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Feel free to skip all this text, because it's a long one.

...Are you ready?

Okay, so this is an idea that's been in my head for awhile now, and it came to me after having watched Criss Angel: Mindfreak on A&E since 2005. That show is basically a once-a-year weekly series that usually premiers during the summer, featuring the magician Criss Angel performing crazy stunts and doing street magic. Being a fan of Pokémon and Pikachu for as long as I can remember, suddenly one day it hit me to cross two of my favorite shows together, to form "Mindfreakachu". Then I thought...hey, why not actually draw Criss Angel himself, but as a Pikachu? Hey, he's inspired me.

And thus, Criss Angel: Mindfreakachu was born.

Tried not to make some freakish Pokémon version of him that looked so much like the real person, but to focus on his most notable visual attributes and mesh them into the Pokémon style formula. His clothes are based on real stuff he wears from his preference in the Afflictionclothing line, including the chains and necklaces he wears around his neck. Didn't wanna totally overdo it with the bling, so I just threw in a few things here and there. He's holding two playing cards from his personalized card deck. The toughest part about drawing Criss Angel out in Pokémon form was the face, and trying to convey that without making it look strange. So I aimed to convey his relaxed, chill, cool personality...especially in the eyes and mouth. The hair also definitely helped to show that off, along with the hat. His eyes aren't red, but more of an auburn. But that's how it came out looking, with the glow effect.

Here are some pics for comparison: http://www.casinosnob.com/pictures/crissAngel.gif and http://s4.evcdn.com/images/edpborde.....-angel-63.jpeg and http://hollywoodmeasurements.com/wp.....ght-weight.jpg

The background was mostly customized by me. Digitally drew out in GIMP the famous Luxor Las Vegas resort hotel, where he currently resides for the most part. He's even done some notable tricks using the hotel, such as levitating from the top floor to the bottom inside, levitating above the blue beam of light that shoots out from the top outside, and most recently, actually climbed up the side of the Luxor outside. Figured it'd be a fitting backdrop. You can see the original background, before it got warped into the swirl waves in the final version, here: http://i41.tinypic.com/fwq135.png . The hotel, beam of light, and the sunset background were drawn by me; the palm trees were clip art I used and the dusky clouds were done using a brush. Seemed to work out, for the most part I guess.

However, I ran into a few roadblocks along the way, particularly with my disdain for the line art quality (the way my outlines are always so jagged and uneven in GIMP, I didn't want it to be that way this time) and trying to emulate the text in the Mindfreak logo to match with the "MINDFREAKACHU" theme I had in mind. So with that, I turned to two friends for help. RojoRamos from dA helped me out with the text in the left-hand corner and getting it to work. Another friend of mine on here, Ratte, kindly helped me with the outlines by smoothing them out for me, so it looks more presentable and "professional", if you can call my art that. <_>; Without Ratte's assistance, for example, the line art quality would've looked junky, like this: http://a.imageshack.us/img716/8564/.....almostfina.png . So don't get too used to seeing good line art quality like what you see here or cool text effects like those--those were all both my friends' doing, so they get the credit there. All the rest though, drawing and coloring and background included, were all done by me. Couldn't of gotten this done without them though, so much thanks to them for their kind and generous assistance.

Fun Fact: I've been compared to him at one time or another, looks-wise a lot. Like in these two pics: http://www.furaffinity.net/view/2862955/ and http://www.furaffinity.net/view/2862988/ .

A lot of you probably won't recognize Criss Angel or his show Criss Angel: Mindfreak on A&E. So I won't be too surprised if you have no idea who the heck the guy even is. A lot of people like him though, myself included. He has his haters too, and his skeptics and all that, but I could care less. All magicians and celebrities have 'em. I watch his illusions for fun, and he's enjoyable too, so if you don't like him for whatever reason, oh well, I don't care. :b For those that do like him though, I hope you enjoy this, if that's even remotely possible. I drew this for fun for myself and as a tribute to him...so yeah, that's that.

Took about four or five weeks to finish up in GIMP. Wanted to get this done while his current season 6 series is still airing and relevant, so I'm glad it's finally uploaded. There's three more episodes this year, out of 6...there used to be a lot more in his earlier seasons but I guess they've had to trim 'em down for whatever reason. If you like magic and street magic and stunts and illusions, I'd recommend his show--he's good. He also has a live show called Criss Angel Believe which he performs quite often at the Luxor Las Vegas hotel. It'd be cool if someday I could go there and watch one of his shows. :P Maybe even meet him, though slim chance of that happenin'.

+-MINDFREAK-+ Non-Glowy Eyes Version: http://bowser81889.deviantart.com/a.....-U-2-176081830

Go look in my scraps to see a fake promotional poster I made using this image promoting his current season on his show. There's two versions

Anyways...uh, yeah, enjoy maybe. :b Sorry for the usual lameness, but eh...not much I can do about that. When you're born lame, that's how it rolls.

Criss Angel © Himself
Criss Angel: Mindfreak and logo, Criss Angel "A" logo © 2005, 2010 Criss Angel, A&E Network
Pokémon, Pokémon Style, Pikachu, © 1996, 2010 Nintendo, GAME FREAK
Affliction Clothing clothing line, Affliction logo © 2005 Todd Beard, Tom Atencio, Clifton Chason, and Eric Foss
Luxor Las Vegas Hotel © 1993 MGM Resorts International
Some Brushes and Images used © 2010 Their Respective Owners
Logo Help Assistance by RojoRamos
Outline Smoothing Quality Help Assistance by  Ratte
Art © 2010  Bowser81889