine Books . It’s also worth noting that early in his artistic career Freas painted pin-up girls onto the nose cones of bombers for the US Military, and it’s an echo of that inspiration I’ve chosen to focus on, here’s the notes on the selected images:

Top: “Rhapsody in Black” – This sultry beauty I featured in a book jacket context back in August, via research mining I’ve since discovered this larger version of the original painting, I have to say one of my favourite pieces posted in 2010 hence it’s appears again. What I also find most interesting here are some of the shared character traits with the other Illustrations: luscious lips, graceful swooping eyelashes and perfectly formed “Ski Jump” noses.

2nd top: “The Lion Game” – This 1973 DAW Paperback book covers serves a great demonstration of Freas’s super confident brush stroke work…

3rd top: “Our Children’s Children” – Cover art for an edition of the 1974 Clifford D. Simak SF Novel, the plot concerns refugees from 500 years in the future arrive through time tunnels – and hard behind them come ravening monsters… I like the sound of that I have to say!

4th top: “Mayenne” another gorgeous DAW cover with those trademark eyelashes, this one from 1973. Via Flickr user Bmaginnity

5th top: “Mirror Image” This Daw Cover dates from 1972, again via Bmaginnity. The plot of this book sounds good, a neat SF spin on American cold war paranoia of the time focusing on alien impostors and secret invaders; in this case the “amorphs”, who are indistinguishable from us, are themselves convinced that they are human…. Read more on Michael G. Coney at Wiki

Bottom: “On the Symb-Socket Circuit” – This flame haired impish enchanter takes the focus of another classic DAW cover, again dating from 1972. Love this one, close in tone to the work of Leo & Diane Dillon. Via Flickr user Bmaginnity

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For Further Reading: Check out the official Kelly Freas Site http://www.kellyfreas.com/ or the Wikipedia article: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Frank_Kelly_Freas

More Images: a Flickr Search http://bit.ly/gTuygR

Two reasons for posting here, firstly I wanted to share this wonderful selection of ink renderings detailing some extremely elaborate – and therefore gorgeous – medieval armor. Secondly I wanted to point readers towards the original source of this material: Bibliodyssey a superb blog that features a raft of historic Illustration and draftsmanship. in a similar vein to A Journey Round My Skull Bibliodyssey, with its ever expanding archive of ultra rare imagery, is absolutely essential reading…

Follow Bibliodyssey on twitter http://twitter.com/BibliOdyssey or on Flickr http://www.flickr.com/photos/bibliodyssey/

The Illustrations are taken from Volumes of ‘Dictionnaire Raisonné du Mobilier Français de L’Époque Carlovingienne à la Renaissance’ (Dictionary of French Furniture from the Carolingian era to the Renaissance) Dating from the 18th Century.

See more Knight Attire at the original source: http://bibliodyssey.blogspot.com/2008/03/knight-attire.html

Whilst I prep some new feature post’s I’m going to follow on from my recent Flickr Round with a collection of images I’ve bookmarked and backtracked via the excellent FFFFound.com – lazy? yes I know!

I actually still have FFFFound set as my Firefox home page and although I don’t spend quite as much time browsing as I used too, I still think it’s an excellent resource. In fact I’ve even saved off hundreds of bookmarked images too form offline inspiration scrapbook- It was a boring chore, but has since proved to be very handy!

Ok so here’s the notes on this somewhat arbitrary selection:

Top: Stunning Gothic, fantasy tinged fashion Illustration from Russian Artist Vania Zouravliov, this piece is entitled “The Head”. Really beautiful work, I think you’ll agree and someone I’ll definitely be looking to run a full feature on in the near(ish) future – in the meantime check this post at Jeff Hamada’s superb Booooooom.com or maybe just a general Google image search on Vania Zouravliov http://bit.ly/gwiMLU

2nd Top: I’m not sure on who the artist is here, only that I very much like the piece! As is often the problem with backtracking from FFFFound the link ends http://supersonicelectronic.com but not on the exact page – If you know who it is and have more info, please post a comment.

3rd Top: Now I really like this photograph, but again I’m lost for any more info on it – is it real? or a composite? The link ends here: www.ryanduenas.com – please help!

4th Top: Here’s one that’s easy to spot, it is of course the work of SF French illustrator extraordinaire Moebius this Image is via the fantastic butdoesitfloat.com – check out much more here: http://butdoesitfloat.com/filter/moebius

5th Top: This haunting portrait is the work of another illustrator I’ll be featuring again soon, Autumn Whitehurst – see more from her gorgeous portfolio here.

Bottom: Again this is another piece I’m not entirely sure on, though it looks somewhat similar to the work Cartoonist Spain Rodriguez whom I featured earlier in the year http://bit.ly/bm2l8q

** Proper posts coming soon! please give us a shout if you can help out at all identifying any of the unknown pieces…

A Halloween special here, consisting of zero Halloween related material! Instead what we do have is an excellent selection of obscure(ish) French SF Illustration…

These images come via bxzzines.blogspot.com a blogger site maintained by “Clifford Brown” (an anonymous pseudonym) The focus is mainly on vintage soft erotic magazines and related material; however Clifford also blends the occasional SF & Fantasy Scan into the mix, and that’s where this set has come from…

Here’s a link to the full post with 30 or so large scans: http://bit.ly/aPjHlO there is some mild nudity on the site, hence the warning. Merci beaucoup à Pierre for originally pointing me in the right direction!

Top: I think this is a Moebius Illustration (or is it Enki Bilal?) as I’m unsure of the source I can’t confirm – If you do know the origin please post a comment…

2nd Top: No real info on this piece I’m afraid, I’m guessing it’s from the 60′s? – The creatures great anyway…

3rd Top: This is definitely the work of Philippe Caza, again I’m not sure of the exact source though it’s dated 1973. Caza really does possess a knack when it comes to Illustrating freaky looking monsters – out there! Check more of Philippe Caza here

Bottom: A slice of Psychedelic Sci-Fi and Surrealism dating from 1970, these paintings are part of a set composed by polish born but French based artist: Wojciech Siudmak – more of him here: http://www.siudmak.com/

Once again the link to the source: http://bit.ly/aPjHlO

A very welcome to return to Sci-Fi-O-Rama for contemporary Sci-Fi/Fantasy Fashion Illustrator Barnaby Ward definitely one of my favourite featured artists. As is clearly demonstrated here, Barnaby’s capable of drawing extremely beautiful female characters whom he vivaciously mixes with the surreal and bizarre, such a cool inspiring style that always makes me want to grab a pen and start scribbling… In fact I’d go as far to say that’s there’s really only one other contemporary Illustrator capable of drawing quite such gorgeous, stylised characters and that’s Britain’s Jason Brooks.

Ok so to the notes on the Images, the top four here I’ve cropped into from a series of large Illustration intended as desktop backgrounds, there’s a full set of 9 available via Banarby’s expertly presented portfolio site: somefield.com, the final Illustration is a teaser illustration for his next major Illustrative project “Leavetaking” – all very much under wraps at the moment!.

Finally If you’ve not had a look before I also highly recommended checking Barnaby’s past Graphic Novel Work and the superb “Sixteen Miles to Merricks“.