SUPERTOYS LAST ALL SUMMER LONG

 I saw these Supertoys [of New York] EXPLORER III toy vehicles on auction a while back so I saved the images.

Being a sort of 80's type of SpaceX, the BHS Explorer 12 toy line has always found a warm welcome on Moonbase and these Woolworth specials have too.

Looking at the price stickers, they were clearly in a sale way back when and half price!

Mike Noble did the original BHS books artwork that went with the line. These Woolworth jobs look to be too simple to be Mike's work.

Did you have anything like this? Do you still? Does anyone collect them?

ZERO-X: PLANET OF BONES ON ANDERSON ENTERTAINMENT

Check out this cool multi-part TV21 strip story about our fave mars ship Zero-X on the Gerry Anderson Official site via You Tube.

Art by Mike Noble no less!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_VG3bywwQUs

What do you think?

THE NOBLE ZERO-X

Art by Mike Noble

for TV21 Comic

Do you like it?

TV21 STAR FLEET AND THE NUCLEAR FERRY

In April 1983 the British comic Look-In ran a story-line in it's Star Fleet strip involving what SWORD fans recognise as a Nuclear Ferry nearly twenty years after its appearance as a Century 21 toy. 

The strip was illustrated by the late great Mike Noble, who was well-known to fans of TV21. 

The entire Star Fleet Look-In strip is available to view online over at the excellent Star Fleet X Bomber webpage created by superfan DJ Dust. I contacted DJ and asked if I could post the April strips depicting the Nuclear Ferry [called a 'Tanker'] who replied as follows:

Hi Woodsy

Thanks for the email, and when I say that, I actually really mean it. I find these days that people just take stuff off web sites and pass it off as their own and if you ask them about it, get incredibly defensive and rude!! I've got no problem at all with you borrowing anything you want from F-Zero-One. Help yourself mate... :)

cheers

DJ Dust

Some of you may remember in January 2012 generous blog readers clubbed together to buy Wotan an original page of Mike Noble artwork from the Star Fleet strip for his 50th Birthday from The Book Palace. Like an episode from the Twilight Zone, Wote blogged about Mike Noble's Star Fleet Christmas 2011, not knowing he would be the owner of the original art a month later! The Book Palace still have original Star Fleet art for sale should you wish to dream!

So, what do you think of Mike Noble's version of the Nuclear Ferry?

Re-posted from 2012

MIKE NOBLE OX MYSTERY SOLVED!

Hi Woodsie, I was really impressed with Scoop's comics art posting last month. Not the least because it explains a ten year old mystery for me!

I LOVE Japanese SF art -Shigeru Komatsizaki's Anderson works (going all the way back to Supercar!) are the best! If I could paint competently, that is the style I'd like to produce.

Anyway, almost 10 years ago I was working towards my first exhibition and one of my (unsold) pieces was a 3D plaque inspired by a Japanese illustration from 1967

and here's what I did with that image...

What i didn't realise then, was the Japanese illustration was pulled from this Mike Noble piece...

Thanks Scoop -

you rock!

Lewis

Oz

SPACE 1999 ALIEN BUGGY KIT: A POSSIBLE ORIGIN BY READER MIKE N.

Hi Woodsy

The only loose connection - and it's VERY loose - I can find is that it, Terranova47's Alien buggy kit [featured the other day], slightly resembles a buggy driven by an invading alien force in a story from Look-in's comic strip version drawn by the great Mike Noble.

Here are the Look-In pics as promised.

Cheers.

Mike Nicholl

 

Alternatively it's maybe a pre-production prototype of the 2-man buggy they rode around in but the design was altered before shooting in a similar way to the original Eagle design by Chris Foss?

PS. also a cracking model from Martin Bower that I found whilst googling pre-production art although I think it's a much more recent creation - would pay serious money to own a kit of that! We need to see this design in a sci-fi show sometime.

Mike N.

MIKE NOBLE HOVER TANK IN COLOUR

Still pursuing space tanks, here's another from Mike Noble's Fireball XL5 TV21 strip for the blog!

Andy B

mike noble's project sword zero-x

Above, Mike Noble's black and white OX artwork from the Project SWORD story SCAPEGOAT from TV21 issue no. 187

Mike Noble's colour version in the Zero-X strip in TV21 issue no. 114 

Connection made by Scoop.

THE FUTURE IS FANTASTIC: GUEST MIKE NOBLE

I think we're all aware of artist Mike Noble and his comic strip  contributions to Gerry Anderson's TV series.

Mike's first full Gerry Anderson related comic strip first appeared in issue 6  of TV Century 21, when he took over from Graham Coton on Fireball XL5.

He was still working on it when he started on his next comic strip, Zero X. This is his last single page for Fireball XL5, prior to Don Lawrence (better known for his Trigan Empire strip in Ranger and Look & Learn) took over.

Mike did say regarding the Fireball XL5 strip that he'd discussed things with the editor, and it was decided to give the strip more realism , and make the characters look human rather than their puppet TV counterparts, hence Zoonie never makes an appearance.!

Mike's first two panels for Zero X. Considering this was never a TV series it was still a popular strip.

It started in issue 105 and continued until 241, although like Fireball, Mike didn't illustrate all the Zero X strips. Jim Watson did a fair stint, and  briefly,  Eric Eden and F. Belsia.

Here's Mike's last panels for Zero X in the penultimate issue 241 of TV21.

Mike was one of the several artists who worked on the Captain Scarlet strip. Following Ron Embleton, Mike's first Scarlet strip appeared in issue 158, and covered four pages - two in colour, and two in black & white.

His last Captain Scarlet strip for TV21 issue 189. Still four pages but only one in colour.

When TV21 changed it's format, following issue 242. Mike did produce some impressive work for the Star Trek strip, but once TV21 was swallowed up by Valiant comic, Mike got regular full colour comic strip work with Look In magazine starting with Timeslip. But he would be doing another Gerry Anderson series comic strip in time!

Mike worked on the Space 1999 strip in Look In, taking over from John M Burns. During his talk he mentioned this, and his mistake in giving the Eagle three boosters rather than four. A reader had complained, but as Mike explained, he'd never seen the programme, and his reference material was fairly limited. Although , he did say he still had his original reference sheet sent from AP Films for Fireball XL5.

Mike's debut panels for the Space 1999 strip.

Mike's final panels for Look In on the Space 1999 strip.

These days Mike doesn't do that much art as arthritis is creeping in. But just to keep his hand in, he can still manage odd commission though. 

MIKE NOBLE RETURNING TO ANDERCON

I'm pleased to hear that prolific comic artist Mike Noble is another returning guest to Andercon, 

Some of my earliest memories are seeing Mike's excellent renditions of Fireball XL5 in TV Century 21. in 1965.

His style is instantly recognizable, as can be seen on this 1967 annual, and his talent shows no sign of diminishing as this painting shows from the 2009 Network DVD Fireball XL5 release.

Here's a limited run B&W print signed by Mike Noble that was released by Fanderson in the eighties.

When I saw Mike at last year's event, he and fellow artist Lee Sullivan had collaborated on another limited print featuring Mike's Zero X art, with Lee providing the computer generated background.

As Lee is attending as well, I look forward to seeing them both again, and wondering what they might have planned this time.

LEE SULLIVAN AND MIKE NOBLE ZERO-X PRINT

Further to Scoop's post about artist Lee Sullivan, check out this beautiful painting of Zero-X Lee has done along with the legend himself, Mike Noble. It sort of reminds me of what a US Tarheel box might have looked like for a Zero-X toy! To see this picture properly and more then check out Lee's website.

BIRTHDAY SPECIAL: MIKE NOBLE'S PROJECT SWORD ZERO X

Well Swordies, we are nearing the end of the Blog's fourth birthday bash and I hope that you have enjoyed it. I certainly have and there are still a few choice goodies for your delectation this final party weekend.



 

 

To kick off the Saturday here's a little something on Zero-X. Like many of you I love this particular spacecraft's design and remember how awesome a toy it was back in 1967. Seeing it cruise along the lounge floor between the lava lamps was a thing of beauty. Like many of you as well I love illustrations and paintings of the Zero-X and it was a random browse through the fabulous GACCH website [Gerry Anderson Complete Comics History], where I discovered that legendary illustrator Mike Noble had drawn it as the brilliant black and white masthead for the TV21 story THE SCAPEGOAT [17th August 1968] pictured below.

In March 2011 I wrote to Mr. Noble about this illustration and below is an extract from his insightful and interesting reply:

 

 

"Regarding the Zero X mast in your letter [below], I did not do it specifically for Project SWORD. It was I'm sure recycled from a strip story I recall doing for the magazine [TV21] at an earlier date....

....You are quite right in thinking that I got quite a lot of inspiration in my work from NASA space projects that were going on the time. An aunt living in America used to send me LIFE magazines on a regular basis and there was a lot of information there about space vehicles and pictures of outer space which was very useful to me. I did however, like to design my own hardware and make them practicable and believable. because we freelance artists worked at home generally there was not much personal contact between us, consequently any inspiration and ideas we may have gleaned from one another would have been through seeing their artwork in TV21. As to my knowing the artists you mention in your letter, I know only about Eric Eden and those regulars drawing for the magazine. There were any number of people doing artwork for packaging and annual work whom I was not aware of at the time.

 

 

Kind Regards

Mike Noble"

[Brackets] indicate inserts from me, Woodsy. 

 

 

The earlier TV21 strip Mike refers to in his letter, from which his Zero-X was recycled for the SWORD story was found in a TV21 over a year earlier, 25th March 1967, in a colour strip entitled Story Two aka The Stowaway/ Sentence of Death/ The Alien Menace. You can see the colour original of the 'SWORD' Zero-X, below top right, courtesy of TV21 enthusiast Mike B.

For more Mike Noble you can do no better than read GACCH's lengthy interview with him in two parts. There is also a great 12 minute video interview on You Tube by TB1fan, which you will find in the right-hand side-bar of the blog. Lew Stringer also covers Mike's work on his great blog BLIMEY!

 

 

Although Mike Noble is the most famous, many of you will know that there were a handful of comics' illustrators who tried there hand at Zero-X, not to mention Shigeru Komatsuzaki's box art for Imai. One of my favourite TV21 artists is Ron Turner, whose dark shadows and epic mechanics are instantly recognisable, also had a crack at the OX. His unique rendering of the spaceship can be clearly seen on the strip CONFLICT ON MARS, which appeared in the 1967 TV Century 21 Annual. An extract of the strip and close-up appear below.

None of these great illustrators would have been able to get stuck into the Mars ship had it not been for the late great Derek Meddings and his genius for designing grand hardware and space machines including the Zero-X. I have never seen his original concept art for the spacecraft but you can get an idea of what it looked like from this black and white photograph of Sylvia Anderson admiring what appears to be Zero X concept art in the Meddings style [picture Frasers]. I shall consult my copy of his book 20th Century Visions but in the meantime, if anyone has insights into Derek Medding's original art or any other Zero-X illustrators you admire then let us know and we can keep this thread going. OX is GO!

[photo: Frasers/ Sylvia Anderson]