RAR WITH TODD, THE CANDY DRAGON!!!

WOOOOOOOOOOO!!!  No I'm not doing my Ric Flair impression, though I think we all gotta salute the "Nature Boy" every now and again, I'm celebrating the end of February!  Now before any tears are shed, let it be known I have no issues at all with the second month of the year.  In fact, I've had a lot of fun days in February over the years.  But if y'all know me well enough, you'd know some VERY good times are rapidly approaching, so yeah, I'm pretty excited for the coming month!  But we gotta finish this month first, so lets do this with a candy-coated cameo!  Enjoy...

This is Todd.  He is a dragon.  In fact, he is a Candy Dragon!  What sets him a part from other dragons?  Aside from looking like he may reside at Santa's Workshop in the off season, he also spews candy instead of fire, making him a safer dragon, though he still has sharp teeth and claws.  A dragon's still gotta dragon yo!  This colorful little fella comes from the wonderful comic series Phoebe And Her Unicorn, the tale of a spunky little girl named Phoebe and her Unicorn pal, Marigold Heavenly Nostrils.  Together, Phoebe and Marigold have all sorts of fun encountering fantasy critters like goblins and dragons while exploring a real world that sometimes proves even stranger than any fantasy realm!  Dana Simpson is the creator of this delightful, all-ages tale and a pal on Twitter.  She's also very kind and very supportive of other creators, knowing the ins and outs of web comics all too well.  When Animal Alphabets picked Dragons as their mythical creature for the letter D, I knew I had to draw Todd!  It should be noted that his eyes are actually red.  GoComics doesn't really do any archive feature without actually looking through ever last strip of the comic you're looking up.  So, I made a judgement call and thankfully, Dana liked it!  Kinda gives his eyes an M&M's, hard candy vibe!  Be sure to give Dana's comics a look.  They are fun reads for everyone!

And that's a wrap on February!  I hope y'all enjoyed the creatures of ancient mythology.  I had a lot of fun drawing them and once again wanna thank the team at Animal Alphabets for creating such a fun theme!  I promise there's even more waiting to be posted in the future!  Speaking of the future, the art will be going on hiatus for the next few weeks, but fear not!  I got a pretty good substitute waiting in the wings!  What could it be you ask?  Well, remember when I said some good times were coming in March at the beginning of the post?  Well, one of those is WonderCon!  And it just so happens, I got some more con pics to share from the past!  So be sure to come back and get in the WonderCon spirit with me!  Until then, take care and I'll catch y'all in March!

THE SAUCY CENTAUR!!!

We are back!  This mythical beast theme has been a lot of fun to post so far!  Outside of Hogwarts, Narnia and Middle Earth, these critters don't get much attention, so I'm happy to shine a spotlight on them and even happier that Animal Alphabets gave so many artists a forum to share them on!  Hopefully, other creators out there will be inspired to put these creature to page or even in more dimensional forms!  But hey, we still need to get to today's art, so saddle up and give it a gander!  Enjoy...

The Centaur.  Half man, half horse.  Ain't much more to it than that.  Clearly, this is going to be a very interesting "Birds & Bees" speech when Mama Centaur comes home!  Centaurs play a big role in many fantasy realms, most notably those of Narnian origin, but they've appeared in other mediums as well.  The Centaur I tend to remember best is the cyclopian one that the great Ray Harryhausen did for The Golden Voyage of Sinbad.  He was a true master of not only special effects but creature design as well.  His creatures were amazing and looked as if they could work in the real world.  I'm honored to say I met him way back when and cherish the brief moment I spent with him.

And we're done for this week.  Next week, we'll wrap things up for February with a scaly tribute to a sweet comic!  Until then, take care and I'll catch y'all later!

A BASILISK!!! TIME TO BAIL!!!

Here we are again!  At the midway point of February already!  Well, I can't really chalk this one up to any kind of weird speed up in time.  It's a short month.  The middle comes quicker in February!  But hey, you're not here to debate quantum physics.  You wanna see another mythical beast!  At least I hope you do.  It's okay to lie and say you do even if you stumbled on here accidentally while looking up cat vids, I'll totally be cool with it!  Anyway, here's the next beastie!  Enjoy...

The dreaded Basilisk!  A terrifying snake-like creature with a poisonous bite and deadly stare!  In some mythologies,  the Basilisk has short legs while others depict it as a straight snake.  The stare also has differences among the myths as some claim its stare can turn a victim to stone, much like a Gorgon, while others claim it merely paralyses a victim.  Either way, I think we can all be thankful this critter doesn't currently exist.  People have a hard enough time leaving regular snakes be, let alone giant ones that can kill you by merely making eye contact!

And that's all for this particular week!  Be sure to come back next time to see a figurative horse of another color!  Until then, take care and I'll catch y'all later!

TONGUE-TIED IN MYTHICAL MAYHEM!!!

Welcome to February CRAZIES!!!  We made it through another dreary January and I'd say the wait was worth it!  Know why?  Because now we know the fun of Spring and is that much closer!  Boysenberry Fest!  WonderCon!  Easter!  Shamrock Shake Season!  Do I really need to go on?  But first, we do have to get through February which has its own fun to be had if we're gonna be fair about things.  So let's dive in with some fun art kicking off a fun month with creatures of legendary proportion!  Enjoy...

The mighty Alphyn. The body of a lion with the arms of an eagle (which is weird as an eagle's arms are actually wings, thus making the alphyn a four-legged animal), an exceptionally long tongue and a knot tied in its tail.  Okay, I'm gonna be honest folks.  This isn't a very practical creature.  Its front legs would stymie any kind of fast movement and its long tongue would probably hinder chewing.  Don't even want to know how the tail got knotted!  But hey!  It's mythical!  That's still cool, right?  Today's art came about from the great Twitter art collective Animal Alphabets, which picks a new theme every round of letters.  This particular round revolved around creatures of ancient mythology, which happens to be among my favorite subjects to read up on!  The Alphyn is a creature I often mixed up with a Gryphon, so it was nice to get things cleared up!

And that's all for today!  The whole month's gonna be mythical creatures, so I hope y'all are ready for some fantasy!  Be sure to "slither" back next week for more mythical fun!  Until then, take care and I'll catch y'all later!