Rare Fan Art Gallery Showcase #1

Regular viewers of Rare’s social media channels will be familiar with our weekly #FanArtFridays, where we call out some of the coolest artwork we’ve seen from Rare fans on our travels across the World Wide Web. With new art regularly going up on Rare’s digital fridge for all to see (as well as our dedicated Facebook fan art gallery), we’ve put together a recap of recently featured fan art, and have even booked some Rare in-house art talent in the form of Art Director Ryan to give us an appraisal.

So don your finest dinner suit, grab a canapé and let’s carefully observe these fine pieces of art, taking us right up to the beginning of April.

Our first selection from late February – the debut of our fancy new fridge frame – was headlined by WillWivel’s Sea of Thieves pirate in pencils. Benjamin Barnacles is his name, and we might hazard a guess that catching crustaceans is his game. Accompanying this pirate portrait was TheInsaneDarkOne’s depiction of Orchid in her classic Killer Instinct 2 outfit (complete with side slits for ventilation? Jury’s still out on that one), along with mickecchi’s sketch of Jo Dark and a rugged-looking Elvis. Here’s what our very own Ryan thought of this first selection:

“Some great texture work on this pirate portrait, I like the way pastels were used for the skin colour and there’s some really nice blending there. This version of Orchid offers a stylish manga-style rendition of the character’s classic look, and for the Perfect Dark piece, the lens flare and use of the old-school Rare logo sells that ’90s aesthetic from the time it was being made. Feels like it could be art for a Saturday morning cartoon: The Adventures of Jo and Elvis!”

Our next installation was dedicated to the 20th anniversary of a certain inebriated woodland critter’s bad day, led by RodentKnight’s piece showing a tired and emotional Conker, after having a few too many in celebration. He can’t take his drink like he used to – poor chap. Banana_Meteor’s piece also showed Conker nursing a rather foamy pint (probably taken before he keeled over), while grollak_art’s Tediz-inspired depiction of the squirrel had him wielding both a machete AND a chainsaw. Must have been a really bad day. Ryan had this to say about these gallery additions:

“The Tediz-style Conker is an interesting take on his normal cute design – the lack of pupils really gives him a badass look. I could just see this graffitied on a wall somewhere. With Conker nursing a pint, there’s a great suggestion that he’s well and truly sloshed with the drunk bubbles above his head and his mismatched eyes squinting longingly at his drink. I can imagine him doing drunken ‘hic’s, which, just like the framed picture of him flat on his back, really ties into the game’s cartoony style.”

This subsequent selection featured a piece by DannyCortoons for you animation aficionados, rendering Banjo and Kazooie in that classic rubber-hose style from the 1930s. In some alternate universe, this version of the bear and bird are appearing after a newsreel in Steamboat Grunty. Also featuring in this selection was an incredibly cute yarn pirate from Sea of Thieves by esmerudy – complete with crochet tattoos – and a rendition of Killer Instinct’s Glacius by knightlineart, puddle punching someone with a massive frosty hand. Let’s hear what Ryan had to say:

“This rubber-hose rendition of Banjo and Kazooie is really lovely! It’d be a joy to see in motion, you can just imagine the trademark bounce that 1930s cartoon characters had. Good composition on the Glacius piece, focusing on what’s always the most important feature of a KI fighter. And looking at the crochet pirate, there’s some fantastic detail here – you can see an Order of Souls eyepatch and a map tattoo on his chest as well as the great big woolly beard!”

Quite a personal piece fronted the next March art drop, commemorating LulzyRobot’s pirate earning the burning Ashen Curse in Sea of Thieves. Having lava flowing through your veins sounds extremely painful – we’ll stick to blood, thanks. Also in this collection was civetcider’s tribute to Viva Piñata, complete with an incredibly dashing Horstachio and a very distressed Fudgehog, and sketchbook master siddcole’s fine portrait of Jo Dark from Perfect Dark Zero. Let’s go back to Ryan for his impressions of this batch:

“That’s one pirate I wouldn’t like to cross swords with – the moody expression coupled with the fiery background strikes a great feel. The comedy of the Viva Piñata piece is excellent, especially with the extremely worried Fudgehog reflecting his personality in the cartoon. Interesting inclusion of a Galagoogoo’s detailed bum anatomy, especially as Piñatas don’t have that! As for the portrait of Jo, fantastic pencil work and great feathering on the hair. I’ve always liked Jo with that haircut as a change-up for the character, so well done for doing it justice!”

To cap off March’s art selection, we led with SlaveRain’s unorthodox take on Fulgore from Killer Instinct. Rather than being an unstoppable killing machine, this diminutive Fulgore was enjoying what looked to be mint chocolate ice cream. Also in this batch was BigFatGamer’s brooding Sea of Thieves landscape, complete with Flameheart mid-bellow, and cloudnine987’s cartoony Banjo & Kazooie depiction with Kazooie actually looking happy! We’re stunned. We also have some thoughts on Fulgore’s choice of ice cream flavour, but let’s go to Ryan for his more important artistic impression of this helping of pics:

“Great reinterpretation of Fulgore, taking a nasty cyborg and turning him into a little cutie. I always find it really interesting to see someone take one of our character designs and turn it on its head. For the Flameheart piece, very flattered that this is the artist’s first piece of fan art – keep being creative! The addition of the hair trailing across his face adds to the spooky, haunting feel. In the Banjo artwork, I like how the repeating line background cleverly suggests the shape of a Jiggy. With the white outline around him and Kazooie, I could easily see this being a sticker on someone’s laptop.”

April’s art offerings began with a blocky rendition of Kameo, lovingly snapped together by poison_bricks. Transforming should be dead easy when you’re made of Lego – what happens when you misplace a piece though? Elsewhere in this batch, we cast our beady eyes over EvilEgg’s Hama bead rendition of the Sea of Thieves Reaper’s Mark, which would have been perfect for the alternate reality NES version, and then marvelled at tardonkieart’s drawing of a Bunnycomb from Viva Piñata about to tuck into a candy carrot. Let’s check in with Ryan for his expert impressions of this selection:

“Speaking as someone who’s worked with Hama beads, this Reaper’s Mark shows great patience and dedication, especially to get details like the sword and pirate hats in the foreground. Lucky someone didn’t knock your elbow! The Bunnycomb is a very cute rendition – making the patterning around the eyes a bit 3D to show its focus on the carrot is a lovely touch. As for Kameo, I’m very impressed with the little details like her headdress and facepaint. I know a lot of Lego-loving people in the studio would love to have that on their desk.”

Phew. That’s it for these fine art offerings – we’ll be back with more soon, but for now we hoped you enjoyed taking the tour, and our thanks to Ryan for his thoughts! We’re always on the lookout for more of your lovely art to shout out, so please tag us on the social media platform of your choice so we can easily find your masterpieces. Check out our fan art gallery on Facebook, our Instagram page where we also feature occasional pieces and of course the weekly #FanArtFriday spotlights on Twitter for our very latest finds!

Rare on Twitter: https://twitter.com/rareltd
Rare on Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/RareLtd
Rare on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/rareltd/
Rare on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/rare-ltd
Rare on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/RareLimited