Zatannurday: Deviant Art Cosplay

Con Season will coming up soon and what better reason to go to cons than cosplay!  Well not me doing the cosplay. But others.  Here are some from our good friends at Deviant Art!



Zatanna at London Expo Oct 2011- 4 by *Andserkiel on deviantART


Zatanna. Trick Time. by *IamLizbit on deviantART


Zatanna at London Expo Oct 2011- 2 by *Andserkiel on deviantART


Penguin and Zatanna by *Andserkiel on deviantART


Poker Face by *Andserkiel on deviantART


"I'm a spellaholic." by *Andserkiel on deviantART


Zatanna by ~esophia on deviantART


Zatanna Preview Collage by ~ProtectorKorii on deviantART


Giovanni Zatara's Daughter by *Andserkiel on deviantART


Zatanna Zatara by *Andserkiel on deviantART


:DC: Like Magic by *Eva-No-Jutsu on deviantART


Zatanna by ~KaitoEinsam on deviantART


Zatanna's magic! by ~KaitoEinsam on deviantART


Zatanna by ~KaitoEinsam on deviantART


Zatanna Zatara by ~KaitoEinsam on deviantART

Zatannurday: Deviant Art

Time to revist Deviant Art and see what is new. Or in other words, the week got away from me and I didn't have something prepared!



Zatanna Zatara- Cosplay Fever by *Andserkiel on deviantART


Under the Streets of Gotham by *Andserkiel on deviantART


Zatanna at London Expo Oct 2011- 3 by *Andserkiel on deviantART


ZATANNA IN WONDERLAND by ~jdavidlee1979 on deviantART


The cat in the hat by *TorqueStudio on deviantART


Zatanna 2012 by =Supajoe on deviantART


Zatanna Commission by *martheus on deviantART


The bat and the magic ian .... by ~CoOkIexDoUgH on deviantART


Nothing Up My Sleeve by *BestNameEver on deviantART


Zatanna commission by *monkeymarc on deviantART


dc: shining like a spider's web by ~bakhu on deviantART


Zatanna by ~judittondora on deviantART


Zatanna Zatarra by *OverGround-EIC on deviantART


Careful What You Wish For by *petercotton on deviantART


dc: behind the blinds the dancing snow by ~bakhu on deviantART

Zatannurday: Steampunk Zatanna

Long time readers know I Am a fan of the Victorian era and in particular Victorian horror. I am not though a Steampunk fan per se. It is cool. I get the appeal, but if I am wearing my Victorian costume I am going to carry a cane, not a nerf gun I spray painted.

That all being said I am a huge fan of the these Gaslight Justice League figures over at Sillof's website.
http://sillof.com/C-Gaslight.htm.  I was a big fan of "Gotham by Gaslight" and Wonder Woman: Amazonia and would loved to have seen more.  I felt his figures were a great look for the Victorian Justice League.

If you have never seen his custom figures then you need too. Now.  Especially his re-imaged Star Wars as an old Japanese Samurai movie.

But you notice something missing?  Yup!  Where is Zatanna?!
Well she was hanging out on Deviant Art!

Zatanna Steam punk 1887 by ~doonboy on deviantART

I love how she looks.  Very classy, like you would expect the daughter of a world renowned magician be.  Of course her secret is she really know magic.

Given the high weirdness of both the Victorian age and mixing the JL, I thought it was only proper to stat her up for Ghosts of Albion.  Given her power level in the comics Zatanna (in any reality) should be one of the more powerful magicians in the game.

Zatanna (1887)
Zatanna Zatara is the daughter of the late Giovanni Zatara, renowned illusionist, prestidigitator and expert on all subjects occult.  Having spent her entire life in her father's show it was natural that Miss Zatanna would continue that occupation after her father's untimely demise.
What is not generally well known is that Zatanna also inherited her father's magic and mantle to protect the world from magical beings that would attempt to do humanity harm.

Zatanna Zatara
Very Experienced Master

http://my.deviantart.com/messages/#/d3hsevs

Life Points 50
Drama Points 10

Attributes
Strength 2
Dexterity 4
Constitution 3
Intelligence 4
Perception 5
Willpower 6

Qualities
Attractiveness +3
Charisma
Contacts (the Justice League) 4
Contacts (Supernatural) 5
Hard to Kill 2
Fast Reaction Time
Magic 10  (Homo Magi race)
Magical Family
Nerves of Steel
Occult Library (Amazing)
Resources 8
Situational Awareness
Supernatural Senses (the Sight)
Status 3 (lowered due to profession and gender)

Drawbacks
Adversaries (Lots) 5
Honorable (Minimal)
Mental Problems (Fear of Commitment)
Minority (Woman)
Obligation (mundane humans, Important)
Secret 1 (really uses magic)

Useful Information
Initiative +
Actions 1/2
Observation 1d10 + 11
Fear +

Skills
Armed Mayhem 1
Art 6 (stage performance)
Athletics 2
Crime 1
Drive / Ride 1
Engineering 2
Fisticuffs 2
Influence 6
Knowledge 7
Languages 6 (English, Italian, Latin, Greek, Egyptian, Backwards talk)
Marksmanship 3
Notice 5
Occultism 9
Physician 2
Wild Card

Combat

Maneuver	Bonus	Damage	Notes
Dodge / Parry	+6	-	Defense Action
Grapple	+6	-	Defense Action
Punch	+6	4	Bash
Magic	+25	per spell	Must speak backwards
- Deflect	+25	Special	Deflects spell 45 degrees

You can see more of his Victorian super ladies here: http://doonboy.deviantart.com/gallery/33431300

Can't wait to have her run across Madame Vastra and Jenny!

Zatannurday: Happy Birthday Bruce Timm!

Bruce Timm, artist, animator, director and producer celebrates his birthday this coming week (Wednesday, Feb 8).  So I figured what better than some Bruce Timm and DCAU/Timmverse version of Zee!

Zatanna came in to the Bruce Timm/DCAU/B:TAS world in the episode naturally titled "Zatanna".

It featured a young Bruce Wayne and an even younger Zatanna back when Bruce was learning escapology.

Here is what Timm and Paul Dini said at the time about this episode.

Paul Dini on Zatanna’s appearance on Batman: “Bruce [Wayne] had to learn to be an escape artist from someone, and I thought, ‘Wouldn’t it be great if he learned from Zatara, DC’s old Golden Age hero, who at the time had a cute, little sixteen-year old daughter?’ I pitched this to Paul Levitz, president of DC Comics, who said, ‘That’s wonderful; that’s better than anything we’ve ever done with Zatanna! And it was logical that, if he learned from her father, he would have had a little thing going with Zatanna (courtesy of Cinefantastique Magazine)."

Bruce Timm on Zatanna (circa 1998): “We wanted to make sure [that] any superhero guest stars would make sense within the context of the Batman show. So we played Zatanna’s down and made her more of a David Copperfield-type of magician so that she had a bit more realistic framework for her appearance (courtesy of Wizard Magazine).”

She would then go on to stay friends with Batman, even learn his real name and display the power we are accustomed to seeing.

We all know Paul Dini loves Zatanna, but Bruce Timm can't be too far behind.

So happy birthday Bruce Timm!

Zatannurday: Cedric Poulat

I discovered Cedric Poulat in a Deviant Art search for pictures of Ice for the first day of winter.  Turns out he is just about as crazy about Zee as I am.  So I figured I'd start out the New Year's Zatannurday with the artist I ended the old year with.

His Deviant Art page is here, http://j-estacado.deviantart.com/
And his Zatanna gallery is here, http://j-estacado.deviantart.com/gallery/11873463  here are some of my favorites.



Z by *J-Estacado on deviantART


Z A T A N N A - markers by *J-Estacado on deviantART


Zatanna 2 by *J-Estacado on deviantART


Zatanna- A R T N O U V E A U by *J-Estacado on deviantART


Z A T A N N A - burlesque by *J-Estacado on deviantART

So, go to his page and check out all his cool art.

Zatannurday: Happy New Year!

Time to say goodbye to 2011 and hello to 2012!

So how about Zatanna and Cedric Poulat show us the way.



zatanna -new year card by *J-Estacado on deviantART

Here is to a great new 2012!!

First Day of Winter, celebrate with Ice

Since today is the first day of Winter I'd thought I'd celebrate with something for my oldest son. Here is one of his favorite super-heroes, Ice.

I have always liked Ice.  Like Tara I felt she was totally shafted; killed just make a point that was soon forgotten.  I am glad she is back in the comics now.



Ice Wallpaper by ~Ziggyman on deviantART


Cool as Ice by *SebbyWhite on deviantART


Riddle1 Ice by *AmericanNinjaX on deviantART


Cold as Ice by *eisu on deviantART


Ice by *olivernome on deviantART


Ice by ~Dani-V on deviantART


Ice by ~ArtNerdEm on deviantART

Zatannurday: Deviant Art Research

I had post for today, but I am not quite done with it.
So instead I am posting the "surplus" of the research for that post (which you will see next week).

So here are some more Deviant Art Zatannas!



Zatanna 2 by ~Pencilbags on deviantART


Ame-comi Zatanna by *SANTI-IKARI on deviantART


ZATANNA II by ~LORENA-CARVALHO on deviantART


UnCD-annataZ by =windriderx23 on deviantART


Illustrious Bits Week 2 - Zatanna by *Ricber on deviantART


Zatanna by ~ronsalas on deviantART


Zatanna commission LCF by *manulupac on deviantART


Zatanna Dave Hoover by ~pressy24 on deviantART

Zatannurday: More Deviant Art

I like Deviant Art. While there is a bunch of junk on the site, there is still a ton of great art to enjoy and sometimes even buy a print of.

Here are some more of my favorite Zatanna pieces.


do you believe in magic? by ~KillerStella on deviantART


_Zatanna by ~JardelCruz on deviantART


Zatanna goes to Heroes con by ~doonboy on deviantART


Zatanna-Ink by *leonartgondim on deviantART


Zatanna - Elegance And Magic by ~Canjoke on deviantART


Zatanna by =Candra on deviantART

And more from Chrissie Zullo


Zatanna Commish by *chrissie-zullo on deviantART


Zatanna Commission by *chrissie-zullo on deviantART

And one special non-deviantART one that was posted earlier in the week.
http://artofdesignosaurus.tumblr.com/post/12071958763/zatanna-i-experimented-a-bit-more-on-this

Zatannurday: Happy Birthday Darwyn Cooke!

We have had the pleasure of seeing a lot of good artists at DC. But one of my favorites just had a birthday on Wednesday and here are some of his best Zatanna pics!

So Happy Birthday Darwyn Cooke!

And as a special bonus, head over to DC Women Kicking Ass for a awesome post on why Zatanna Kicks Ass.

Horror is everywhere

I have recently seen some posts on how to do horror games.  Inevitably someone posts something like "You can't do Horror with XXXX system."

To which I always mentally add "Maybe YOU can't, but the rest of us have."
Horror is about tone. It is about style. The system can support it, even add to it.  Think about the game Dread and it's Jenga block mechanic or Call of Cthulhu and it's sanity system. Those are system supported horror.  But can you do horror with say Toon or d20?  Yes. But expect it to be a little different.

In d20 systems the characters will have more power as the level up.  You could take the cheap path and up the baddies too, but that isn't horror really.  You need to get them where their fears live.  Even the most powerful character will find themselves in a situation they can't control or even properly understand.  Lovecraft said it best, the greatest fear is the fear of the unknown.  So keep players in the dark.  The powers they have are not the ones they need.  Modern supernatural books do a good job of this.  When solving a problem Harry or Rachel have all the magic they need, but what they don't have are answers. They have allies, they don't have knowledge of who or what their enemy is.

What about Toon?  Well if a picture is worth a 1,000 words then here are 100 score words to illustrate my point.

Toon:

Toon + Horror:

Artist here: http://sideshowmonkey.deviantart.com/art/CASPER-ISSUE-41-by-Hartman-191809383
Yes that is the same Hartman who did animation for Rob Zombie.  So Wendy here is cut from the same cloth as The American Witch.

I'll keep talking about how you can do horror in future posts.

Jeff Dee kickstarter

Jeff Dee has new Kickstarter project to recreate all his old Egyptian gods art from the original Deities and Demigods (one of my favorite books).

I guess at some point TSR threw out all the art he did. So he is not only redoing them, but also doing some new ones for gods not pictured.

You can read more and donate some money here:
http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/jeffdee/re-creating-my-egyptian-art-from-deities-and-demig

I have supported other Kickstarters in the past and would love to support this one too.

TBBYANR: Thoughtcrime Inc.

Once again it is time for another entry of The Best Blog You Are Not Reading.
Which really is an excuse for me to tell you about blogs that I like that off the beaten path of what you normally see around here.

This time around I want to draw your attention to Thoughtcrime Inc.
Run by artist David Reynolds of Shadowgirls fame it features his art and thoughts on cartoons, animation and comics.

If you are a regular reader here then you have seen David's work.

and this

D.Rey has been talking a lot about the DC 52 and some of the issues going on there.
Plus he has an undying love for the Batgirls and that is ok in my book.

He has been talking about a faux comic/fan comic "Batgirls: Hope Prevails" which has all the Batgirls in it.

• http://thoughtcrimeinc.blogspot.com/2011/08/batgirls-aka-if-i-had-my-way.html
• http://thoughtcrimeinc.blogspot.com/2011/09/batgirls-hope-prevails-character-cards.html

As well as a favorite of mine, Power Girl,

• http://thoughtcrimeinc.blogspot.com/2011/10/last-daughter-of.html

I like his purely Atlantean take on her.  Or Lemurian.  Which also has lead to the creation of his own character: 

• http://thoughtcrimeinc.blogspot.com/2011/09/intrepid-verisimilitude.html
• http://thoughtcrimeinc.blogspot.com/2011/08/lemurs.html  (names are Marcia and Shampoo according to DA)

I like her, and the lemur is a nice touch.

He also has a Deviant Art page. http://machsabre.deviantart.com/ and his Journal there talked about a lot of the same things he talks about on his blog.

If you like comics, comic art and thoughts on cartoons, then Thoughcrime Inc. is a great place to start.

OSRIC Player's Reference - RETRACTION

EDITED TO ADD:  Looks like editor/creator of this project did not know the art was not PD and has taken down the copies.  I guess the lesson here is unless you know for sure, err on the side of caution.

So this morning I posted my endorsement of the new OSRIC Players Reference.

Only after did I learn of the drama behind it (which I am not getting into here, but you can read about it on your own here, here and here).

What really struck me was the cover art.
How cool it was and much better it was than anything else produced by the OSR (yes, present company included).  Soon I discovered why.  I wasn't produced by the OSR at all, but an old AD&D 2nd ed cover.
http://www.tsrinfo.net/archive/dl/dl-lairs.htm
http://www.acaeum.com/ddindexes/museum/dlbooklairs.html

Well the painting is by Bruce Eagle and was owned at one point by Pat Wilshire.
The interior cover of the OPG book claims that the cover is public domain.  That, and the fact that cover is very pixilated made me curious.  So I contacted Pat Wilshire.

Turns out that the art is definitely not in the Public Domain at all. Pat is still friends with Bruce and contacted him about it.  It looks every bit like this art was stolen for use of this book.

This is exactly why companies pay for art. They say don't judge a book by it's cover, but on the net that is often all we have and this cover looked awesome, so I got the book.  Turns out the Editior, Vincent Florio didn't even pay to use this cover.

The more digging I did the less I like this product.  All of it is copied right out of OSRIC.  Which in and of itself is not a huge deal.  But it is tacky.

Here are the pages that detail it.  Click to enlarge.

The page on the left is the OSRIC Players Reference. The right is OSRIC (2.2) version.
The page has been copied with the new information added in, in a different font no less.

The thing that sticks out of course is the "Cover/Back artwork is Public Domain".
Well not according to the owner of the art in question.

I wanted to like this product.  But I can not in good conscious recommend it.

Please instead download OSRIC proper and just use the pages you need.

Next time I'll put a little more research into a product before letting you all know.

Elmore love

So there have some posts recently about people's love (or general like) of Larry Elmore's art:
http://monstersandmanuals.blogspot.com/2011/08/larry-elmore-and-utter-ridiculosity.html
http://rolesrules.blogspot.com/2011/08/light-fantastic-and-eight-other-fantasy.html
http://jrients.blogspot.com/2011/08/my-favorite-elmore-cheesecake.html

I even posted about it last year:
http://timbrannan.blogspot.com/2010/01/elmore-art-for-old-school.html

I know there are some of the "old guard"  that don't like Elmore's art or associate it with a change at TSR and in D&D they are/were not happy with.  Well to quote my youngest "Balderdash and Poppycock!" (he heard me say that in a game and now he uses whenever he can).

Elmore art can be cheesecake, but it is also quite a step up from the art we had up to that point.  Nothing against those old-school artists, but Elmore had a vision of the D&D world and it was a vision I liked.

But let's be 100% honest.
I love his witches.

This witch appeared in the famous Dragon #114 version of the witch class and she was the "face" of my witch character ever since.

Later when I was looking for some new art I found this one:

I liked it so much that last Gen Con I bought the mini from Dark Sword and a signed print from Larry himself.

Of course those are not the only witches he has done. (linking instead of adding the pics of these)
http://larryelmore.com/white-witch/art
http://larryelmore.com/the-green-witch/art (have another mini of this one)
http://larryelmore.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/11/EYES_OF_.jpg

He explains it a bit in an interview he did in 2010 with Casey Philips:
http://fyi.timesfreepress.com/news/2010/feb/19/q-larry-elmore/

CP: You've illustrated so many different things over the years. Do you have a favorite character you've depicted?

LE: No, not really. I've sort of been plagued with the image of a dark-haired, woodsy kind of woman - a witchy woman. She's always been on my mind, starting when I was about 22 or something. That's why I do a lot of witchy looking women, especially in drawings, but I don't have many paintings of it. It's funny, I just laid out a painting of a voodoo woman I'll be doing for myself.

The biggest thing when you're making a living as an illustrator, which I've done for my whole life, is that you don't get to do what you want to do. You're always illustrating a book or a game or somebody's image of a creation. Finally, after 25-30 years of it, I just got tired of it. Now, I'm doing more private contracts and my own work. I like to paint people and landscapes. With people, I like to paint women more than men, of course. I'm a red-blooded man. (Laughs.) This witchy woman thing still plagues me - this mysterious, dark-haired woman.

I totally get that.  Maybe he can join the Witch Lovers Anonymous I am planning to start with Paul Dini.

Zatannurday: Ryan Sook

To followup on last weeks Justice League Dark, here are some Zatanna images by artist Ryan Sook.
You can find his website here, http://www.ryansook.com/

Zatannurday: Brandon Peterson

Zee by Brandon Peterson.

Soure: http://www.comicartfans.com/GalleryPiece.asp?Piece=158528&GSub=25016
You can also find his site here: http://www.brandonpeterson.com/blog/index.php

Zatannurday: Picture Round-up

I have a bunch of Zee pics laying around so I thought today would be a good time to post them and their sources.

First up from the Comic Knock Outs tumblr site:

by Da Xiong

by Stephane Roux

by Jeremy Bastian

And this one, but no idea where I got it from.

by Dave Hoover

Zatannurday: Deviant Art

I am a huge fan of Deviant Art.  I love that they give up and coming artists a place to showcase their talent. And there is quite a bit of talent there!

So here are some of my favorite Zatanna pics from Deviant Art.


zatanna and raven by ~gianmac on deviantART


zatanna and raven colored by ~gianmac on deviantART


Zatanna quick sketch by *mainasha on deviantART


Zatanna - DSC by *zet on deviantART


Zatanna by ~Kawuamo on deviantART

More soon!

Cliff Chiang Bad Reputation

Making the rounds today but it is very cool. Cliff Chiang's mashup of DC women and the Runaways.

I love Black Canary singing and Z on bass.
Course I posted this to Amazon Princess, but given that it had Z in it I figured here is a good spot too.

Something nice till they completely reboot the DC universe. Again.

Other links:
http://cliffchiang.tumblr.com/post/6037210898 Cliff Chiang's tumblr.
http://dcwomenkickingass.tumblr.com/post/6037306593/omg DC Women Kicking Ass
http://girls-gone-geek.com/2011/05/31/dc-women-runaways-mash-up/ and Girls Gone Geek.
http://amazon-princess.blogspot.com/2011/06/cliff-chiang-bad-reputation.html Amazon Princess