Harold Shull, Art Director for Mego Toys in the 70s

[bobws]

oh!,a question mr. shull,i have many more,but since 1974 i have always wondered why on the star trek card ,spock looks as if he smelled a skunk walk by?.thanks

Because "Logic is wreath of pretty flowers , which smells bad"

But seriously,Thank you sir for your amazing art and for joining us here at MM.

WELCOME!

[drmego]

Harold,

Thank you for joining us at the Museum - it is the home of the most enthusiast
fans of MEGO.

I am Paul Clarke of EMCE Toys - unfortunately we mainly communicated by
e-mail and usually under a deadline, so it's great to see you here.

[ScottA]

Welocme Sir. It is an honor.

[CreativeHal]

Hiya guys, I just did a damn stupid thing. I answered each and every one of your posts and then hit a wrong key and lost all of my remarks. I will have to get back to you tomorrow. This time I will save my remarks as I post them so I won't have to type them twice. But I do want to express my heartfelt thanks to all of you for the warm welcome you have given me.

[SlipperyLilSuckers]

Awesome. Thanks for stopping by!

[megozilla13]

Welcome to the Museum. So happy you joined.
Was wondering if you were involved with any of the artwork for the Planet of the Apes line.
Particularly, do you have any recollections about the watercolor? painting on the back of the bendy package. Who did it, why was it chosen? It's unlike anything done on any other mego packaging.

Also, the faces on the card front of the 8 inch figures. The illustrations for Zaius, Zira and Cornelius are found on other company's Ape products of the time. Did other companies swipe Mego's art or were they stock art everyone was using? Do remember the origin of the Astronaut and Soldier Ape illustrations? I've never seen them any where else.

mikej

[megoscott]

We're happy to see you back here, Hal. I'm such a fan of old school product illustration. I was so pleased to see your work on the EMCE Star Trek releases a few years ago.

For those of you who may not be aware there is an interview with Hal in the Mego Museum Library. A good introduction to his work for Mego.

The Mego Museum Interview with Harold Shull

[trekman101]

Welcome aboard sir .....the museum is a great place and will be enriched by your experiences

[jacoblb]

I just wanted to express how much I love the art work too.

[Wee67]

Its interesting how much of your art work beamce definitive of the character for many of us. I really look forward to your insight into the process of creating Mego (and probably much of the industry) art.

[PNGwynne]

Welcome--and thank you!

[Remco Monster]

Welcome to the board Harold! And thanks for being a part of making my childhood so much fun!

[CreativeHal]

Thanks everyone. I will try to get to know you after some time. My career took off at Mego and, thank God, is still rolling along In Baltimore, where I grew up and got married, I had a couple of Art Director jobs and a cartoonist's position at the Baltimore News American. As a matter of fact, that's how I got Bernie Wrightson his first job. The Baltimore Sunpapers Newspaper was looking for a cartoonist, so I took my buddy Bernie over there and introduced him. They hired him on the spot. Bernie and I knew each other from Baltimore. We used to meet at his home or mine and check out what each of us was working on. We made a pact that whoever got to NYC first would make room for the other one. As luck would have it, Bernie beat me to the punch by one year. He had an apartment on 79th street. We lived on the eighth floor with Michael Kaluta and Jeff Jones lived on the first floor. That apartment became a meeting place for many budding artists. Vaughn Bode, Roy Krenkle, Neal Adams, Al Williamson and many other artists used to stop in and say hello.

[CreativeHal]

I will start answering some of the posts but won't be able to get to all of them right away.

@ Tim baron, my friend you already are an accomplished illustrator. My advice to you would be to just keep on drawing and painting.

@ tilign, I had painted the portrait of Cheron before the sculpturing had been done. I think Ken (damn, I forgot his last name) had done that one. He was our main sculptor.

[megoscott]

Ok, what a mind blowing story! Ground zero for so much pop culture greatness!

Thanks everyone. I will try to get to know you after some time. My career took off at Mego and, thank God, is still rolling along In Baltimore, where I grew up and got married, I had a couple of Art Director jobs and a cartoonist's position at the Baltimore News American. As a matter of fact, that's how I got Bernie Wrightson his first job. The Baltimore Sunpapers Newspaper was looking for a cartoonist, so I took my buddy Bernie over there and introduced him. They hired him on the spot. Bernie and I knew each other from Baltimore. We used to meet at his home or mine and check out what each of us was working on. We made a pact that whoever got to NYC first would make room for the other one. As luck would have it, Bernie beat me to the punch by one year. He had an apartment on 79th street. We lived on the eighth floor with Michael Kaluta and Jeff Jones lived on the first floor. That apartment became a meeting place for many budding artists. Vaughn Bode, Roy Krenkle, Neal Adams, Al Williamson and many other artists used to stop in and say hello.