Photo copyright Rockstar Pro Wrestling – Austin Manix
A while back, I was asked to design a new championship belt by a member of Rockstar Pro Wrestling. They had known my work through Sparkle Comics, and wanted me to come up with something original for the Intergalactic Champion belt. With no other real information to go on, I set off to work.
The challenges of the belt design was accounting for the embossing, and not knowing if it was going to be cast in gold or silver. I decided to make proofs in both so they could see what each would look like. As for the colors, I went with their normal Rockstar logo colors of maroon and green.
Using their guitar and lucha mask logo, I went with a UFO abduction theme for the first panel. For the second side panel, I took inspiration from from crop circles, and planetary diagrams.
For the front of the belt, I wanted to play on the “Face” and “Heel” aspect. The “Face” being the good guy, and of course, the “Heel” being the bad. In this case, our hero is the astronaut, and the alien is the villain. For the background of the Rockstar logo, I went with a moon base and kept Earth on the side of the astronaut, and Saturn on the alien side.
Due to Rockstar Pro Wrestling wanting to keep the belt a secret, I didn’t hear anything else about it until a month or so after I submitted the art. The reveal of the belt was well received by fans, with requests of shirts being made.
The belt itself has had many appearances all around the US and Mexico. Although I wasn’t able to get one, an action figure series of Aero Boy was produced with a replica of the belt and sold at his shows. And in it’s earlier debut, it was featured along with previous champion, Aaron Williams, in the October 2019 issue of Pro Wrestling Illustrated.
Photo copyright Aero Boy
Photo copyright Pro Wrestling Illustrated – Aaron WIlliams
Programs used: Illustrator.
