We Love This Portrait

This is an altered version of We Love This Wallpaper. I thought I could make a version that can be framed and be hung on a wall or something. It was partly because I decided that I wanted to put this image up for auction at the Anime Expo Art Show so I took all forty of the original images and changed them around for a better fit in a frame.

The Prince: I have an image of the Prince growing up to be just like his dad. Big, lazy, and arrogant!

Ace: His image was inspired by the firefly stage of We Love Katamari. I know Dipp is the cousin you roll up in that stage but I had something else in mind for him.

Dipp: A disco stage for Dipp was pretty much a no brainer since his stars are flashing all the time.

Ichigo: I had to do something with strawberries for her. I guess a strawberry cake with balloons in the background was the best I could think of.

Miso: I don't I would have came up with the boiling pot idea if they hadn't added the soup inside Miso's head. That was the first thing I thought of when I saw his WLK design.

Lalala: I rembember having difficulties coming up with ideas for Lalala's image. When I saw her blindfold costume, I thought maybe she'd blindly run around at random. In the end, I ended up with having her look for a lightswitch blindfolded. I don't remember how I came up with that.

June: I think it's time I try improving on rain effects. Anyway, I got this straight out of her Item Collection description about having rainy weather whenever she's outside.

Lucha: Because he's supposed to be a wrestler, I placed him in a wrestling ring with some random opponent, and boy is it ever random!

Miki: I had quite a time thinking for Miki's image. I mainly relied on the King's description of her about not living up to her own expectations (getting 6th place when she wants to be in the top 3) and had her losing in a race.

Odeko: Now this was a tough one! I just drew a random pose for him and played along with what I ended up with. I consider this my least favorite image, mainly because the legs got cut off.

Foomin: She's supposedly not very bright. So I had her do some frolicking in the clouds. That's some trademark act with those not intelligent, right?

Johnson: I was like WOAH! when I saw his outstretched face. Then I had the idea of him picking a kite out of a tree with his mouth. I don't know, it just came to me so suddenly.

Daisy: I really like this one because it was easy to come up with and the end result was really cute.

Marcy: The King said she's a fashionable cousin. Somehow I connected that with flowers and came up with this.

Shy: This image was made on the basis of her name. Shy?! Come on, that's a no-brainer!

Kuro: I decided to have him on his motorcycle from the racing stage and go driving on the desert like some punk-type person from a motorcycle gang. Since I only had the racing stage to use as a reference for the motorcycle, I had a tough time getting this down on paper. Then there's knowing what colors I'm supposed to use.

Odeon: His design creeped me out at first but after making this image, not anymore. I think I came up with this idea because he's the only cousin who doesn't have his face on the actual body... well the antenna can be considered a body part for these people but you know where I'm getting at, right?

Velvet: I really liked her UFO-type design for the original Katamari Damacy. Felt disappointed that she grew legs in WLK. The design of this image was based on her KD design, but I had to use her WLK design for consistency.

Havanna: With a head like that you can get stuck in a lot of places, like a hallway! Again a picture based on the design of the cousin.

L'Amour: According to the King, she's supposed to be a Cupid-type of character. Pretty simple idea with a few heart-shaped clouds to compliment it.

Slip: Sometimes I wonder if we need multiple Prince variations. WLK already has four with a fifth one appearing in Me & My Katamari. Anyway, this is another picture based on the cousin's design. Slip always gets carried away by winds so I had him flying around a tornado.

Nik: He's so fat! How could I not make a picture of him eating so much?

Huey: His face supposedly lights up when he's happy about stuff. Never was shown in the game but I thought I could portray that. Don't care much for the background.

Beyond: One of the stranger cousin designs apart from Odeon and Drooby. He supposedly has a strange personality so I had to come up with something strange for his image. Driving a funny car up a building was pretty strange so I used that. I think there were other ideas but I don't remember them.

Drooby: That drill she has on her bottom looks REALLY AWKWARD!!! But at least it made for an easy image to make for her.

Nickel: I love this robot cousin! The idea of him being unplugged and not working reflects on his short battery life. I also just realized that his cord is too short! Now that's just perfect!

Honey: Honestly, I never liked her head. I read King's description of her clumsiness so I went with that as the theme of her image.

Jungle: Jungle deserves my award for "Best Transition from Katamari Damacy to We Love Katamari" for the transparency alone. The transparency effect was suprisingly not very difficult to reproduce. Just requires copy-and-pasting. Had him spying in a dark forest because I feel that it's pretty much the point of his design. Even added his mushroom hat for good measure.

Opeo: He's been a sickly cousin since KD. So having him bedridden was easy to think of.

Kinoko: The original idea was having her be an empress of some mushroom world but I couldn't draw a good pose for her so I scrapped the idea. The Super Mario Bros. cameo was the second thing I came up with. This one ended up being my favorite. I used a SMB screenshot in the wallpaper version but decided that I should use a homemade version when I decided to put the portrait up for auction at Anime Expo. Copyright stuff, you know?

Shikao: He's a TV-boy so he watches TV! 'Nuff said!

Marny: I've always noticed that he always hangs out around water. You roll him up in a lake in KD and roll him up in the underwater stage in WLK. So I made him a scuba diver. Bubbles could've looked better.

Colombo: Having all that hair, I thought the bathroom stage would be perfect for him! Wasn't sure how to handle all that hair when I was coloring this! Thought I could use the techniques amateurs use to color sheep but he ended looking like poo!

Macho: He looks tough but he's actually a peaceful guy. That's what the King said about him! So I had to do something that would make him look peaceful, like resting under a tree or reading a book... or both!

Nutsuo: I was not sure about what I wanted to do with him. He is peanut shaped so I thought having something related to peanuts could work. Having him walk on a giant peanut seemed reasonable but I think I could've done better.

Peso: If it weren't for the King's item descriptions, I may have had a hard time coming up with an idea for Peso, or much of the cousins for that matter. Peso likes golf so I had him playing golf. Staying true to the randomness of Katamari's nature, I had Peso use a ladle for the club and a cherry for the ball! I love the end result.

Signolo: As I was brainstorming what to do for Signolo, I thought of how I should poke fun at his three-faced-ness. Then I thought of how he could sing a three-man choir... or one man with three faces choir on stage. I know the King said he can only use one face at a time but I just had to do this.

Fujio: His head shape is supposed to resemble that of a mountain. Well that's just as well as he supposedly sprouts lava from his antenna, though the game never showed that. Mountain climbing seemed to be a perfect theme for the mountain guy so I went with that.

Twinkle: I always thought he looks like a Christmas ornament, so I made him one.

Can-Can: I think this image is hilarious because of the cheapness of the background characters. This is based on the King's description of his head spinning really fast and catching on fire when he's mad about something. The idea of putting him in a theatre came from that rule about how you're not supposed to yell "Fire!" in a crowded theatre. Yeah, I know he's starting a fire in a crowded theatre. You could probably tell that what he saw in the movie offended him.

I like how this turned out. I don't like what became of Odeon's image after the change but it was overall for the better.

If you care about what became of this image at AX, it got bidded for at least fifteen dollars when the starting bid was three dollars. Not bad, eh? I just wish it got enough bids to make the live auction but that ended up going to KATAMARI'D, most likely because of its starting bid of fifty cents.

Katamari Damacy (C) Namco