Thank you, Beau! Sorry I caught this so late -- life has been particularly filled with stuff lately. Appreciate the attention.

happy birthday

Hi, Heralde8. See my other message for more information.

Hi a little late but just wanted to let you know I loved the "Nearest Faraway Place" story. How did that come about?

HELLO THERE FRIEND , HOW YA DOIN' ? I DIDN'T QUITE EXPECT SUCH A LONG & INVOLVED ANSWER , BUT I'm GLAD THAT I GOT ONE ANYWAY !

I HADN't REALIZED THAT THE CHARACTERS I HAD ASKED ABOUT HAD SUCH COMPLICATED HISTORIES . ALTHOUGH I've LOVED THE TRANSFORMERS SINCE '84 , (much like yourself) , I HAD NO IDEA THAT THEY HAD BEEN OFFICIALLY NAMED SO MANY YEARS AFTER THE FACT .
MOST OF WHAT I KNOW ABOUT THEIR BACKGROUNDS CAME FROM THE "CHARACTER-DEPICTIONS/BIO-PAGES" ON "TFWIKI-dot-NET" , SO IT NEVER EVEN OCCURRED TO ME THAT IT MIGHT NOT BE CORRECT .

THE RED FEMME IN THE BACKGROUND "IS" WHOM I WAS ASKING ABOUT , SINCE SHE WAS ON SCREEN FOR ONLY A FEW SECONDS , I GUESS THE NAME "REBEL" WILL HAVE TO DO .
(i suppose it could be worse;she could've been called the 'unimportant-nameless-red-colored-robo-chick-in-the-background-shot' by the t.v. show's original producers!)

I'm NOT EXACTLY SURE THAT I AGREE WITH YOUR OPINION OF THE PARADRON MEDIC THOUGH ; TRUE ENOUGH THAT SHE's PRACTICALLY "ARCEE's" TWIN , AT LEAST VISUALLY SPEAKING , BUT I've SEEN SOME OF THE COMIC-ART FOR HER & HER KIND ON TFWIKI , & IT SEEMS TO BE A COMMON FRAME-TYPE FOR THE FEMMES OF THAT ERA , (according to "them" at least,anyways) , SO I GUESS IT ALL DEPENDS ON HOW YOU CARE TO LOOK AT IT .

I "DO" LOOK FORWARD TO SEEING THE HUMAN-BUILT NINJA-FEMME "NIGHTBIRD" THOUGH , SHE WAS JUST SO COOL ! BUT EVEN THOUGH THEY GAVE HER EPISODE A TYPE OF "CLIFF HANGER" ENDING , THEY NEVER BOTHERED TO RE-ACTIVATE HER AGAIN !

IT WAS SUCH A SHAME TOO ; I REMEMBER THAT AFTER SEEING BOTH THAT EPISODE AS WELL AS THE ORIGINAL MOVIE , THAT THE TRANSFORMERS WOULD USE HER AGAIN AS A TYPE OF "ARCH-VILLAINESS/PERSONAL-ENEMY" TO ARCEE . IN RETROSPECT , IT HAD AN AWFUL LOT OF POTENTIAL , AT LEAST TO ME IF NO ONE ELSE , BOTH AS A KID & A FAN OF THE SHOW , BUT IT JUST NEVER SEEMED TO OCCUR TO ANY OF THE ANIMATORS OF THE TIME .

Sorry.

Actually, my friend, I have already given them plenty of thought in the past. Most of the characters you mention are possibles, and I've already decided to "avatarize" NIGHTBIRD one day.

However, I have a problem with retroactive nomenclature.

The characters now referred to as GREENLIGHT and LANCER were never originally meant to play prominent roles, which is why they went unnamed. It is of course possible that Beth Bornstein invented names for them, but they were never used -- they were only background characters -- and I doubt it was the two names that appear in the quite recent BotCon Timelines text story FLAMES OF YESTERDAY. And, to be frank, no matter how officially sanctioned this tale may be, these names, to me, add up to little more than professional fan creations. I know that's not a very charitable thing for me to say and it may ruffle a few feathers, but it's how I feel. For lack of anything better, I'll probably use them, but reaching that decision is taking a lot of back-and-forth in the tennis courts of my mind.

The red female rebel from FOREVER IS A LONG TIME COMING you mention -- is it the one we see as BETA explains about their group of slaves not being fighters, but rather scientists and workers?

It's not too likely that I'll make an avatar of the Paradron medic, because, for one thing, I think her actual significance falls far short of the adulation she seems to receive. It was an interesting curio that she was given her own figurine years ago, but she's primarily a copy of ARCEE, her likeness unlikely to have been used for any other purpose than convenience. But the most important reason for an omission is the fact that her head is exactly the same as that of her more well-known "sister" -- right down to the colour scheme.

The female Junkion is a much more probable project, though I find "Nancy" problematic, because it derives from Japanese publications and possibly the Japanese dub of THE BIG BROADCAST OF 2006. It goes hand in hand with other infamous dubs in which BLURR became "Wally" and BLASTER became "Billy," so accepting "Nancy" is tough. The original script referred to her as "Junkion Lady." I kind of like that. If I do an icon of her, I'll probably use that description.

Sorry to be so particular, but there's an odd thing I always see happening when current writers try to add to a mythology created by people of another time and place, who were informed by other influences. I wonder if the simple fact of there being no pre-existing TRANSFORMERS continuity to inspire the original writers and creators is what makes their approach the only one that would continue to work if the desire were to be true to the origin and retain a proper sense of belonging.

It's the same principle that means the same story -- say THE HUNCHBACK OF NOTRE DAME -- could be filmed in 1939, 1959, 1979, 1999, and 2009 and you would be able to place each movie within a few years of its production. Why? New people, new technology, new franchise rules, what-have-you.

That's why the publications these days appear to pay little or no mind to the self-contained nature of each continuity (original cartoon, new cartoons, original comic, new comics, the live action movies, and so on), attempting to reconcile the irreconcilable, bringing vernacular specific to one series into another, where it doesn't belong (the sparks of BEAST WARS never having existed as a term in the original series, for example, or how Primus is really a comic-only entity), so there's this kind of hodgepodge of elements mixed together and made increasingly difficult to maintain.

But, though I'd wish for some real names from the original people -- Beth or even Bob Budiansky, who came up with most of the regular character / toy names -- if and when I add their icons, GREENLIGHT and LANCER will have to do. They're not bad as modern attempts at classic names go.

YOU're GONNA DRIVE ME BUGGY ! ! ! YOU're JUST TOO DAMNED "GOOD" AT YOUR JOB DUDE !

I've GOT , LIKE , MAYBE 70%-TO-80% OF YOUR GALLERY , & I'm "STILL" FINDING STUFF FOR ME TO ADD !

STOP BEING GOOD AT THIS STUFF !

HI THERE "TRECATHLUS" !

YES , I WAS KIND OF HOPING YOU MIGHT DO THEM TOO ;
(& 'b.t.w.' their names are "GREENLIGHT" & "LANCER" ) !

BUT I WAS ALSO TALKING ABOUT SOME OF THE OTHER "RARE" FEMME-BOTS .

LIKE , FOR INSTANCE , "NIGHTBIRD" ;
THE RED-COLORED REBEL-FEMME FROM "FOREVER IS A LONG TIME COMING" ;
THE GREEN PARADRON MEDIC WHOM RESEMBLES "ARCEE" , BUT WITHOUT THE SHOULDER PAULDRONS THAT SHE HAS ;
& FINALLY OF COURSE "NANCY" , THE JUNKION FEMALE & WRECK-GAR's GIRLFRIEND !

NOT A LOT OF PEOPLE EVER REALLY PAY AS MUCH ATTENTION TO THEM AS THEY DO TO THE G.-1 MECHS OF COURSE , BUT I'M STILL PRETTY CONVINCED THAT THEY DESERVE JUST AS MUCH LOVE AS ANY OF THE OTHER CANNON CHARACTERS .

STILL , YOU "ARE" OF COURSE THE ARTIST , SO THE CHOICE "IS" YOURS , BUT I HOPE THAT YOU'll STILL AT LEAST GIVE IT A LITTLE MORE THOUGHT TO TRYING THEM IN THE FUTURE IF NOTHING ELSE .

THANKS FOR LISTENING , & PEACE !

Hi, AUTOBOTLOVERPRIME.

Hope you can read this all right (saw the thing on your page where you explain your use of ALL CAPS, but it's hard for me to type the same way).

Which females are missing? If you mean the unnamed ones -- orange and green -- from THE SEARCH FOR ALPHA TRION, it's certainly true that they've not been included. Others have asked for them to be featured as well. My problems are these: There may be just enough of them in the episode to be able to get all the details into avatars, but I honestly dread the work, because females are much harder for me to do in the first place, especially without a few really good frontal shots. The other issue is the fact that they have no names.

So I'm kind of torn, unless I can come up with some decent names that might be believable as being of a piece with the ones whose names we do know.

That said, I'm really glad to know you enjoy my work so much and I appreciate all the favs very much.

HI THERE "T" , HOW YA DOIN' BUDDY ? I WAS PERUSING YOUR "HEAD-SHOTS" -
(for lack of a better name )
- WHEN I REALIZED SOMETHING ;
YOU DON'T SEEM TO HAVE "ALL" OF THE 'G.-1' FEMMES IN YOUR COLLECTION YET !

DO YOU PLAN ON ADDING ANY OF THE MISSING FEMALES SOON ? I HOPE SO , 'CAUSE I REALLY DO LOVE YOUR WORK , AND I HAVE QUITE A GREAT DEAL OF IT IN SEVERAL OF MY "D.A." COLLECTION-FOLDERS !

I GUESS THAT's ALL FOR NOW , PEACE-OUT BUDDY !

I guess he only appears with it in the feature film and THE REBIRTH (which doesn't offer that much visually of any kind). I haven't tried to grab such a shot myself, but is nothing usable even at the point in the movie where he puts it on?

Has anyone noticed how hard it is to find any good pictures of Daniel Witwicky in his exosuit. Been trying to find one in the style of the Mtmte profiles. Turns out there isn't any at all. Granted he's not everyone's favorite character, but I figured there would be something. Anyway I thought I'd throw the ideal out there to see if anyone else felt the same.

I have every confidence that you will.

Thank you!

I hadn't actually thought about doing Superion. Hmmm. Maybe once I've done Silverbolt! Hopefully I'll be able to do them both justice.

My privilege!

Your renditions of the Aerialbots are really wonderful -- like excerpts from novelettes. I consider these five the overall handsomest team of combiners -- and SILVERBOLT has always been a favourite. I look forward to your adding him.

Any plans to depict SUPERION in this manner as well?

Thank you very much for the +favs!

You're very welcome.

And thank you, beau20. I appreciate it.

Thank you, David.