Jed Henry is a prolific artist who focuses on Japanese print style art. I was able to interview him at Super Magfest 2018. He’s worked on movie animation, video games, comic books and traditional and computer art.

0:37 – Artist Jed Henry talks about the work he is most proud of and he finds it to be the one that was most difficult. He points out his Final Fantasy 6 triptych.

1:42 – He says that he’ll work on something for 2 to 4 hours and then stay away for a half hour and then look at it again. He checks at each phase of production if it’s done. Sometimes he just throws a piece away.

2:40 – He sketches in photoshop and does inkwork in traditional Japanese paper. He scans this in and adds color digitally.

3:10 – He’s inspired by people who show talent and he likes tattoo artists who do Japanese style tattooing. He gets inspirations from dance music, cinema and he reads a lot of comics, novels, poetry and so on.

4:19 – He talks about his inspiration to do Japanese style Star Wars artwork. He likes the Buddhist and eastern mysticism elements of Star Wars.

5:24 – He says he’s addicted to working on his computer. He also needs real brushes and inks for his work. A digital brush won’t work for him.

6:00 – He most likes doing line work. It’s the foundation of his Japanese style work.

6:36 – He feels a compulsion to do art and he loves doing it. It’s like a sweet torture and he would be unhappy doing anything else.

7:33 – He’s been doing art since he was a little kid and just kept doing it. He was a serious student and didn’t do as much art while in school. He tried to get good grades and create art but around age 22 he focused on drawing while in college. He barely slept but wanted to create art.

9:10 – He got free copies of Adobe and he began using that to work on his scanned in work. He picked up digital media pretty quickly in college.

10:00 – He studied animation in college and since the 90s animation was done on computer software. He never questioned using computers for his art. It was the tool of choice for his goals.

11:23 – He balances skill and effort to achieve success. It’s almost a numbers game and has had to reinvent himself half a dozen times to have success. He had a movie internship in LA and didn’t like it. He went into children’s books, then Japanese printmaking, a video game, and is working on a comic book. An artist must explore and also think like a businessperson. His process always changes to match his career goals. He wants to channel his creativity in a way that people will want to support him. You can’t do too much of any one thing.

14:46 – He says that many talented artists didn’t have complete freedom.

15:20 – He says that many people approach being an artist in a different way. He doesn’t know if an artist should focus on survival or making it a better place.

16:13 – He loves the Shattered Sea series by Joe Abercrombie. The first book is Half a King and are great YA fantasy. He gets impatient with lots of YA fantasy. Many lack character and emotional connection. He loves character first and concept second.

17:50 – He loves David Mitchell. He writes great literature but also writes great crazy science fiction. He also recommends the sci-fi novel Stories of Your Life and Others. He says it’s great people science fiction. He loves Mitchell’s latest book titled Bone Clocks. It’s an insane vampire novel.

21:25 – There are many pieces he’d like to create. He likes doing the fan art and enjoys going to conventions. He also wants to make more video games and continues with the comic book.

22:35 – People can find him on google under “Jed Henry.” He’s not the male model or the Jed who brings service member remains back from overseas.

 

Links to things mentioned

http://store.steampowered.com/agecheck/app/382900/

https://www.amazon.com/Half-King-Shattered-Sea-Abercrombie/dp/0804178410

https://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/538163/stories-of-your-life-and-others-by-ted-chiang/

https://www.amazon.com/Bone-Clocks-Novel-David-Mitchell/dp/0812976827

http://ukiyoeheroes.com/

 

For more “Creating Sci-Fi and Fantasy – An Inside Look” please follow me on Facebook at crisalvarezwlc, on youtube at Cris Alvarez and on Instagram @crisalvarezscifi

Guests: Jed Henry

Host: Cris Alvarez