Artist Mike Trcic: Movie Monster Maker and Dinosaur Sculptor

You may not be familiar with the artist Mike Trcic, but you have most likely seen his work many times.  Although I’ve only discovered who Mike was about two months ago, I have been a huge fan of his since I was 5 years old.

Mike Trcic is one of the key artists responsible for many of Hollywood’s iconic characters and monsters.  If you’re a fan of memorable movies such as Batman Returns, Terminator 2, and Jurassic Park, then you’ve definitely seen Mike’s magic.  Side note: he was also a zombie in Day of the Dead!

For me personally, Jurassic park was a huge part of my childhood.  I can remember my mom taking me to the theatres expecting to be scared half to death, only to witness one of the greatest movies of all time.  My favourite part of the movie was definitely the T-Rex.  As I am sure with many of you, I can remember thinking “man that thing looks so real!” 

Mike sculpting the full sized version (Photo cred:Stan Winston School)

 

Mike Sculpting the 1/5 scale T-Rex( Photo cred:Stan Winston School)

 

Mike was actually the key artist in sculpting the T-Rex, so we owe a lot to what we saw on screen to his crafty hands!   The T-Rex was first sculpted at 1/5 scale for Stan Winston’s approval.  It was mentioned that the original sculpture looked more like a movie dragon than a dinosaur.  As a huge dinosaur fan himself, Mike had a back and forth struggle to convince Stan Winston to bring the sculpt back around to make it look like an actual dinosaur.  Believe it or not, the final T-Rex is only 60% of what Mike wanted to get it to …. I wonder what his full vision would’ve really looked like! After approval it was then created at 1/16 scale and the full sized 1/1 - 40 foot long version.

Above is a cool shot of all three versions Mike sculpted.

 
Cool side note: the 1/5 and 1/16 version were going to be used in the film until ILM created them in CGI.  So the only version we see on screen is the actual full sized model.  We also have to remember that this was just around the time that CGI was just realising its potential.  At that time, artists like Mike didn’t work in computers to create monsters, but hand sculpted full size versions of them.  I guess that’s why movies seem so much more magical to me back then.
 

Mike Trcic’s Work Today

Since his movie days, Mike has opened up his own business - Trcic Studios.  He is known as one of the top Paleo-Artists in the world and has sculpted beautiful, accurate and realistic Dinosaurs without the constraints of a director telling him how they should look in Hollywood.  Below are some of my favourite pieces from Mike’s collection:

All three photos are taken from Trcic Studio (trcicstudio.com)

If you’d like to own a piece of Mike’s work, please visit his website.  His recent work includes a lot of bronzes  that celebrates key figures in Western American History.  A lot of time, research and sculpting is invested into each piece he creates. All this is followed by a long process to create the bronze.  You can also purchase the 1/16 scale Horizon T-Rex model kit which is a direct casting of the 1/16 scale T-Rex that Mike sculpted.

I first emailed Mike back in June of this year and we’ve had a few conversations about his work.  I can tell you that Mike is a down to earth, helpful and humble artist.  It still amazes him that a movie made so many years ago has such strong and interested fan base.  For me personally, it would be an honour and dream to own a personal piece from Mike Trcic (fingers crossed).  I hope you enjoyed this article, until next time!

Action Figure Sculptor and Industry Legend: Tim Bruckner

Well I did exactly what I thought i'd do when I started this blog, not post for months.  My apologies to anyone who came to visit in the last little while, but I've got a very special post today.

A few months back I did an article about a very talented sculptor, Jonathan Matthews. I had a chance to speak with Jonathan and he recommended I check out Tim Bruckner. 

As with all artists I seek out, I immediately hunt for their portfolios. When I got to Tim's characterful website (www.timbruckner.com) I quickly saw many familiar faces.  If you're a wrestling figure fan like myself, you will definitely remember the Toybiz WCW/NWO figures, some of my favorite wrestling figures ever.  Guess who was responsible for sculpting those? that’s right, Mr. Tim Bruckner. 

I can remember 1997 clearly, I was 12 yrs old and studying these incredibly sculpted wrestling figures: Scott Hall, Goldberg, Sting, Hogan... and thinking “Toybiz does a way better job than Jakks... I wonder who made these?"  I never thought I’d get a chance to know one day.

Tim has had a long career spanning many different companies.  If we go back even further in the 90's, we can see some of the great and memorable sculpts by Tim, here are some of my favorites:

Tim has had a long career spanning many different companies.  If we go back even further in the 90's, we can see some of the great and memorable sculpts by Tim, here are some of my favorites:

Now I can tell you that Tim’s HUSH Batman is tied for my favorite Batman figure ever, along with the new Greg Capullo Batman. Consequently, Jim Lee and Greg Capullo are my favorite Batman artists. 

Just looking at Tim's work, I feel his finished pieces project a lot of character... For example, he has done many Joker action figures, each one capturing the insanity that is synonymous with the character, while also staying true to the original comic artist’s interpretation:

You can tell he has a unique talent of taking 2d comic characters and really bringing out the comic artists vision.  I would like to believe this is a combination of raw talent and many years of his skills honed into creating these excellent figures and statues.  You may also notice that the paint jobs on these are superior to the one you might own, that’s because Tim has hand painted these himself.  They are called paint masters, and they provide an example to the factories of how the figures are suppose to look.  Tim is a one-stop-shop, meaning he not only sculpts, but he casts and paints the figures too. 

Some of his more recent DC work includes the incredible DC Dynamics statues. These pieces, not just the sculpts, but the idea behind them, are just pure genius.  It is no wonder that so many top profile sculptors admire Mr. Brucker, he is truly a legend in the industry.

From reading interviews, I get the sense that Tim really enjoys a solving difficult puzzles in respect to sculpting.  He seems to embrace the challenge of tackling sculpts he's never done before, or finding better ways of executing a piece. 

Now I’ve only shown you a glimpse of Tim’s work, and I’ve stayed only within the realm of Toy Biz and DC Direct action figures.  For some of his personal work, statues, commissions and other great projects please see Tim’s facebookpage. 

Tim played a very pivotal role in creating some of the best and most memorable collectibles in my lifetime. Thank you Tim for all the great work, I look forward to more amazing accomplishments from you.  

Jonathan Matthews: The Man Who Brought Comic Characters to Life

I had a hard time coming up with a good title for this blog, but IMO "The Man Who Brought Comic Characters to Life" is a great representation of the artist i'm about to blog about.  To me, he truely took these characters straight out of comic books and transformed them into tangible sculpts.  

Last week I was scouring the net looking at various sculptor's work and got caught up in an 4 hour long journey...  That day I ran across the work of the incredible Jonathan Matthews.  

If you haven't heard of Jonathan Matthews, you've probably seen or owned some of his work.  JM is a top industry sculptor that works exclusively for DC Collectibles (lucky company), and the action figures and statues he's created are nothing short of perfect.  

On his web site, some of the action figures he's showcased are Scarecrow (from HUSH) and Killer Croc:

These pieces are some of my favorite renditions of these characters.  The amount of detail and character that was put into these sculpts really took them right out of the pages of the comic book. It's even more amazing to think that these were sculpted almost a decade ago (or more?)..oh no.. i'm getting old!

I ended up on a non-stop hunt to find more of JM's work,  looking through past interviews and anything with his name attached.  I discovered he was responsible for the recent Greg Capullo line of Batman characters.  In my opinion, these figures are some of the best Batman figures to ever be released.  I feel he really brought Capullo's art to life coupled with great articulation and accessories:

Everything from the sculpt of the anatomy, the face, and pose-ability are awesome... These were the Batman figures I've been waiting for!  

JM is also responsible for these Batman statues that I've seen in local comic book shops.  The one done of Mike Mignola's Batman (first one) is a 3D statue that I could swear would be 2D from certain angles... it takes a particular talent to be able to interpret another artists 2D work and translate it so perfectly into 3D... JM is that talented.

Jonathan is a traditional sculptor that sculpts in Castilene but I've heard he's made some progress as a digital sculptor.  As you may know, I am a huge fan of traditional sculpting, I just love looking at raw hand sculpts or the WIP pictures.  I hope JM becomes a great digital sculptor but always keeps delivering great products through traditional methods.  You are a master of that art form.

You can find some great interviews of JM on the net where he talks about his work, process and favorite pieces.  

I have had the pleasure of contacting Jonathan via email and he is a very nice, humble and helpful person.  It is always great to see an artist,that is so talented, take the time to share their insight with fans.

I must say that in a span of a few hours,  I immediately became a huge fan of Jonthan's work and will watch his career closely to see what other amazing works of art he creates.  In the short time that I have had the pleasure to discover his work, I've determined it would be my dream to one day own a personally commission sculpt from him to add to my collection.  Unfortunately for me, he works exclusively for DC Collectibles... but hey... a man can dream right? 

I hope you enjoyed Jonathan's work as much as I do.  Stay tuned for some more posts!