There’s a great new shirt up at TeeFury today, with a design on it by Jason Tracewell called “Bob-ombs” As you can see from the image at the right, it features two Bob-ombs, from the Super Mario games, encountering each other. Each one’s wearing a sticker that says, “Hello! My Name is Bob.” What an awkward moment…

The holidays are coming up, and its a good time to get creative. I mean, there’s a good chance that you may be making home-made gifts for your family and friends this year, if you’re short on cash. So to help you get into a creative frame of mind, this week Important Importables is going to talk about oekaki. Yeah, I know, I’m stretching for some kind of connection between this festive time of year and the whole oekaki message board thing. Humor me.

Besides, oekaki could come in handy for preparing for the fast approaching holiday season. You could practice your drawing skills on an Oekaki board, then create a design you could use for your own Christmas cards! I’d say Hannukah cards too, but it’s kind of late for that, since Hannukah ends December 19, 2009 this year and today’s the 18th.

So, let’s learn about oekaki, and some oekaki boards where you can start doodling…

This week Important Importables continues the whole fan-creation theme. Last week we looked at video game doujinshi, which are fan-made comics inspired by video games. This week, we’re moving onto video game fan-art, the other way fans can express their devotion to a particular game. In particular, we’re going to be going over how to find fan-art drawn by Japanese artists.

Since it can be difficult to find art by Japanese artists, this week’s column is devoted to searching for it using two tools. First, we’ll see how to effectively use Google.co.jp to find images or artist websites. Then, we’ll learn how to make an account at and search the Japanese image site Pixiv.

So, let’s learn how to find some fan-art…

I remember working with perler beads as a child. Nothing elaborate – just flat designs from kits that my mom would later iron to make permanent. Never did I even imagine that works of video game art, like the ones by Doctor Octoroc were even possible. Just look at the Gamecube (pictured above) that he created!

Doctor Octoroc creates perler and hama bead sprite creations in his spare time. Incredibly elaborate creations. He not only creates large bead sprites or scenes from games, but also creates 3D replicas of consoles and custom sprite creations. (I didn’t even know they had that many different bead colors!)

Game art contests are fairly common, but they seldom have rewards like the Little King’s Story art contest. The art contest for the Marvelous Entertainment and XSeed game will have 100 winners, and the winning pieces of art will appear in the game, which will be released Q4 2008.

See, the contest asks people to draw an Unidentified Mysterious Animal (UMA). The best one will be created as an exclusive character for the NA release of the game, and the other pictures will appear in the game’s art museum as masterpieces. The contest ends August 1, 2008, so start drawing.

I like hamsters. In fact, I’ve always had pet dwarf hamsters. So naturally I was drawn to the cuteness that is Hamtaro, from the series anime/manga series Hamtaro. So when I came across Hamtaro: Ham-Hams Unite sprites at The Shyguy Kingdom while looking for other sprites to use as potential patterns, I couldn’t resist. Originally the piece was going to have Hamtaro and Bijou in it, but I didn’t realize Hamtaro would end up so big. I had precut the fabric, thinking I had plenty of room, and then once Hamtaro’s outline was complete I realized I should have actually measured rather than guessed.

The artist from Pixeloo has accomplished an interesting feat. The artist has created a picture of what Mario from Super Mario Brothers would look like if he were a real human being. The photo is jarring to say the least, and definitely isn’t one for the weak of stomach. Maybe it’s just me, but I wouldn’t be too confident if someone told me I had to rely on this guy to save the day…

My latest cross stitch creation was a very special gift for my mom. She too loves video games (my dad and her owned an original Intellivision), and Burgertime was one of her favorite classic titles. Once she heard I was making cross stitch creations from video game sprites, she asked if I could make one for her, and this was what I came up with. It features chef Peter Pepper being chased by a hot dog and an egg.

My latest cross stitch was a request from one of my best friends. She’s a Legend of Zelda fan, so she asked if I could make a Link for her. This was the result. It is Link, accompanied by a little Navi. (If you’re a Phantom Hourglass fan, you can pretend that it is Ciela.)

Click through to learn more about the piece.

Growing up, owning a NES was a big deal, and every game became part of a treasured memory. This is, in part, what drew me to Little Nemo: The Dream Master for my second video game cross stitch. For my second cross stitch I wanted to do a slightly larger cross stitch, but at the same time go back to a classic system. So I headed over to The Shyguy Kingdom and picked out some sprites from the game to create a pattern. I always loved how Nemo could become different animals or fuse with them by tossing candy at them, so I wanted to incorporate that into the cross stitch.