It occurred to me that I've been contributing to the San Diego Comic Con program booklet for almost as long as I've been doing Cutey Bunny... I started sometime in the early 80s (don't recall which year exactly) and as I recall, I only missed one year between then and now... So I gathered together some of the old pix, most of which have never been seen elsewhere, and figured I'd make a li'l gallery of 'em here...
During the 80s the Booklet Editors (usually Jackie Estrada) suggested themes but didn't enforce compliance, so many of my contributions were more generic Bunny material than theme oriented... and for the most part I don't really recall what they were... The following are the ones I found without looking too hard... By the late 80s themes became strictly enforced and there were times (like in 98) where I obviously didn't have much empathy for the subject matter...
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1983: Vietnam Holiday: This may be my first contribution, (if not, it's almost - as I wouldn't of contributed anything before 81 or 82) and this was some sort of Vietnam theme...
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1984: The Space Gophers Hijack the Toonerville Trolley (with Apologies to Fontaine Fox)... I don't recall what logic (if any) there was to this thing...
In 84 I wouldn't have been working on QT 6 yet, (in the first version of that unpublished comix the ToonerVille Trolley did have a part)
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1985: I obviously used the space to plug QT #5 featuring the X-Critters... As a side note, at the time the Chicago Comic Con was sort of in contention with San Diego for being the Big Con of the year... and No, they never did invite me...
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For whatever it's worth, Here's the same pix (almost) after a cut & paste job to turn it into an Ad for somewhere else... Just lookin' at this again gives me a renewed appreciation of modern computers... What I couldn't have done with a Mac back then..! Of course Macs were around at the time, but it'd be a few years before they got the type of power needed for full scale image processing...
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1986: (if I recall correctly) marked the 100th anniversary of the Statue of Liberty... So seemed appropriate for another "Tribute"...
The Bunny's outfits by the way, seem to owe something to Mae West who wore something similar in one of her old flicks...
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1988: QT for Prexy - It was one of those election years... so I figured if Pogo could run, then why not Cutey..?
By the way, she didn't get even one Electorial Vote...
Bummer
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![](CCs88Prx.gif) 198
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1990: a Tribute to Will Eisner and Jack Kirby... Every ten years another Will Eisner Tribute... I hope I'm not in a rut..!
(It's actually better than the one I did this year)
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1991: a Salute to Carl Barks and Wonder Woman: what a combination..! I actually think much more of Barks' work than WW... but hey, so who could pass up an opportunity to draw QT in those very tight - tight fitting Spandex tights..?
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1992: Jack (King) Kirby's birthday party... and a great time was had by all...
I also located an unused pencil rough... sort of a three panel sequence with a bit of verbiage about the King's contribution to reinventing comics... As you can see, I eventually settled for a simpler layout, basically a blow-up of the 1st panel...
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The Pencil sketch for the King's 75th
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1993: Invasion of the Bunny Snatchers - in which we tried to hash together a myriad of 50s B SF Flicks...
![](CCs93BSR.gif)
And the marker layout for Invasion of the Bunny Snatchers
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1994: the Theme was Terry and the Pirates - I don't recall exactly why that was - But we did revision of an original Caniff pix, only using the cast from the "Taffy & the Pirates" strip that I'd started a few years earlier...
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1995: Paper Dolls Theme: a tribute to Katy Keene (sort of) but mostly just an excuse to draw a QT Paper doll...
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1997: The Theme was Low Budget Indy Films... Which seems the type of thing that Cutey and the gang might get mixed up in...
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1998: Cutey meets the Legion of Sooper Heroes (almost)... I guess the theme this year was either Hopelessly Over-Bloated Team Comics or: Pointless and Useless Characters... or maybe both...
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1999: 50 Ever Lovin' Blue Eyed Years with Pogo: Walt Kelly and his Swampland creations being some of my all time favorites, I had a great deal of fun patching this together..!
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In 1984, I also did a couple of covers for the Comic Con Flyer... I don't recall if both were used or not...
This one was my inx over a Lela Dowling sketch of Cutey and her Cheshire Cat,. Later on, Lela did a much better ink job of the same sketch...
By the way,.. the scribbly background was my fault not Lela's...
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In fact, Here's Lela's Pix for comparison... She certainly did a nifty job and has a great feel for mass and shadow...
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This is the other 1984 Flyer Cover,.. as sort of take off on that old Conanesque standby layout...
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Another pix, just for interest... a simmilar pose done for an early cover sketch...
For some of the comix, I did multiple cover ideas... many of which, like this one, remained unused...
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I also contributed a few Name badges over the years... Here's a couple or more which I found while looking for the page art...
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Three Bunnies for the price of one:
This had something to do with a story I was workin' on at the time...
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This one they rejected three years straight... I eventually got the point and quite submitting it...
I think it's also the Last badge I submitted...
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Here's another reject:
(Uncle Joe puts in his Two Rubles Worth)
Jeese, ya just can't please some people...
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