Dog Eaters

Interview with Guillermo A. Angel

Posted on 07.31.08 3:38PM under Interviews

Dogs Eaters artist Guillermo A. Angel has been pretty busy as of late working on the book and trying to stay ahead of deadline. But we managed to catch him for a few minutes of downtime to ask him some questions about the series!

BlackDogClan: How did you get into the comic book industry?

Guillermo A. Angel :  Since I was a child, my hobby was always DRAWING, and I’ve always liked different kinds of comics. However, is not easy to develop as a Graphic Artist, and just impossible to do in the comic industry, since local comic book industry was FROZEN. It almost vanished for many years in Chile, due to a strong cultural change that came from political issues that led to a very low artistic development in every aspect (music, theatre, etc). My generation didn’t take part directly in it, at all, but we all grew up in that atmosphere, and against all that, I was able to keep myself surrounded by things that kept my interest in art, like comics, animation and videogames, but in an absolutely SMALLER scale compared to USA, in cultural terms.

When I finished School, I studied Graphic Design at the University of La Serena (my birth place). However, I never felt happy with it, and continued cultivating my dream of becoming a comic book artist. I quit University, and after many years of trying local projects, and even a quick second try studying Architechture, I received an invitation from a friend to join a National Project, which allowed me to move to Santiago and develop as a comic book artist and Illustrator. The rest has been all by self-promotion, mostly by the DEVIANTART comunity, where I have my gallery, and could meet many other artists outside CHILE, and the chance to work for other countries, just like with Dog Eaters.

BlackDogClan: What are some of the projects you’ve worked on?

Gullermo : Back in La Serena, between 2004-2005, I participated in different Regional projects, like art workshops for school kids and young people, and different exhibitions at different times. By that time, I was creator with some friend, of a Graphic Novel project , to present it at some National Art Financing contest here in order to be able to publish it, and become some sort of small editorial magazine. Sadly, it wasn’t approved.

Then, since 2004, I became an Illustrator for SALO S.A., based in Chile, and I’ve worked for their TCG’s "Mitos y Leyendas" and "Humankind", which has been the best "self-learned" school I’ve had. In the Comic book Industry, the main project I was part of is "Berserker Comics", an editorial born in 2004, directly from a group of Artist friends that decided to give a twist to the poor situation of Local Comic Book production by that time. I was finally making short stories all by myself, drawing and painting, for "Berserker magazine," a short stories magazine. But again, tragedy struck, and we never had a second issue for the main publication. I kept then working as illustrator, designer and letterer for different projects in order to stay alive — always as a team, ready to do any requested job , pencils, inks, colors, etc, until most of us took our own paths.

BlackDogClan What have you enjoyed about working on Dog Eaters?

Guillermo : OH there’s a whole EVERYTHING I’ve enjoyed in this project, but If I have to choose only one thing, it’s FREEDOM!… the exquisite chance to create and design a whole world described in the story, and not being limited to already done designs, is unique. Everything you see in Dog Eaters has been created from words on a page and nothing else, always with the help and advice of Malcolm and Sean, which has been a very inspiring labor, sometimes difficult, but always fun. It takes a piece of myself on every detail, and I’m very happy with it.

BlackDogClan: Who’s your favorite character so far, and what do you like about them?

Guillermo : I have two favorite characters, without a doubt.

First comes Tommy "Tomahawk" BlackDog… from the very beginning I knew Tommy was my favorite. He’s just the coolest guy on "that" earth, He’s tough, troublemaker, an incomparable Casanova, and can shoot better than anyone. In the early designs, he looked just like Stevie is now, but then I found just the right idea for him, and Stevie ended being the old Tommy. If you search a bit, you can figure out some more about him.

My second favorite Character is Tracy Black Dog, because she’s like a small precious stone in that tough lifeless world. She’s cute, she’s brave, and very smart. The thing I like the most about her is her courage. She confronts anybody and says what she wants and spits it in your face. She fears no one.  She is also a great shooter, and can shoot those big machine guns. Nothing stops Tracy, at all.

BlackDogClan: What’s been the most difficult part about working on this story?

Guillermo : It’s funny, but the same reason I’ve enjoyed so much, it’s the same reason that makes it difficult…. freedom.

Creating and designing a world for the Black Dog Clan is a very long difficult and complex proccess, where you never get the absolute perfect point in the creator’s vision and the artist’s vision. However, there’s balance after many ideas, but getting to that point is the difficult part. The world in Dog Eaters , that "earth",  is the result of many events in time, evolution in a fast small scale, etc, so visually and functionally, it must speak by itself, and tell that story in some way. Nothing can be done without thinking on the background for it.

Guillermo A. Angel is the pencil artist for DOG EATERS. You can see more of his artwork at http://giye.deviantart.com.

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