Thanks for tuning in to the Loser Kid Pitball Podcast. My name is Josh Root. With me, my co-captain. Scott Larson. One person has said, we've dropped the episode numbers. Okay, here you go. We're on episode 175. I'll keep track. I promise. 175. And today, we've got an awesome guest on. But before we jump into the guest, we're going to be talking a little bit about Funhouse today, and maybe some other games that might be announced. If you're getting these games, Scott, who are you buying them from? I'll buy them from Zach and Nicole Mini at Flip N Out Pinball. They've actually been great in so many ways. So if you want new stuff, if you want used stuff, they have great customer service. Zach is always super responsive, especially with Facebook Messenger. That actually seems to be the best way to get a hold of him. But they post their used stuff also on Facebook all the time. So if you're looking for the new game, if you're looking for a used game, Stern is going to be coming out likely with a game here. So if you want to be on the interested list and there's a big rumor, it's a big title again, go ahead and contact Zach and call me and flip it up pinball. Or if you want fun house, definitely hit up Zach or Nicole many right now. You can get $500 off if you use discount code loser kid where you do that checkout or you just let Zach know through messenger. hey, I've been listening to Loser Kids. I've been dying to get a fun house. Whether it be the LE or the Classic Edition, doesn't matter. Get $500 off on that. Also, if you like our shirts, silverballswag.com. These are the new ones from Vic VP. Thanks, Vic, for sending these over to us. He was nice enough to give us the PNGs to hook us up. So you can now buy these shirts through Silverball Swag. As long as Neil has put it on the website, he's out of the office till Wednesday. So Scott, why don't you introduce our guest for us? Okay, so this is Brian Allen with Flyline Design. So I've actually been familiar with Brian Allen for a long time. In fact, over my shoulder here, you're mirrored, but it's my right shoulder, but it looks like my left on the mirror. You can actually see the Medieval Madness alternative translight. I also have his alternative translight for Monster Bash, which is great. And he's been doing a lot of different art packages for especially classic games. He's been great. I even have the art blades in my Medieval Madness. So I have the Flyland Design Alternative Medieval Madness. And it's been great. I really like the new take on the old projects because sometimes the old projects you don't really like. You know, OK, it gives you a good option to say, hey, I like the classic, but I really like a new option, too. So we'd like to welcome Brian Allen. He also did the alternative art package for the Funhouse remake. so welcome to the show brian and thanks for joining us yeah i really appreciate it yeah and thanks scott i think you were probably like one of my earliest supporters going way back to monster bash i mean i remember your name from way back then so i really appreciate it and then just seeing you at shows constantly and stuff so really appreciate it speaking of the artist on your uh on the loser kid shirt that's fantastic so vick vp he's an arcade uh gentleman you can check out his youtube here but yeah he he's he's testing out some some uh designs we'll put it that way and if you look really closely at the shirt it's actually quite fun um i thought the rule was never uh wear a t-shirt with your picture on it but i am i'm breaking that rule now because if you look It has Loser Kid in the Funhouse font, and it has Josh and I as Rudy, and we are pointing at each other. And by the way, VicVP is an awesome guy. Just background, if you don't know, he's the guy that we talked about when they were talking. I believe it was John Wick, right, Josh? It was John Wick when they did a reveal, and Stern reached out to a few influencers and said, hey, we're trying to promote a product. And part of us was like all the people who are doing the podcast was like, we are we have been doing this for a long time. Why didn't you reach out to us? You you reached out to some of these some of these people that we haven't heard of. Well, Vic was actually one of those. And he's the one that we talked about. Like, well, he has a he has a pinball machine in the background. He actually reached out to us. We have been able to interact with him. And he's he's a great guy, by the way. He is he is fun. He has a lot of arcade stuff. And so it's been really fun to get to know him. And he asked us, hey, what is your Stern Insider Connected? And also, what do you enter in when you get a high score? So he had some ideas for t-shirts. And this is one of them. We're going to show the other one. But this is awesome. It says Loser Kid in the Funhouse font. But it also has Josh and I and our caricatures on it, which is fun. So as Josh said, if you want to get your own version of that, it's on Silver Ball Swagger. It will be shortly. But one thing I want to talk about, Brian, you've been involved in pinball for a while. Even before we got into the podcasting thing, you've been doing this for a long time. So can you give us the background on what brought you into pinball? What is your origin story in pinball? And you also do a lot of other stuff, too. So let's talk about first how you got connected to pinball. that was actually uh the ill-fated alien pinball machine with highway pinball um i was i can't remember if i reached out to andrew highway or if he reached out to me i think he might have reached out to me and at that time i was really not plugged into the world of pinball at all. So I did not know at the time that that alien pinball was already kind of struggling. But he hired me to do the limited edition back glass for his machine. And later, I pretty much realized that he probably just did that to kind of buy himself some time, because he wanted to release some new artwork to like get some new interest to just because it later came out that there was like he was basically out of money at that point um but i drew this alien queen for the pinball machine uh he released the artwork and that brought in like a flood of pinball fans to my website and then very shortly after like i mean i'm talking like two weeks after, I think. That's when Andrew Highway announced that they weren't going to be making any games, and he basically was out of money. I luckily did get paid for that, but I know a lot of people who worked on the game didn't, which I think is terrible. But when people found out that this Backglass was not going to be released, I started getting messages from people saying that they want to buy it on a print. So we made a really nice, like, really thick paper, really huge prints of this thing. I signed and numbered them out of 100 or something like that. And everybody was so incredibly supportive because they, you know, they were disappointed that it wasn't going to be on a game. I was incredibly disappointed because I thought this was this huge opportunity that just kind of went up in smoke um but after that then i just started getting messages from people saying for for example monster bash did like hey you should you should redraw some of these old back glasses because we love your artwork and we want it in our machines and i just kept i would do one and then i would get requests for another and i kept going um and and that's when i connected with planetary pinball to get a williams uh bally license so that i could like officially make artwork for their games um and i think now we've got like maybe 13 alternate back glasses now um i've done cabinet artwork through planetary pinball uh the side blades you mentioned and stuff like that um started going to pinball conventions everyone's very supportive there um and i'm i'm rambling but like in in between that there have been opportunities for me to work with some of the bigger companies i can't really get into specifics but unfortunately like probably like four different times it's either happened where I've started something and then the licensing deal blew up or things blew up before I could even get started. Um, so I haven't had very good luck in that area. Uh, but I am, I do have a couple, probably like three different things, opportunities cooking this year. They kind of came all at once actually, like in the last couple of months. Um, I can talk a little bit about that, but can't get into specifics. Well, before you, before we start developing into that, There was a lot you just said that we can unpackage. First question I have, so you did the Alien edition for Andrew Highway. Is this the one that's on your website that's the 35th anniversary banner that you sell? Yeah, yeah. It says, like, Alien 35th, and the eggs are, like, beneath it. They're hatching. Yeah. This is insane. If you're watching the video, I've just posted it right here next to me. But this artwork is insanely cool. I didn't know this is where you started out at, was doing the alien stuff. Yeah, in pinball it was anyway. Before that, like I've been a freelance illustrator full-time since 2012, and I've been a professional illustrator since 2004. So like 21 years. Definitely. But this was your introduction to pinball. because I think when I first really remember pinball, so I've been in it for quite some time. When I started listening to podcasts, started digging deeper, it was during the whole shenanigans of Andrew Highway and all that stuff, right? And the whole two weeks and all that. But I mean, this is some art that I've definitely seen of yours that I think we see occasionally because it's just amazing art. It really is. So you were saying though that you've kind of had some other projects fall through the cracks. I know one that I kind of asked you about before we got on screen was the Oktoberfest one. Can you kind of tell me a little bit about that and how that didn't pan out, I guess? Oh, that was more like, so I had reached out to them thinking that maybe I could make alternate back glasses for American Pinball. And they were open to it, and we were going to do it. I think it might have been, I think I just got too busy with freelance projects. and then with the Williams Valley alternate back glasses that I just didn't have time to get to it and it just sort of fizzled out. If there was interest in that, I'd certainly do it because it would be a lot of fun. I'm picturing something just with tons of activity and drunk people. Although I do remember some direction from them that I don't think that they wanted it to be too fun and drunk. and like if you like if you've seen a lot of my artwork some of my characters are i like making things a little weird and creepy and fun and stuff so um since these alternate backlashes these are all things i do in my spare time like if the theme is not something i'm really excited about i'm probably not gonna make time to do it you know because there's always there's still a big line of ones that I want to get to that I'll probably do first. Definitely. Well, I know that like you're, you're, you have a Mario one that's kind of like a darker take on Mario and stuff too. That looks pretty cool. Yeah. Thanks. Yeah. Go ahead. The one thing that's interesting about what you've done is now in art, it's actually licensing is a big deal and you've actually done something that I think a lot of artists haven't done is you've actually approached the original license holder to make sure that, hey, you are making something with the permission of the license. Can you tell me a little bit more about that and why that's important to you? Well, for one, the back glass would be kind of useless if it didn't have the title of the game on it. So most of the people who are making bootlegs, they avoid putting that title on. And I think that makes the product look worse and it's probably not going to sell as well. But mainly I just – I wouldn't feel comfortable because all of these backglasses are made by like artists that were at the top of their game. And like they're all masterpieces in their own way, right? So like for me to just come in here and start copying everybody's work, I think I'd be run out of town really quick. And I would feel terrible about doing that. I think most of the people that you see doing unlicensed stuff in pinball, they're usually overseas. Like they're, you know, from Europe, mainly Europe actually. and the only reason they get away with that is they're just harder to sue it's a lot more expensive to do that so so I guess morally I thought it's the right thing to do but I also didn't want to get sued that you know so there is a little self-interest there and also it's just like it's worth paying the royalty to not have to like look over your shoulder all the time and now i don't have to uh now i can draw the characters as they are instead of like trying having to make like a a kind of parody or spoof on everything you know so how does how does fair use work sorry now that you bring it up drawing characters in a parody and stuff like that sure so so i just i'm not a lawyer um but i do have a copyright attorney So I do know a little bit about this stuff. So don't take my word for it. But it's not like there's a law written that if you make a parity of something, nobody can sue you. But there is precedent. and if I made a parody, which I do often, you'll see that I do a lot of parodies of licensed properties. And if somebody wanted to send me a cease and desist or sue me, they certainly could. And then I would still have to defend it. But my understanding is that if a reasonable person can look at that parody and say that, well, that did not come from the actual brand that's something that is commenting on it that is like not necessarily making fun of it but drawing it in a different way and there's a point to the way that it's being drawn then like that is a parody and it is protected um but again it's not a law you'd still have to defend it and And so, I don't know. That's why when I do fan art, I don't just draw the characters as they are, which I think is a little boring and lazy. Like I'm trying to put a twist on things and make them caricatures. And I'm not just talking about the pinball art. I'm talking more about my own personal parody work. which I day-to-day I mostly do freelance work for clients so most of the stuff that I do is not parody and it's not like I IP other people's IP but in my free time that's normally what I kind of gravitate to because I just I'm a fan of all these things and I just want to like you know, do my take on them. And they're more popular, too. I mean, to be honest, they do sell better when people can identify what the IP is So I want to be honest about that of course Well there is one that I actually looking at and I have thought of pulling the trigger a few times. I actually have a Black Rose. Oh, yeah. We've always laughed a little bit about the backlash of Black Rose because although it's consistent with the era it was done, And the joke was it kind of looks like Richard Gere in drag. And so it's kind of fun to see your take on it. And I look at that and I think, actually, that would fit really well in my Black Rose. Right now my Black Rose is in storage. It's actually usually over here where my Beatles is. But I try to rotate games because I only have room for 10 games down here. But why did you use Black Rose? Because that's a little bit of an outlier. I was getting a lot of requests for that one. Probably because of the Richard Gere. Maybe. I choose them basically on, like, how many requests I get. And then if it's a theme that I think I can draw well and have fun doing. And here, like, I love drawing pirates. And I drew a bunch of skeletons and skulls in it. So any opportunity I had to do that. um that was challenging though because it has a uh it has like a a cutout um for the score and like it was actually very difficult to line up because that cutout for whatever reason is actually not centered in the back last it's just a little bit off um so there's a lot of technical stuff like that that comes up that is really difficult because i don't have a black rose So I had to – I had some friends or fans test it for me, which was extremely helpful but challenging. But anyway, yeah, Black Rose has actually done a lot better than I thought it would because there's not – I don't see a lot of those games out there. Yeah, I certainly like your Backglass way better than the standard one, so I'm sure I will be placing order for that one here soon. Well, thanks. Is there a trans light you don't own from Brian, Scott? Okay. Okay. I do have Attack from Mars. And I do love the original Attack from Mars because it is – one, I have an LE, so it's a mirrored back glass. But I do like that classic 50s feel. It feels like one of those B movies from the 50s. And so that one speaks to me a little more. Yeah, I love that one. I mean, I love all of these. When I go into these, I'm not trying to improve on them because I think they're already perfect. And that's actually one of the challenges is that you're starting from something that somebody spent a lot of time on to already find the best way to do it. And I'm just trying to put my spin on it, just make an alternate version of it. How would I have done it at the time? um but i also i have to stick generally to the same layout because the lights in the back glass if i move things too much then you're you might have like a blinking light on somebody's crotch or something you know so we don't want so um so that gets really challenging because i want i want to change things but especially um i did one for bride of pinbot and it's like there's really no other way to draw that without her her leg you know because it has the it has the lights on it um i tried to try to do different poses but i couldn't so that's um it's a fun challenge for sure and i would say i'm okay i'm being a little dismissive of the of the uh of the black rose backlash but it certainly is iconic and i do like having sometimes a different take on it because most of these games are fan favorites that a lot of people own and it's nice for me like medieval madness yeah i do like the original but i like people when they come up they can see an alternative approach and just a different vision of it so i i find that a little more fun so it's more refreshing for a classic look yeah thanks yeah i think there's nothing wrong with presenting alternatives i think some people get offended at me trying to uh they think my by me doing this i'm like insulting the original creators but like i i couldn't respect them more i mean these guys are legends and when you talk about the black rose like that was literally painted and i have these tools that make it so much easier uh to do stuff like that and i'm just amazed that they were able to do what they did um painting or like having to to worry about silkscreen which is a nightmare i set up a lot of silkscreen posters for for bands now and it's just absolute i hate it so tedious it's a nightmare trying to figure out half tones and everything so so i have so much respect for them i mean you're we're talking about original art here so how did you have this mentality going into funhouse because funhouse is that classic design and stuff like that and so there's kind of like a realism to the original one so how do you how do you i guess pay homage to the original but yet put your flair on it well yeah so funhouse was excellent because they really do they gave me a lot of freedom on that one um i should be working with them again soon i i think we've been talking about it um for their for their next one but i just to me the the rudy was always so creepy i just wanted to like uh crank that up a notch um and i i love fun houses to me are scary um i i went to this one in ocean city all the time and it like There were these skeleton pirates in it and stuff, and it just freaked me out as a kid. So I just pumped in lots of scary clowns. It's very difficult to design something if you worry about trying to make something that's going to please everybody. and I knew when I was drawing it that like not everybody is going to be into freaky clowns and like the way I drew it but in this case if they really didn't like that they can choose the original so this was a great opportunity to just really pull the trigger on my own style and that's a consideration I always make too is that I remind myself that they hired me because they like my style of work and I have this opportunity. So I need to make it look like I made it. Like I want people to look at it and say, that is Brian Allen's style. Uh, I don't want to be hired for a job and then have to like copy someone else's style. Does that make sense? Um, cause I, I just, I don't really understand, don't really see the point, you know, um, that, That sort of becomes a dead end if you're just a guy who could just – you're hired to just finish someone else's style rather than have your own. Yeah, mimic it. Yeah, yeah. Yeah, so I do try to pump my style in everything, which can also hurt because my style is definitely not good for everything. You know, there's a lot of themes that have come out in the last few years for pinball games that I would I would have never been the right pick for, you know. So having such a specific style has really helped me in my freelance work because I think I can I think I get bigger jobs because people are looking specifically for my style rather than just anybody who can do the job. but then it also makes it harder to get jobs like specifically pinball jobs because the theme has to be like an exact fit for for my style you know definitely that makes sense so pendretti has talked about different versions of different games too that they have considered doing now i'm looking at your website you also you already have a theater of magic you have a tales of the Arabian Nights, you have, you know, Bram Stoker's Dracula. Is there, are there other things, how do you incorporate like an entire art package? Because you have the back glass or the translator, but then you also have to incorporate, you know, the side panels and you have to incorporate, you know, the side art and the coin door. And how do you approach making a new take on an entire art package versus just focusing on the translator? The play field, so far, that's the most challenging part for me. Most time-consuming part, too. I think I've designed maybe 10 now, 10 playfields. so to do an entire package the translate is like the part i enjoy the most because that's the most that's most similar to everything else i do you know a lot of t-shirt designs a lot of poster designs that's what i do day to day that to me is like the book cover that's the window into into the world. So I have the most fun with that. The cabinet art I usually do next, and then we usually save the play field for last, at least on the projects I've worked on. Just because I think the back glass sort of sets the tone for the game. It says what the characters are going to look like, and then the play field becomes way more technical about what are these characters doing? Where are they? So you're drawing different landscapes and stuff like that. And then the side blades. I forgot about side blades. Those are a lot of fun too, but they have their own challenges because you have to draw around all the ramps and obstacles that block the artwork on the side blades. so I usually do I usually do a lot of work like I put paper up on the side and trace over the ramps and stuff with a pencil and then scan it in so I know like exactly what's going to be blocked I think some of the other side blades out there um they're they're not really taking that into account so they just like throw a lot of art on them which ends up being covered when you when you apply them so i really try to make i try to make the side blades like complement the area that they are uh uh sharing on the play field um did i answer your question yeah well okay the question is do you have like is there is there potential other ones that you would be interested in working on with like with the funhouse you did the the entire art oh sure oh yeah yeah so i i have like a couple things I'm juggling at the moment. I might get all of them. I might get none of them. I don't know. But there is, Pedretti has been talking to me all year about possibly doing their next one. But I haven't started that yet. So I don't know what is going on with that. But there's another, one of the big companies did just ask me to do an art test. And I'm just waiting for them to approve my quote. It's a fantastic IP. I think I would be perfect for it because it fits my style really well. I think there's only a couple other artists doing the test. I don't know. I might have a good shot on that one. Then there's another company. I was going to say big company. They're in there. We've been talking about Like we've had like three almost starts this same year. Actually, it lasts like four months. So that can be frustrating because I've been on like a conference call and then we have the IP set and everything and then something changes the last minute. But it seems like I will be working with them very shortly, I think. so the issue is with these the way pinball works is that these things even if i start working today they're not going to be released until like 2027 so that that's a frustrating part of this is that the the production cycle is so long and each company is really only making like two games a year maybe so if it's it's really hard to get an opportunity to do one of these things and if you miss it which I did I missed an opportunity in the spring for one of the bigger companies I did an art test along with three other artists and they ended up choosing the IP ended up choosing the artists that they always work with i'm trying not to say too much um but which i i understand that choice you know but it's still like a devastating hit because uh you know it's so exciting to maybe and i really like the ip too and then you put a lot of work into into the test but um that's just part of it uh unfortunately well two questions yeah you keep talking about art test can you explain to our listeners what an art test is and then the the second question tacked onto that too is um when you're talking about you know i just my my brain went blank i'm so sorry okay oh my goodness you know what we'll just let me really okay before you can't go any further that's your question about the art test i'm re-asking okay okay before we go any further I want you to, if you would explain to us what an art test is. Now I remember my second question. Yeah. And then, because you were talking about a licensor decided to go with the artist that they usually use for any other product that is out there in the world. So whether it be plates or T-shirts or whatever, how it's harder for one of those artists to be integrated into pinball. Yeah, sure. So an art test, this is not something I experience a lot, actually. Because most of the clients that I work with, they already know that they want to work with me because they've seen my portfolio. So they're just asking for a quote, and usually the quote, either the price is too high or they say yes, and I work with them. um in the cases of pinball i've been asked to do um i think three art tests trying to remember and this will be they will tell you to complete like a very small section of like the cabinet artwork for example um they don't they purposely don't really give you much direction they're just trying to see like it's like an audition you know like a line reading you go in and you you read the script and they they figure out if you're the guy or not um which can be frustrating of course because like i've like i said i've been doing this for over 20 years i've got probably over a thousand pieces of artwork on my website so i think i think it should be pretty clear what my artwork would look like. But I do, I understand in these situations, they have so much money they're putting on this. It's worth having a bit of an audition, right? Um, the thing that's so challenging about an art test is that normally when I work with a client, like you're talking directly to the art director and you're throwing ideas back and forth, you're drawing sketches to try to get, uh, to develop the idea together. But with an art test, you're really like, you're on your own you're taking your best shot it's a shot in the dark really you know so anyway the the art test is just basically a in the in the case of the one in the spring that I didn get was a section of the cabinet inked and colored And they ended up, like I said, they ended up going with, without saying too much, one of the artists that they worked with on all their other stuff. So did I even have a chance? I don't even know. But it was definitely nice to be invited, for sure. So – oh, your other question. So I think if you're an artist outside of pinball, which clearly I was not that long ago, there's a lot to learn about how to set up a playfield that took me a long – took me many playfields to understand. A lot of technical aspects to it. Um, so I, I could see if, if a brand is just going to take their artist who's never done anything in pinball, that can definitely be a, uh, there's probably a large learning curve in store for whoever that guy is. Do I sound bitter? I think I sound bitter. Well, okay. I would argue that when you're asked to audition, in some ways, it could be more of a test audition because they already probably have someone in mind that they're likely doing. But giving you the opportunity to give a take on something that they may have preselected anyway, I bet what it does is it allows them to see what your take would be and then consider future projects to say, well, I think Brian would be good for this one because he gave us the test for this other one. And so in many ways, I think that actually still gives you the opportunity of working with them. Maybe not on that project, and it's probably a little counterintuitive, but to say, well, we auditioned him for something else, and so maybe you'd be the front runner on a future project. yeah and the art test that i will be doing next is for that same company so hopefully uh hopefully uh this one is picked we'll see but the same thing could happen again the same thing could happen again because it's like the the ip also they may be the final word in this right but you have you have to please the ip and you have to please the pinball company and the art director. So, yeah, it's challenging, but I mean, it's like I'm competing against the best artists out there. And there's only, like I said, there's only a couple slots to fill every year. And I've given quotes, been asked for quotes from pretty much all of the smaller companies. and I'm off an outbid but I haven't got I've had a couple starts with them where I've like started a project like I mentioned earlier and then the IP collapses I had one really unfortunate one where like I had the whole package almost finished except for the playfield so I had the back glass, the cabinet side blades and then they found out that basically the contract they thought they had with the IP had expired or something. Somebody didn't double check. And so that project is lost forever. That's a shame. But I don't know. Can you talk about that project or no? Because even though it's been lost to time. Well, I guess if I don't say the company, It was actually supposed to be a Bride of Pinbot remake. And I ended up – after that, I ended up doing my own Bride of Pinbot alternate, which is totally different artwork. I didn't want to reuse the same artwork. I think it would have been pretty cool, but I don't know. And there was there's also like lots of little. Kind of startup pinball projects I've been involved in where I've done the backlash or something, and then the game is never built. I heard it's hard to make pinball. That's what people say. That's what they say. It definitely is. Well, and how I mean, it's hard for you, too. I mean, Fidretti has put out that they're going to be making more versions. and like you said you've been in talks with them on on some of this but you know how do you take theater of magic how do you take tells the rabbi knights how do you take creature from the black lagoon and you do art packages that are still you but they also pay homage to to these titles that people just it's like it's it's what brought them into pinball or it's it's the nostalgia phil you know what i'm saying like do you ever have people get upset that you're doing these projects oh yeah but i i get people i get people mad at me all the time i mean daily not even talking about pinball um now that i'm doing more concert artwork like um i oh yeah i wanted to say i i released uh posters for the offspring if this releases tomorrow um i have like a foil poster released for the offspring uh today i released that and then in two days i'll have another poster for the offspring so if you're if you're a fan uh please check it out um but yeah so anytime i release a new poster like luckily most people do seem to be very supportive and like it but there's always that guy who says you know this sucks you know and it it's hard it hurts you i think people think that because we're artists it's our job to like take criticism and then and we must have gone to a special school to like harden us or something like that but i mean it hurts your feelings just like anybody else you know um and it's funny you don't you don't like see a lot of people you get a haircut and then you turn around you say Like, that sucks. This is a slop, you know. I mean, people online just talk so much more aggressively and cruelly, you know. But anyway, yeah, so I have gotten some negative feedback, and it usually is like, well, I don't like the attack from Mars, for example. I changed the woman to not be in a white dress. She's wearing more like a, like Daisy Dukes and like a checkered redneck shirt. Why did I do that? I don't know. I thought at the time I thought it was funny. I think people think I put way more thought into this stuff than I do. I'm just sort of drawing to amuse myself, you know, but I'll get messages from people saying, my favorite is when they say, I would have bought this except for that one thing. And it's like, no, you wouldn't. You know, the people who like my style, they buy it or they share it or they comment on it or they like it. You know, you don't have to. I'm not saying it to buy something for me to be supportive. But the people who say those kind of things, they never would have bought it. So what makes me chuckle, too, is like art is subjective, like whether people want to agree with that or not, it is subjective. And like you said, people love their certain styles and stuff like that. But it makes me chuckle when people comment as if it was like a hard and fast fact when it's like, you know, it just isn't wasn't doesn't appeal to you on that level because of your tastes. And so it just. Yeah. Yeah, you hit it. I mean, that that is it exactly. and people get defensive when I get defensive because there's such a huge difference in saying I don't like that or that's not for me versus saying hey that's wrong or that you know what I mean and that's what they those like when people tell me they don't like something I don't get offended by that because I I'll be the first to admit my style is not for everybody you know I uh The people, the artists that inspired me are like the Jimbo Phillips from the 90s, like the Thrasher Magazine artists. Those guys weren't. They were counterculture at the time. So, like, I grew up drawing and learning from people who were not, like, the main accepted art style at the time. So, anyway. So, yeah, that's such a great point. It's like art is subjective. You're totally allowed to not like it, but when people start talking about it, it's like I failed a test that I didn't know that they wrote the rules for. It's so silly. I don't know. or now I get, this one's aggravating, but now I'll get people that accuse me of using AI, which is funny. I'll post something from something that I drew like 10 years ago, and they'll accuse me of AI, which would have been impossible. That one sucks because not only do I have to compete against, I almost said artists. I have to compete against people using AI, but now I have to defend everything I draw to like prove that I drew it um which is actually impossible to do I mean I'll show them videos of me drawing and and then they'll be like oh yeah well you could have just made it in AI and then traced over it it's like well unless unless I buy him a ticket to come like sit sit in my desk and watch me like I don't I don't know so anyway I I don't think you want those people around anyway, so it's not a big deal. No. Usually I found that talks with people are best to be kept at arm's distance. It's true, but they find me. They won't leave me alone. But that's the curse of having to be online. Like, this is my full-time job, so it's like I constantly have to be posting artwork to get new clients and to sell stuff. And like, so I guess in a way I do ask for it, right? If I didn't want that, then I would just stop putting it out there. But I don't know. Yeah, the keyboard commandos are very loud and they're usually very toxic. And I guess I try to remind myself that how someone reacts is probably more of a reflection on what's going on inside themselves than how they actually feel about you. They could probably go up to any pinball artist and say exactly the same thing. So, yeah. Well, if you're trying to get me to feel sorry for them, it's not going to work. Well, I do have to say one thing, Brian, is like, I really appreciate what you did for us as Loser Kid during flipping the script on autism that we did a few years back, a couple of years back. Sadly, your booth hit, got hit. Our booth got hit. Some stuff was stolen. you had a lot more stolen from you and and luckily with with us we had people that stepped up and and paid to replace the items that were stolen for us because it was all donated for autism and and it was going towards a charity cause where you you weren't so lucky but you did draw i'm putting it on the screen right now the the butt face sketch art for the gentleman that may have stolen your trans lights and ran away yeah and to summarize i i think we skipped over it but what you're talking about is a few years ago at pinball expo there was a guy or multiple guys who went around and stole a bunch of stuff um they stole like four thousand dollars of merch from me um first time in 15 years of doing conventions that I ever had anything stolen. Uh, so it was a bit of a shock, but, um, but luckily I have, uh, my business insurance Ryan Policky actually covered it all. So, so state farm is now like one of my best customers cause they basically bought it all from me, which is pretty good. So, um, so anyway, but yeah, that was, that was terrible. It hasn't happened since so i don't know i don't know who that was or what what that was about but i can't believe they stole from you guys is basically a charity oh i can't yeah it's fine we we appreciate everybody who stepped up uh but let's talk about positive things so i want to talk about what are some of the of the themes that you are interested in like you know either bands or or a pinball era that you're you really like covering or what are the things that really charge you to draw for pinball or in life um well for my own for the alternates i'm working on circus voltaire right now um i hope to have that oh well not hope i will have that for expo um but as far as like dream themes it would be anything from like 80s 90s cartoons so like ren and stimpy comes to mind i would absolutely love to do something like that uh i'd love to do gremlins um i think i could have so much fun with that one i think um what about pinky in the brain i think you could do a pinky in the brain i would love to do that um i would love to do anything cartoon related actually because that's the style I feel most comfortable in. But I would love to do... I'd love to see more video game-related pinball machines. Like Metroid would be a great one. I know that Sonic has been done. A lot of the ones I'd love to do have already been done. Because I would have loved to do Ninja Turtles. Bands, just thinking of bands. See, I was about to say Iron Maiden, which has obviously been done and done perfectly. But I'm sorry, I'm blanking. Just basically Transformers would be great. He-Man would be so much fun. Thundercats. Yeah, that's all I got. Okay, I'm going to do a follow-up to Iron Maiden, though, because now we know that Zombie Yeti did, you know, Jeremy Packard did the Iron Maiden package. Now, it's a little challenging because the iconic artist for Iron Maiden is actually a guy named Derek Riggs, who worked with them. Very familiar. Yeah, during their heyday. And so in some ways, I would wonder, would that be something you would be interested in doing? Because it is challenging for people to look at a different artist taking that style because Derek has a very distinct style. and he's the one who wrote all or did all the iconic eddie faces all the all the the different zombie looks and so what challenges would you have to say okay i know it's not derrick's take on this but it's my take but i need to at least keep somewhat close to derrick yeah and i am i wrong in saying that didn't derrick and iron maiden have like a falling out yeah on that they did a little later. So some of the later versions like the X Factor and I think Fear of the Dark may have been his last one but I could be wrong on that. He came back and did Brave New World but for the last 20 years has been more in and out of the picture of Iron Maiden than he's been in. So they've found different ways of doing it. However, I would say the original, the Iron Maiden album, then Killers, and you have Number of the Beast and you have Power Slave, you have Somewhere in Time and Seventh Son of a Seventh Son. Those were all Derek Riggs, and that was really the zenith of their popularity and power. So people like in my world are the ones who are going to identify with that style. For sure. I mean Iron Maiden like not to discredit their great music and the lead singer and the lyrics and everything about Iron Maiden But if you didn have those album covers and that mascot Iron Maiden could have just gone the way of all the other metal bands around that time and just kind of faded away. That branding is so important. I should look into the full story about what happened with Iron Maiden and Derek Riggs, But I thought they were kind of taking advantage of him or something like that, and I hope that's not the case. That happens a lot, unfortunately. You want to see somebody who basically was partly responsible for their rise. I hope he got compensated very well. I have no idea. But anyway, to answer your question, so I think the approach that Zombie Yeti took was perfect. and I'll kind of circle back to that. But when I am asked to work with existing IPs, sometimes it's my job to make it look exactly like that IP and that product. And that's usually like when I'm working for a logo design for a brand or like designing a mascot or something like that. But when you're doing something like a pinball machine, To me, it's like you're reinterpreting this existing property into a totally new media. So I love what Jeremy did with Iron Maiden because, yes, they look like Derek Riggs' eddies, but it's so clearly Jeremy's style. It looks like he took them and said, what if they made a Saturday morning cartoon about Iron Maiden? And I think that is so perfect. It's funny that I'm like – it's almost like I'm defending – I mean Jeremy doesn't need to be defended. What I'm saying is that's like the perfect approach because you're taking something that is kind of already perfect. You can't make it better, so instead make it different. Take a different spin on it. And since a pinball machine, essentially it is a game. It is a toy. So you need to make it more fun. and I think that's what he did on Iron Maiden. It doesn't look too dark and depressing. There's just so much activity going on. Anyway, so that's how I would at least tell myself that I would approach these things. It's like how can I take these characters that everybody loves but make them look like they all fit in a newer version of that story. So I keep saying like what if I was designing a Saturday morning cartoon of blank? So that's how I would approach it basically. And that's also a limitation of my style is that I don't do like photorealistic paintings. A lot of the stuff that you see on movie posters or movie-related themes are usually just photos that people paint over. So you achieve this exact photorealistic representation, and that's just not – I don't know how to do that, and I don't think I would ever want to do that. But that means that I can't really draw something to look exactly like you remember it. And sometimes that's, I think, what people do want. Those are usually the people making negative comments is at the end of the day, they kind of just wanted the character to look exactly like the character that they remembered growing up. And, you know, I don't know. That sounds boring to me. It's funny that you say that. So like one of my favorite art packages is the Jaws that Michael Barnard did. And I like the premium. but it's funny because like you hit like the different versions kind of hit on what you're talking about right like the premium was a fresh take on the license from the perspective of like more of an artistic take right but then the le was like straight up the movie poster because it wanted yeah it wanted to honor that photorealistic like and granted i know like licensors have a lot more sway in what they what they want and stuff like that and so i know i'm kind of like me discrediting i don't know but i i just think that it's it's funny because like you could tell that there's two separate different types of groups because there's some that definitely want that photorealistic like a christopher franchi and then there's someone that wants more of an artistic take like yours um it just it's it all comes back to subjective right like it's i i think i think people need to start stop looking at this isn't fine art right like we're not going to the museum and all this stuff like you don't need to be my uncle has put it this way and he equated it to movies you can enjoy movies one of two ways right like you can either go sit down and turn your brain off for an hour and a half to two hours and just eat popcorn enjoy the movie or it can be like fine dining you're going to sit down you have to have your forks and your spoons and everything in the right place and you have the courses in a certain way with with the stuff to cleanse your palate and whatnot if you enjoy it more from the perspective like this is something i can turn off my brain and just enjoy i think for all pinball where this isn't like a fine dining experience you're just going to enjoy it all the way around i think everyone does a great job that comes to this table right there's been some amazing artists that have joined pinball including yourself brian that has done stuff that i've never seen and it's it's a great fresh take because really before the 90s like there wasn't much alternate and you were getting the same stuff because back in the 50s and 60s was a commercial product so they had a very fit criteria of what they should have to draw more eyes to that product which you're still doing that with that nowadays but you get more freedom and flexibility and these alternate back glasses and stuff like that where you wouldn't get that back in the 90s i mean i mean the shadows over my corner and it's like it's rough like the background yeah is rough but we live in a world now where there's like three different alternate back glasses that all look fantastic and if you're into nudity there's probably a nudity one for you as well so yeah i do get asked to make a lot of nudity back glasses i never really got around to it uh but uh but yeah i um what you were saying about the the ip too like sort of i'm really jealous of those guys who got to work in the time of like of um attack from mars and whitewater and stuff where almost every game was an original ip they were like they had the opportunity to make their own story and some of those games were obvious riffs on things that were already going on you know like attack from mars um but it that doesn't really exist anymore because all the pinball games coming out not all but most are all like existing ip so so now you know now you have to get approval from the the person whose whole job is to make sure that everything looks exactly like this um and then and even if they're not strict But you're just sort of – you have way less freedom than if you can just make up a new character and make up a new story. It's also easier too because there's nothing to compare it to. So you can make Rudy, and they're not – there aren't as many people like, well, hey, why didn't you make it look more like this? I don't know. Maybe they existed back then too, but they didn't have a way to express it. but anyway that's a long-winded way of saying that i would love to work on like an original ip um but there's not in pinball but there's not that many opportunities out there unfortunately because because most of the games that come out with an original ip have not have struggled you know they really haven't gone very far um it's hard because in nowadays a lot of things come into home environments. And so I'm very lucky in that I do have, you know, the CGCs over my shoulder and I actually have Attack from Mars currently in storage, but they almost became kind of a brand unto themselves. And so it's almost like they are licensed themes at this point. But if I'm going to be buying a game, like for example, I would more likely spend a lot of money on a game called Lord of the Rings than I would to have gnomes, goblins, and elves. Sure, I totally get it. There's a storyline that I connect to. And actually, Josh, I will actually push back a little bit on one thing because when you were talking about a comic book style, in many ways, seeing that type of style, It feels like it's a more accessible style, but I think that's in the challenge of a great artist who's able to do something like a comic book artist style and being able to make it accessible because it's a little harder to make it accessible but also very artistic. I mean, the artists – I mean, I've talked about this before. When I was growing up, there was Wiltz Portacio. There was Jim Lee. There was Todd McFarlane. Like all those guys, they took an existing comic book form – and Rob Liefeld, who did Deadpool. They took an existing form and made it so different because their approach was it was a new take on a very accessible thing that made them very distinct. A lot of these type of artists, like the commercial artist type things, they're surprisingly challenging, especially with pinball, is to make it is to make it more accessible. but also it's so challenging to get all of the themes right and the play field and everything like that. So I think we, we automatically assume because it's, it's more of a comic book style that it's easier. I don't believe that that's exactly it. Well, if Rob can do art, then he can't write feet, draw feet. We know that. Or chat on, on, on perspective. Yeah. Yeah. Well, I, I appreciate that because it, it is, it is more it is more difficult to draw a character draw a face that is supposed to look like the guy but to then also give uh give some kind of style to it some kind of different look um it would be easier to just copy it exactly um i don't know uh i'm not sure where I was going with that. But, but yeah, I think, I think just the word comic book style, you're right. It has been cheapened a little bit because for a long time, comic books were kind of seen as like a lower art form, you know, um, not, not so much anymore now with every, every single movie that comes out as a comic book movie. But, uh, but yeah, I've, I've never found it. I've understood that it can actually take longer than like a painting, for example, especially because most comic book pages are made by three people. It's the penciler, inker, and then a colorist. Well, if you remember the movie 300, if you're not familiar with it, that's actually Frank Miller who did The Dark Knight Returns. Yeah, it's a great book. if you look at his book, it's actually like they took a lot of that exact imagery, like the shots in the movie they took from his comic book art. And he definitely took it into more adult themes and made it a little bit less campy than what we were kind of used to with, you know, it's kind of like when you think of the old Batman 66 type, you know, that's tongue in cheek. It's It's supposed to be lighthearted. It's supposed to be whimsical. Frank Miller took it to more of, you know, kind of an adult theme. And the way that that art is, it's really impressive. I still have the book that I bought 30 years ago. Yeah, it's so great. I love I love his stuff. I have some of it on the shelf here. Him and H.R. Giger. Everybody says Giger when you ask who their influences are. But him and Frank Miller and Todd McFarlane, probably my biggest influences back then and still really. Yeah, it was funny because Todd McFarlane did buy the – back in the home run derby race, he actually bought the Barry Bonds 73rd one. I think he paid like $10 million for it. What? Yeah. No, it's crazy, right? It's kind of fun. That's crazy. I wish I had $10 million. If I had a baseball, I'd sell it for $10 million. Yeah, I don't buy them. I think I'd buy 10 million baseball cards. That would be fun. Instead of just one. Well, Brian, we appreciate you coming on. We've kind of went over an hour now. You've got so many more projects coming out, and we can't wait to see what you're working on. I know that you've got a lot you've got to keep under the hood. Is there anything where I know you talked about you've got your Circus Volterra coming to Expo. Is there anything else we might see at Expo from you? Yes. So I'm making some alternate Williams aprons, like magnetic aprons that cover up the aprons. I have Monster Bash and Medieval Madness so far. I hope to have two more. um i'm gonna have a topper uh i'm working with one of the topper companies so that'll either be available or hopefully at the very least we'll have like a prototype to show um i'm really proud of that it's got like lots of mechanics and cool stuff going on um then uh yeah circus voltaire Backglass I had the Black Rose which I did release earlier in the year but I didn't have that last expo what else I'll have a bunch of I have tons of new artwork just fan art and art prints hopefully I won't have any of these offspring posters because they'll all sell out but if I don't I'll have those um other than that uh no i think that's about it awesome well if someone wants to get a hold of you what is the best way to get a hold of you brian uh my website flylanddesigns.com um you can just my email is right there we could fill out the contact form um so and if you have requests on like alternate pinball artwork you want me to tackle next like I keep track of all that. So please keep those coming. Awesome. If you want to get a hold of us, we are Loser Kid Pinball Podcast at gmail.com. You can find us on all the socials on Facebook, Instagram, X, at Loser Kid Pinball, especially here on YouTube. If you like this content, please subscribe and hit the like button. Leave a comment below. Scott, give us our final words. You know what? Get ready for Expo and go and check out our T-shirts. It's the Loser Kid Funhouse T-shirts. It's a group of all swag. So I'm planning on coming to Expo, so we'll see you there.