"Licensed to Trek"

I'm Back!!!

New year, new art ... "Licensed to Trek" is my tribute to the Beastie Boys and Star Trek.

The Beastie Boys are my favorite hip hop group and 'Licensed to ill" is always on my phone. But what makes my love for the Beastie Boys even greater is how connected they are to Star Trek. From their Trek references in their songs to their music being used in the new Star Trek films, its just awesome. So I wanted to do a mashup to pay my respects to both the Beasties & Trek.

Heres my take on the Licensed to ill cover with the Enterprise. I wanted to paint this as close as I could to the original plane. I used different brushes in Photoshop with textures and imitating chrome was a challenge but fun. Added some nods to the album in the art for fun too.

Hope you all dig it!

"Licensed to Trek"
Beasite Boys & Star Trek Cover

"Licensed to ill"
Original Beastie Boys Cover

"Shades" - an illustrated look at the famous glasses in pop culture history!

After many months penciling, inking, coloring and designing, my new book "Shades" is here!

"Shades" is an illustrative look at my favorite glasses throughout pop culture history. From the 1933 "Invisible Mans" Motorcycle glasses to the recent tortoiseshell frames worn by "Harry Hart" in the "Kingsmen, Shades captures the gnarliest glasses inspired by my love of films and tv!

As a young shy kid, it fascinated me how sunglasses made people appear so confident and nigh invulnerable. I wanted so badly to be as cool as the characters I saw on tv and felt that a pair of shades would do that for me. Thats what started me collecting all sorts of unique glasses, and as an illustrator, inspired me to draw what made these characters so special to me.

Thats always been the intention for “Shades”, to capture the confidence a pair
of glasses gives a person, the same way I saw these characters in this book as a
kid. I hope you all enjoy the art as much as I did drawing them, it was a lot of fun re visiting these great characters.

If you'd like to see the book in it's entirety, check out my online portfolio MrMauro.com

order your copy via Amazon!

stay Rad!

Mauro

Order a copy of Shades for yourself!

Calling Dixon Hill come in Picard

Always on the case is Dixon Hill, the holodecks very own gum shoe. I LOVE detective stories like sam spade or philip marlowe and when our captain Picard first donned his fedora i was psyched. Here I'm paying homage to both the star trek character but also dick tracy, another great noir character.

Jean Luc Picard as Locutus Borg

this one's a tear jerker, my Picard as Locutus when captured by the Borg. this one almost made me a little sad when they show the scene of him being transformed and he has a tear running down his cheek. the Picard doesn't cry damn it!!! Hope you guys dig it.

Geordi La Forge's Visor

OK I'm having a lot of fun doing these!! Here's my tribute Geordi La Forge and his Visor in star trek. Always loved this character and the actor, Levar Burton, is one of my childhood heroes as a kid (thanks reading rainbow!). Always loved the way Geordi described the way he saw things differently through his Visor and I always wanted to do a blueprint style layout for him. hope you guys dig it.

Q the Omnipotent by Mauro Balcazar

this one was a lot of fun. I am a huge Q fan and John De Lancie's performance always makes it really enjoyable on Star Trek. Here I imagine him embedding himself onto our currency just to show us how all knowing, all encompassing, and omnipotent Q is. mischievous bastard! lol

Worf's Klingon Prune Juice!!

this one was a fun one to draw. <--- tongue twister much? lol. here is Mr Worf enjoying his warriors ale prune juice. never drew a Klingon before and had a lot of fun with this one.

Commander Riker, #1 ladies man making it so.

I've been watching all of Star Trek TNG thanks to netflix and i love re watching the series i use to see as a kid. now in my 20's i definitely can relate more to the characters and enjoy the entire series. One of my favorite characters is Commander Riker, played by awesome Jonathan Frakes, who hooked up with a girl in almost every other episode. it always makes me laugh when i watch an episode and you can see him smirk as a girl walks by, it's like you can almost time it. I drew this to pay homage to the man, the myth, and the legend that is William Riker, 1st officer of the U.S.S Enterprise. Boldy go sir!! hopefully one day i'll get a chance to meet some of the cast. that would be really great.