1 plain white tee + 1 black Sharpie pen = instant custom ROM t-shirt

I found a well fitting t-shirt at some clothing discount outlet for only $2. Using some Rom fan art I created as vector line work in Adobe Illustrator (http://csuhsux.deviantart.com/gallery/#/d4l4gou) as a template. Once a print out was placed underneath the fabric of the shirt I just took a brand new Sharpie I appropriated from work and decided to just go for it. The image is a bit blurry in this posting because of the close up focus of the snap shot.

Well folks, on the heels of this little accomplishment came some more bullshit news along with some other pending bullshit that has me really preoccupied at the moment. I'm going to be on hiatus for a while as of now for an undisclosed amount of time as I endeavor to sort out all the bullshit in my life right now. Sorry about the inconvenience.

Airbrushed ROM fan art for sale on ebay, but just for 3 more days. Plus some more none for sale fan art eye candy!

Apparently somebody made this by attaching a layer of pages from some ROM back issues onto either a board or fabric canvas and then spray painting the head shot image over that.You can find it easy enough on ebay by doing a key word search on the site (Rom spaceknight collage spray paint stencil original). The seller was nice enough to provide many close up photo images of it from different angles. It's going for $150 but it's only gonna be posted for 3 more days if you're interested.

Here's my latest find for Turbo fan art on Deviant Art. This is some pretty hot digital magic as you can see I bet this took a long time to do. Unfortunately I didn't have any luck getting in touch with the artist to get a couple of my questions answered.

Here we have some more stuff I found on Deviant Art. It's actually the top portion of a sketch that feature Deathlock, Rom and some unknown character. It's an all around good drawing but I cropped it because I really wanted to focus on the way ROM is drawn. That is some primo figure drawing going on there! The foreshortening, angle and proportions is excellent it's a damn shame it's not a more finished drawing. This is the kinda fan art I like to see and feature on this blog. I might have too do something with that ROM portion of this piece it has so much potential.

New Warriors 73 & ROM 16 re-covered. Plus, Rakk the renegade spaceknight custom figurine!

I put these covers together with some of the past fan art I've done. You may have seen the ROM issue on the recovered blog already but that guy was being an asshole about posting the New Warriors one so I'm posting it here instead. And just below we have the latest ROM related custom figurine. You all remember the infamous renegade spaceknight known as Rakk "the breaker"?

"Hello. This is my custom Breaker spaceknight action figure. I tried a few new things with this custom. He was made using an inexpensive base figure from goodwill. I believe it was a power ranger. The lack of articulation in the arms and waist bothered me at first but as this custom is really just for my collection, I used it anyway. All of the armor details including the helmet, are sculpted using magic-sculpt. I then primed the figure in black and dry-brushed a semi-gloss red over it. In the comics this character is really more of a burgundy color throughout, but I thought the bright red with burgundy accents suited him. I also tried outlining some of the armor details in black, just to break up some of that red. I've wanted a collection of Spaceknights ever since I was a child. Breaker's was always one of my favorite Spaceknight armors, so after Starshine I had to try him next. I hope you like the custom. Thank you for viewing! -Chris"

Rakk's first appearance was in ROM Annual #2. If you don't have it or have other wise never read it you can check out this Youtube slide show of that issue. Story by Bill Mantlo with pencils done by Sal Buscema and inks done by Akin & Garvey. This issue was an excellent example of how the melding of great story telling and art work made ROM such a great book: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UrOmqDEWQGg&feature=related

ROM Mego action figure (packaged)

Animation video of obscure superheroes with one silver spaceknight (Ptor you friggin rock!)

 http://www.collegehumor.com/video/6762911/too-many-avengers

I wanna give some major props to Ptor of the Sanctum Sanctorum for finding this funny ass video! Yeah Ptor that last posting was for you . . I just kinda forgot to mention that it was for you. But I made sure to get it right on this posting. By the way, Dr. Strange is the chosen one. His real last name is Strangstein.   "Tamam Shud!" and Shalom

S.H.E.I.L.D, Dr. Strange, ROM & Starshine. Not The Avengers but also a mighty team up

ROM #2

I think most of you remember this awesome two page spread of this Dire Wraith assault on the SHEILD helicarrier in ROM #53. Over at the Suicide Squad blog there was some discussion about the new Avengers film and about how both the Marvel and DC Universe utilize their various government spy and black ops groups such as SHEILD or Checkmate. Dan from http://www.itsadansworld.net/ made a good point by mentioning that Marvel did a better job of integrating groups like SHEILD in it's universe then does DC. I think he's absolutely right because we can look to the relative success of the ROM title as an example. Did you know that Mantlo had established as early as ROM #2 a SHEILD presence in the book? A character known as agent Kraller was the Dire Wraith mole within SHEILD. It was never revealed how high up the Wraith infiltration of SHEILD was between Kraller's first appearance and his untimely demise a few issues later at the hands of his fellow Wraiths for being too arrogant and carelessness and ultimately having become a liability. But regardless, it was a good move on Bill Mantlo's part since that served to integrate ROM early on into the Marvel universe which no doubt had much to do with ROM's success with readers over the years. Later in the series the Dire Wraiths had favored a direct assault on SHEILD instead of continued infiltration tactics. That brought SHEILD into the Wraith War as they used their ESPER agents to psychically hunt Dire Wraith activities on Earth. Left click on the images to magnify.

ROM#54

Starshine spaceknight custom action figure

This is something I found on Deviant Art. I do believe this is a first as far as custom spaceknight figures other then ROM himself. The following is from the artist:  
Hello. This is my custom Starshine the spaceknight action figure.She was made using a Marvel legends Mystique base figure.The costume details were sculpted using magic-sculpt.The head was altered using sculpt,the dremmel tool, and some simple hand sanding.Her ponytail is actually from a Marvel legends age of apocalypse sabertooth figure.The entire figure was primed in silver and then painted over in clear yellow to give her that glowing golden look.This was absolutely a labor of love.I hope you guys out there like her as much as I do.Thank you for checking her out! -Chris

So I'm curious what do you folks out there think about this?

Coolest custom Torpedo & Turbo action figures you've ever seen and my finished fan art

Over the years I've lost track of how many custom ROM figures there have been found all over the internet. But with this latest find you see here this is now the fourth custom Torpedo action figure I've come across. That's pretty impressive considering the relatively obscure nature of the character.

What's even more impressive is that somebody else out there made a Turbo custom figures from both New Warriors volume 1 and 2. Unfortunately I didn't have any luck getting in touch with anybody about it. I guess in a way this kind of fandom isn't that surprising if you think of it in terms of the Torpedo armor it's self.

The 20 Year Legacy of the Torpedo Armor
The first user of the Torpedo armor was it's creator Michael Stivak who battled with Daredevil (1975). It was passed on to Brock Jones who also battled with Daredevil but in their final encounter fought a common foe (The Chameleon) as allies. Later Jones participated in the Defender for a Day contest and also fought the Rocketeers (Marvel Premier) on his own which eventually led him to becoming allies with ROM spaceknight. After Jones's death by the Dire Wraiths the Torpedo armor fell into the hands of a relative in the Jone's family Mike Jeffries. After a short stint it was passed on to Michiko "Mickey" Musashi both of which who used the armor under the code name of Turbo with The New Warriors. Ironically the final user of the armor was the Dire Wraith queen Volx (1996). So that makes 5 different users of the armor in 5 different Marvel titles over the span of 20 years in the Marvel Universe.

As you can see I went a little bit beyond the sketch when I started to color it. I just felt like it needed a little something extra added to the scene. This is a high res image so it does magnify when you left click on it.

Next up, another ROM related custom action figure you almost certainly have not seen before!

I'm adding a quick update to this posting because I saw the Avengers this morning. It turned out to be over all pretty good although I felt that some of the fight and action scenes along with Capt. America's head piece needed some fine tuning. I also think the Chitari concept could have been handled a little better but the entire cast did a really good job even though I still miss Edward Norton as Dr. Banner.

Guess who's joining The Avengers movie cast?

Ok I'm just kidding I had to do something to get you all to look. Please don't let this movie suck! 

So as you can see here we've got a couple pages from Toyfare #142 (June 2009) that had a feature article about ROM spanning from the conception of the toy to the comic book series. What a great title, All Roads Lead to ROM. I just love clever word play! Unfortunately outside of the title there's nothing new under the sun with the article it's self. It's a good read for someone who has some familiarity with the character but for any full blown fan there's nothing in it you haven't seen or read before.

Just on general principle it's cool to find out about ROM's enduring legacy where ever and how ever it exists. But in just a few days I promise to have something way cool posted that I'm sure most of you haven't seen before and will love. Including this Turbo sketch completed and in color.