BEHIND THE SCENES - "Into the Bulborb's Eye"

HEY-HO! Let's take a peek into production pieces from the very first Pikmin Bit!

As I've mentioned in the description for the YouTube upload of this Bit, this was a brief animation based on when I was first playing Pikmin, and I wanted to draw it. I started doodling a page worth of poses and expressions on Pikmin and a Bulborb.

This was around a time I was trying to sanitize my art-style to be more cutesy and broad, for lack of better terms, 'cuz I wanna fit in and not turn people away. One night, I was so frustrated with myself and my recent art that I just went loose and off-kilter with some Pikmin sketches, and the Bulborb expressions spoke to me especially. I really wanted to see it in motion, so I opened up another .PSD file and drew out the frames.The Ren & Stimpy Show was a big influence to this particular one, since I was marathoning the second season at the time. When the Bulborb was animated, I didn't want to post it until I had a point to it, so I added more scenes around it to tell a story. I added Captain Karolyn, who already had an appearance in a previous Pikmin-related post. I had to feel out some poses at first.This was too tall for Karo.This was better, but I wanted a more dynamic camera angle.

Now we got somethin'!

There were three Bulborb expressions that didn't make it to the final version, and those were displaying him scared of the incoming Pikmin.

 This part was actually animated by use of Photoshop's liquify tool, but I decided to cut it to save on time. If I kept it in, I would have had to make another shot of the Pikmin flying closer, and it wasn't really needed. Here's another shot of the scared Bulborb:

Same case as the previous. He was gonna be shivering in fear as the camera zooms in slowly. This, however, was not fully animated, and remains a mere gesture.

And then the animation was done, I uploaded it, and it became my most recognized work at that point. I had some art in the past get a sudden amount of likes and engagements before, but this was pretty cool to see unfold!

So I kept going since people were digging it-- I certainly liked Pikmin enough to do a lot of art about it.

All that said, thanks for your time! It's good to have you in the backstage! I'll be talking about the Bulbmin Bit on the next post, and I hope to see ya there!

Before I go, here's a clip of that cut scene I mentioned in animation...

~KARO '24