Meet aaronwty!!!

Sometimes pictures speak louder than words so let me start with this…

Holy batman-flippin biscuits it’s the Joker by aaronwty!!!

Awesome artist, cool and humble person…just a great interview!

Questions by me awesome bat-butt-kickin’ art by aaronwty!

Well, thanks again bro for taking the time for the interview!  Let’s get things started with a brief Bio about yourself. Name (not required if you don’t want) age, and your background with art. Any schooling or classes or formal training?

My name is Aaron Wong and I studied in an art college in Malaysia, my home country, for 3 years taking diploma in Illustration. I loved drawing since I was very small, but until I stepped into college I only realized that I couldn’t really draw so well all that while, during the 3 years of studies I improved alot and I worked as a concept artist in the animation line in malaysia for more than a year after graduation. In a week time i’m going to UK for final year for a degree in Illustration and continue my journey of exploration in art.

Talk about determination! You are truly a blessed artist who doesn’t mind working hard to improve!

Gotta start with HOLY-FREAKIN’ BATMAN! Are you serious! Those joker pieces are the Best I have seen on the net! What drew you to the character Joker from the Dark Knight to illustrate him so many times? (All are fantastic by the way!)

After I watched the dark knight, I almost cried and I was really stunned and touched by the effort that heath ledger put in to the character Joker. I have never seen any acting as good as that and the whole world was amaze. Other than the joker, the dark knight is one of the best movie ever in the sense of storyline, acting, action and so on. It shows the industry that in end a good movie still comes back to the basic foundation of storyline and acting. Not fancy specialy effects with no meaning. And this movie really brought back my passion of painting because I rarely drew for my own interest since I started working. Heath made me feel like I wanna draw again. I was slowly losing the passion. so I decided to create some really nice tributes for him to remember this great actor we lost.

You have a great style with traditional media and digital. Do you think there needs to be a balance or can a person just jump into digital mediums like photoshop and painter without getting an understanding of the traditional things like paint or inks?

Yes I think that in order to master digital art we need to learn the foundation of traditional mediums like water colour, pencils, and acrylic. Especially pencil. I think that if we master the skill of pencil sketching, you can do well in most of the mediums. Cause that is the basic foundation of drawing and it trains your art sense and observation. I dont believe that a person who cant draw with traditional medium can suddenly create brilliant digital art. unless he uses photo montage.

Any particular games you are playing now? (Here is one for you to watch for!) [link]

I used to play warcraft 3 DOTA but I sucked at it.. most of the time i just play winning eleven on ps2. i have been playing since winning eleven 4 until winning eleven 11 now.. I hardly get sick of the same game.. haha.. maybe football games hardly repeat when we play.. so its always interesting

What are your plans for your future in the world of art and design. Are you making this a career move?

When I studied in college I thought about doing covers for movies, novels, comics or albums. But once I started doing concept art I fell in love with it and I think I can do that for my career. Now my dream will be doing concept art for movies, and it will be nice if i can draw concept art for movies like Dark Knight or other cool movies. I worked as an environment concept artist and also a character designer for an animation project previously.. so most probably I will continue with that.

Who are some artist that you admire?

I always admired DrewStruzan, especially all the great movie posters he did for star wars, Harry Potter, Hellboy, Indiana Jones and so on. I also loved Slam Dunk the manga alot but i dont remember the artist’s name in english cause i read it in Chinese. And I also like a Chinese artist called zhuzhu. His works are very special. The strokes are so simple but yet so realistic and nice.

(Deviant Art can’t remove this one!)

I love your digital painting tutorials! How long have you been working in photoshop. Could you give a brief statement about your process work and how long it takes to finish a piece.

It depends what I draw. It’s really different the way I draw environments, portraits and character designs. If it’s a portrait I normally open a blank canvas in photoshop, A4 size and 300 DPI. I start with the outline in one layer, a rough sketch first. Then when the rough sketch is done I trace a neater outline over the rough one in a new normal layer. When the outline is done I open a new multiply layer and start painting the major colours in darker tone from light to dark. and finally I open a normal layer and paint opaque colours from dark to light. Always paint the big areas first and do the details at last.

You are a big fan of films and pop culture. How do these things affect what you wish to create with your art.

I always tell myself that I only wanna draw the things that I like. Because if I have no interest in something no matter how hard I try to paint or draw it I dont think it will look nice. That is why I drew so many football and basketball players, movie stars and batman characters because I like them and I enjoy it alot when I draw them.

If you could work on any project/ film/ video game/ television what would it be.

I would definitely wanna work in the next Batman movie! haha! or Superman, or any basketball or football related movies.

Favorite video game of all time?

Winning Eleven 5,6,7,8,9,10,11!!!

Thanks again Aaron! Good luck on your adventures in the UK! Click here to see his whole gallery!