Over the course of 2005-2008, I assisted Art Asylum, designing production control art for various projects, most notably their Minimates line. This involved turnaround views for every part of the figure that was to be included in the final product, along with any surface artwork that needed to be applied.
My first project at Art Asylum was a fantastic opportunity, but man was it a doozy. I was asked to design a Minimate of the modern era Cylon, from the recently relaunched Battlestar Galactica show. At the time, I hadn’t seen the new show, and I don’t believe anything was out on DVD, so reference material was a little harder to come by. Still, I had received favorable feedback from my “audition” Minimate designs, and the powers that be wanted to see what I could do. In the end, I designed quite a few custom and interchangeable parts for the figure. As I recall, the figure was supposed to come packed with alternate “gun” and “normal” hands. When the figure was eventually released, however, these parts weren’t packed in together, and were spread out across the wave. This initial modern Cylon design got produced as five separate variants, all of which sold out on the initial offering. Out of all of the Minimate designs I have worked on, I believe the modern Cylon had the most mileage. All these years later, you can still find it packed in with the Battlestar Galactica 2-packs still on sale at Toys R’ Us.
While the photos shown here on the site represent the finished figure, it should be noted that I contributed the control art only. As with all of the Minimate projects, there were many talented people involved: production managers, sculptors, other designers… This figure was very much a team effort, and the finished product reflects the contributions of many individuals.
Released 12/20/2006
Featured in TOYFARE MAGAZINE, Issue #105, May 2006, TOYFARE MAGAZINE, Issue #127, March 2008, and WIZARD MAGAZINE, Issue #186, April 2007.
