Sketchbook2k9 - Maraton's humble beginning

I'm not too sure if this was my character, Maraton's, original drawing but this was during the time when Maraton was at it's prime because it was so fresh off of my mind and I absolutely loved this character back then. Now that I think about it it was quite a simple character. It was just a chubby Getter Robot that had Megaman like bubblicious features. I still love Maraton because of the potential that it possesses. It is a robot that is a buffet tray capable of parodying all of the possible super robots from back in it's golden days. I'm not as fond of drawing this character anymore but I really do want to treat this character as my mascot.

I'm not sure if any of your guys remember the days of the mascots when every single product that was being produced had some kind of mascot representing their product. Mickey Mouse is probably one of the most notable character mascots who has displayed his mousy mug in every single product possible. I remember going to Korea, as a child, and I remember seeing a variety of characters being displayed for all sorts of products and I really enjoyed looking at them. Nowadays mascots are no longer in trend so the quality and time spent on the designs aren't that great. For example look at this character for the Moscow Olympics.



This bear is closer to an illustration from a children's book compared to a traditional mascot displayed on products, that are usually crisp and clean. I rather like this liberated form, because it advertises the level of interest and acceptance that the country or the government expresses and allows.



The Olympic mascot for the Korean olympics. I remember seeing this character here and there during the late eighty's, when I was in Korea.



In my opinion the london Olympics mascots were quite terrible. They were hard to like no matter how much I opened my hearts to them. The police man and royal guard designs were engaging at the least.

There is at least one country that still puts a lot of emphasis on character design on products and that country is low and behold, Japan. They seem to use mascots a such a large variety of products, and a lot of their characters seem to make it big by being printed on stationary products. Girls here in Korea absolutely love these kind of mascot characters. Primary school girls up to young adults really dig these characters and you may spot some people on the trains pulling out their smartphone's with ridiculously bling-ed out phone cases. Those phone cases are sometimes related to those mascots. The most popular being Sanrio's Hello kitty and her gang of cutesy money gobblers, depriving poor school girls from their hard earned pocket money, that was solicited from their parents hard earned money from backbreaking working hours.

























One character that really has a spot light is a character called 'Rilakkuma'. This character is loved by many, but what's really fascinating is that I see a lot of women in their late 20's loving this character to the point where they are bordering the line of worship.




Look at his smug expression, and those simple circular eyes. Deep down that darkness he wants his product on your, not made in China Loui Vuitton bag. Speaking of which, it has already happened! The power of marketing!