If you’ve been keeping up with news this week, then we’re sure that you’ve seen or either heard about this new Detective Pikachu movie trailer that’s been blowing up the internet. And of course, it’s been on everyone’s Twitter feeds and on our minds –it’s the first time that Pokemon has gone live-action in an official capacity. We were kind of freaked out at how realistic the Pokemon looked, especially Jigglypuff’s extreme amount of furriness, but at the end of the trailer, we were pleasantly surprised at how entertaining it all looked.
But if you were like us, then you probably remember seeing those “realistic” Pokemon animations that have been around the internet for the past five or so years, some of them portraying Pokemon like Charizard and Venasuar like actual dragons and monsters.
The man behind the bulk of these animations is a Ubisoft SF concept artist named RJ Palmer who, coincidentally, got hired to work on the Detective Pikachu film thanks to his excellent, yet creepy, realistic Pokemon designs (via Kotaku). You can see one of his larger pieces below and if you want to check out more of his stuff, you can check out his art blog right here.
Palmer contributed multiple Pokemon designs in the last year or so towards the production of the film. On Twitter, he went out of his way to thank DeviantArt for hosting his artwork up on their site and also thanked fans for his increase of followers:
My follower count jumped by almost 2k so far today. This is so overwhelming, I just wanted to thank you guys for making today very cool. Its been so fun getting to finally see what people think of the movie.
— RJ Palmer 🔜 Gen Con Art Show 34 (@arvalis) November 13, 2018
Hey thanks guys. It wouldn’t have been possible without your site hosting my work. Deviantart literally gave me my career. https://t.co/VoBqHZnU0d
— RJ Palmer 🔜 Gen Con Art Show 34 (@arvalis) November 13, 2018
Goes to show that if you follow your dreams and do what makes you happy, you’re bound to have your moment of pure happiness. Working on the Detective Pikachu movie was a once in a lifetime job for Palmer and without his hard work and dedication to his art, it would not have happened.
