MUSSELBURGH artist Toby Larner is brightening up the lives of people with his cute mini-robot designs during the Covid-19 crisis.

The 45-year-old dad-of-one was asked by a friend who works at Lauder Lodge care home in Portobello to paint a robot wearing PPE for her colleagues and the residents to print out digitally.

He also produced the image in black and white for the residents to have fun colouring in the robot themselves; then turned his attention to a tartan robot for Musselburgh with the message ‘Stay Safe, Stay Protected’, as the country prepares to ease out of lockdown.

Toby said: “This was some thing I’d wanted to do myself for a little while anyway, so I thought this was a great idea.

“I did a robot with the lilac colour scheme for [Lauder Lodge] owner Care UK but wanted some options for other backgrounds, too.

“I thought about something that would represent Musselburgh and came across the blue and white Musselburgh tartan.

“I hadn’t seen much of this before so tried it out and it looked good, so I used that for another robot.”

He added that he could make the image available for people to download and print free-of-charge.

He also produced a picture called “From My Window” for householders to put in their windows during the lockdown.

“Now that lockdown is seeming to be easing off a little, I think it’s especially important that we stay safe and protected,” said Toby, who is urging people to wear face coverings as advised by the government.

Toby first came to the attention of the public by anonymously sharing the super-cute robot character he created for his son Sean, now 12, by painting it on everything from lampposts to the harbour wall at Fisherrow.

Since then he has painted to raise funds for good causes and also works with schools in the community.

For your own mini-robot poster, go to Toby’s Dropbox link at bit.ly/3bZZprb