HeckBoy and Other Sightings

For as long as I’ve known Dan Dos Santos, I know he's wanted to do a movie poster. I also know he’s a huge Hellboy fan. You can imagine his excitement when the two came together and he was asked to create a poster for Hellboy 2. Alas, if nothing else, Hollywood is fickle and they didn't run it.. This is very common, actually. The movie industry often commissions many more paintings then they expect tp use in the end. (If only books had that luxury.) But congrats to Dan for a choice commission and job well done.

Art Department commentator Eric Orchard is included in the Totoro Forest Project. Congrats on that. Once again, that is a fantastic collection of work and everyone involved should feel very proud.

Last Man Standing 3, round three is up. The theme this time:Unfair Advantage. I’m a judge throughout the competition and, as usual, there are some heartbreaking decisions. (Seen here, Richard Anderson's entry.)

Last Man Standing 3 is on!!!!

There are hundreds of participants and thousands of spectators cheering this week. The third annual Last Man Standing competition has been announced and began registration today.

THE LAST MAN STANDING

Last Man Standing is an art competition cooked up by Cody Tilson. 320 participants will battle each other by drawing and painting an illustration of a given topic. Participants are randomly paired and judged, winners moving on to further rounds until there is just one man (or, as was the case last year, one woman) left standing.

The competition takes the better part of year to complete and it’s a blast to follow. Like the Tour de France, skill will see people to the final rounds, but you can’t escape random events that will knock out some worthy opponents or give a lesser experienced artists break to take advantage of, or not. Great drama.

This year, besides including more participants than ever before, Cody has outdone himself by creating a cohesive website dedicated to following the competition -- interviews with participants, an invite to all participants to post step-by-step demos of their entries, and other goodies. Images from past events have been published in Spectrum, Expose, Imagine FX, and other places, I’m sure.

Let the games begin.

Earlier post, including a quick interview with Cody and some images.
"It was born out of my own need to get off my then-lazy ass and work towards my own artistic development, and an opportunity to include hundreds of other artists in the process." -- Cody Tilson

Spectrum 14 sneak peak

Arnie Fenner sent me a tease of Spectrum 14, due out this fall. At 248 pages, this will be the biggest edition yet, and Arnie, who tends to be fairly low key, is stated that it just might be the best looking one. Here are a few of the front matter pages.

FIRST: Shelley Wan’s winning Last Man Standing competition piece is on the contents page. (As well as in the exhibit section of the book, of course.)

SECOND: Syd Mead fitting receives the Grand Master award – one, because he’s been a big influence on anyone attempting to picture the future and, two, because this will be the first edition of Spectrum with a specific category for concept art.

THIRD: Brom’s Call for Entries poster backing up Arnie’s “Year in Review”.

By the way, the Spectrum website “news” section has been active and interesting. Definitely worth checking out.

Fresh Paint: Shelly Wan

Shelly Wan was born and raised in China. She moved to the States to attend to art school and pursue a career in concept art for movies and video games. Luckily for us, she still manages time to sneak in some illustration -- she was the winner of the latest Last Man Standing Competition and is currently working on a pirate book for Tor. She is extremely knowledgeable of historical painters and illustrators. This strong foundation has lead her to a complex sense of design and color is remarkable for an artist just 25 years old. Mix that with her unique voice and determination and we’ll be seeing tons of great work from her in the decades ahead.

Where did you go to school and how do you feel they prepared you for your career, both artistically and in business?
I went to Pasadena Art Center College of Design from 2000 to 2004 because the school has a good reputation on educating commercial artists. I spend the first 3 year at the school concentrating on live painting/drawing skills. It was only in the last year that I concentrated on learning skills that relate specifically to film and games, and started to paint digitally. Art Center nurtured my taste with its vast library collection. It's there that I first encountered the golden age American Illustrators. In business -- because many of the teachers are working in the Industry, it offer the students a lot of insights into the field.

What has been your biggest challenge post graduation?
To land a job and then to meet the expectations. i have very strong personal preferences in art, so when I encounter artistic differences in art direction of my projects is usually hard for me to wrap my head around it and change my art to fit. But as a concept artist this is almost always the case, so to be adaptable is a constant struggle on my part.

Do you feel as though you've had your first break yet?
I guess so. I am totally not convinced that I have establish my personal style, but I feel I am hitting it here and there, and people are responding to it. The Last Man Standing contest at ConceptArt.org definitely pushed me into the stage light, and I got some of my favorite pieces from it that's also crowd pleasers, and I am very thankful.

Do you have a clear idea where you'd like to be in five years or are you taking each day as it comes?
It's a very blurry idea: I mostly concentrate my thinking on what skills I want to learn and get better at. As for where I want to be, it's probably where ever I can learn the most to aid my artistic growth and to be able to explore my own style.

Any advice to students still in school?
Be open to new ideas, yet be truthful to your own voice. I was continually confused by all the information that was given to me at school: rules vs. no rules, strict academy training vs. right brain thinking... at the end of the day, it's just whether you are doing art that moves yourself. Be sensitive to your instincts, and ask questions when you see pieces you like: "what's in this piece that moves me?" Distill it and make it your own.

Last Man Standing 2 - Final Round

The final round of the Last Man Standing 2 Thunderdome has been posted on ConceptArt. 271 contenders have been whittled down to just five killer artists. The topic, Charge!. The winner should be announced in about a week.

(What is this thing called Thunderdome, you ask? Click here.)

Shown here is Shelly Wan's entry.

Last Man Standing 2

ConceptArt.org is an international community of artists, tens of thousands strong -- everything from high school students to seasoned professionals. One of the more entertaining features is the Thunderdome. These are competitions where artists "battle" each other by drawing and painting -- a topic is chosen, a deadline set, and then...they are off to see who can top the other. No blood is spilled (usually) and no prizes are won, it's just a fun way for young artists to motivate themselves and hone their skills.

About a year ago, Cody Tilson (aka Strych9ine), organized a massive battle, calling to arms anyone in the ConceptArt.org community that wanted to draw until The Last Man Standing.It started with 144 artists and took the better part of a year to complete. In the first few rounds the results were understandably mixed -- in fact, part of the fun is watching students play along with professionals --but as the competition moved on most of the work was solid! In the end, the insanely talented Jason Chan was the last man standing. (The final round taking place during his senior year college finals.) Images created for "the Dome" have been accepted into Spectrum, England's Imagine FX, China's Fantasy Art Magazine, Australia's Expose....and no doubt, many other places.

Unfortunately the links are spread out all over the place, but here is a link to a round where the topic was "A child meets their imaginary friend."

Now, Last Man Standing 2 is in progress: 271 artists will create 396 paintings to come up with 1 winner.

I asked Cody, what on earth were you thinking?

Before I started Last Man Standing on conceptart.org, the forum was peppered with smaller, member-run Thunderdome art battles, but there hadn't been a massive competition for a while. It was born out of my own need to get off my then-lazy ass and work towards my own artistic development, and an opportunity to include hundreds of other artists in the process. It was a total shocker that I had to actually cut off admission into the first dome at 144 people, but it showed me that many artists, professionals and budding artists alike, were excited about the dome.

With LMSTD2 I wanted to take the dome to the next level, make it somewhat of a recognizable force in the community, and with a role call of 271 people currently participating in the event, it's happening. When you have some of the most talented artists any online community has to offer participating and top industry professionals lending a hand to judge, it's hard to go wrong.

The best part about running the dome is seeing pieces created by community members specifically for this thunderdome being printed in annuals and magazines worldwide. I love to see the friends I've made getting the recognition they deserve, and it's nice to know that the Dome has provided the right circumstances for those pieces to be created.

There is no worst part...I've stayed up for hours getting final entry threads created and sifted through hundreds of emails to organize all of the art being entered, but I'd do it again any day. I'm not the only person putting in the time to make this thing float. Every artist involved is donating their free time to create works just for this Dome, and many are required to continue to do so as they advance through the rounds. That's hundreds of new pieces of artwork being generated over the course of the Dome, for no prize other than to know you fought your way through almost 300 people and came out the sole winner of the massive event. That's a contest with balls if you ask me.

Artwork from top to bottom: Jason Chan, Pandoras Box; Shelley Wan, Begining of the End; Dan Milligan, Boys vs. Girls: Tiffany Prothero, The Escape