Underrated Artists In The Spotlight: Issue #1

Aug 16, 200911 min read

Deviation Actions

Published: Aug 16, 2009

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Underrated Artists In The Spotlight
_{The aim behind this new weekly newsletter is to focus the spotlight on 'Underrated' Artists within the community of DeviantArt in an attempt to gain them more exposure which they deserve. Each week I shall put one artist and put them in the spotlight, giving critique on some of their works, showing their works off to the community.}

Can You Help?
_{Any help from anyone is welcome; Please read this journal sharkfold.deviantart.com/journ… for more information on how you can help as I don't want to distract from the goal of this newsletter.</sup>

This Weeks Spotlight is on...

crash-bang-wallop is an Illustrator who has been a member of the DeviantArt community for just short of one year now. She has a small yet inspiring gallery of arts which include pieces based around ideas for a Children's Story book idea, other personal projects and pieces relating to her University Degree.

A brief Interview with crash-bang-wallop
_{What Inspired You to be an artist?
Being bought art kits every single Christmas & birthday by my relatives helped. ^_^ i watched too many cartoons, which was definitely an inspiration - one of my first artistic aspirations was to be a Disney animator when I was about six or seven years old. I had a lot of children's chapter books as well, like the older Roald Dahl stuff, & I used to make my own illustrations for them. Art wasn't ever anything I thought of consciously, like "God, I have to make sure I keep practicing" or anything - I just enjoyed it from the age I could hold a pencil so I kept doing it.

Also what and/or who has inspired you and your style
Comic books have probably been one of the biggest influences on my style. I used to read a varying amount but these days I'm pretty much exclusively Gotham universe. Artists like Dave McKean, Brian Bolland & Bruce Timm have all had a huge influence on what I draw & how I draw it - Dave McKean has particularly influenced me when it comes to creating illustrations outside of Photoshop. The guy's amazing, he uses absolutely every material at his disposal & creates really eerie, surreal pieces of work. That's another thing I'd love to do actually - ink comic books (I really should make up my mind, shouldn't I? ^_^)

What do you aspire to be when you're older and why?
My absolute dream career is to be a lead character artist for a games development company. Designing characters & coming up with concepts for them is where my talent stems from - drawing people is what I'm best at. But, to be honest, there are loads of things I'd love to do. Have a children's picture book is definitely one of them - I adore unusual children's books & to have my own book published inspiring children with my drawings would be a dream come true.

How did you come up with the idea for your story book
My picture book idea originally comes from a brief I was given at university (my BA games design course) which was only a quick, week-long brief but basically I had to come up with an interesting design for a character & their pet. Since I knew all the geeky boys in my class would be coming up with warlocks riding wargs or whatever, I wanted to do something different. My idea was Lucia & Nocks - a lonely little girl with acute nyctophobia (fear of the dark) meeting a nightmare, Nocks who turns invisible in daylight. As a couple of protagonists for a video game, the concept was the time of day that you were playing dictated with character you could play as (Lucia in daylight, Nocks in the dark). Eventually that idea progressed into an idea for a children's book - a nightmare (who looks a lot differently than he did when I first drew him, but has kept his name) who is the scariest nightmare there has ever been... But discovers a little girl who is just not afraid of him in the slightest.

Do you have any tips and/or advice for other Illustrators? Or people looking at going into a degree in Games Design / Children's Book Illustration
Well, practice makes prefect, obviously. You cannot stop drawing, that's pretty much the bottom line - I'm always scribbling on the bottom of coasters when I'm at the pub or in my boyfriend's Japanese study books when he's not looking. Originality is also important - especially in Games Design. There are too many people trying to re-design World of Warcraft - no one's going to be impressed with ANOTHER fantasy rpg where you run around as a scantily-dressed elf maiden. Coming up with fresh ideas is hard but it's so good when they finally happen. I'm too lazy & disorganized to carry around a book that I can record my ideas in but when I think I've come up with something good while I'm sat on a train or something, I just jot it down in a text on my mobile phone & then save it as a draft. It's better than forgetting it & kicking yourself later!}

A Glimpse of crash-bang-wallop's Gallery

_{I absolutely love the idea behind this book idea, the style of drawing and colouring is so 'dark and sinister' yet it's at the perfect level to which it's not scary but instead rather fun. The textures she uses give the characters and scenes a somewhat 'old' look and appeal to them, they don't look flat and boring... It gives them a little life. As you can see from the above examples, crash-bang-wallop has experimented with her characters, exploring different mediums and styles which has enabled her to come up with, what could be described as 'the best' way to present the story. It's clean, refreshing and definitely something I feel a child would enjoy reading, it's also different - not the generic princess being saved by her prince. Interesting characters, fun storyline and different style of presentation is what I feel sets crash-bang-wallop aside from others giving her an edge.

In one this piece you can see crash-bang-wallop has created a 'mock' layout for the book itself, the text is well positioned, making use of interesting font styles which would not doubt captivate any child reader and keep them entertained (needless to say, it makes me want to read more!).}

The 'Cirque Du Songes' Set_{These are truly beautifully detailed and well thought up pieces of art. crash-bang-wallop has drawn and digitally painted different 'key jobs' within the traditional circus job. The composition of each piece is outstanding, the colours all work extremely well and each piece has a creepy and dark look about it, a theme which crash-bang-wallop works very well with indeed. The way in which this set has been drawn and coloured is rather realistic, crash-bang-wallop has a keen grasp of proportions which adds to the realism of each piece within this set.}

My Favorite Piece from crash-bang-wallop

_{'Holmes and Watson' is a portrait of the artist herself as Holmes and her boyfriend drawn as Watson. It's interesting to see any artist characterize themselves into cartoon form, this being something I feel has been done interestingly well in this piece. The textures in the clothing are really well done and give an element of realism to the piece.}}