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 Stephan
Martiniere is an internationally renowned science fiction and fantasy
artist. He is the recipient of numerous awards including a Silver and a Gold
“Spectrum” Award, three Master awards and six Excellence “Expose”
Award. As a director for the five animated specials “Madeline” Stephan
received the Parent’s Choice Award, the Humanitas Award, the A.C.T Award
and was nominated for an Emmy Award. In his varied career, Martiniere has
worked in animation, video games, theme parks and book covers. An
accomplished concept artist, Martiniere has worked on movies such as ‘I
Robot', ‘Star Wars' (episodes Two & Three), ‘Virus', ‘Red Planet',
‘Sphere', and ‘The Time Machine'.
About 25 years ago, Stephan started his career as a very young man working
with DIC, the French company that was making the animated series Inspector Gadget. DIC was outsourcing
animation to Japan and they hired Martiniere as a character and background
designer with still a year to complete in animation school. “What started
as a one month proposition turned out to be seven years!” exclaims
Martiniere. “After ‘Inspector Gadget', I was traveling back and forth
between Asia, America and Europe.”
As a young French man trying to finance his studies Stephan had no
hesitation traveling for work. Stephan admits to being completely unprepared
for the Asian culture. “I had never left France. My vision of Japan was of
bamboo, samurais, geishas and the old-looking traditional Japanese look. “I
was catapulted overnight into downtown Tokyo in the Blade Runner universe. I
had no idea such an environment existed. My visual senses were overwhelmed
but in a very exciting way”, admits Martiniere.
Learning
Stephan
worked on “Gadget” for DIC for six months, and then was sent to the
States to work on “Heathcliff” then back in Japan to work on “Jayce
and The Wheel Warriors”. For
seven years he was sent by DIC to work between L.A, Tokyo and Paris. While
growing up in France, Stephan was already very familiar with American comics
and artists such as Jack Kirby, John buscema, Bernie Wrightson and Will
Eisner. The American influence on his drawings was strong. Manga and Anime
didn't exist in France and the US yet and he had never seen anything like it
before going to Tokyo. At age 19, Stephan Martiniere was thrown right in.
“Anime made an impact on my style but more so in the way I visualize and
convey an emotion in a design or a story ” explains Martiniere, “
Anime’s technical simplification in particular has a way to quickly and
effectively convey an emotion with minimal information. It’s like a
stylistic Zen approach to design and story telling. I found it fascinating.
Directing
After spending eight years in animation and later moving to California,
Martiniere found himself directing various animated TV shows for DIC. Most
of the time these jobs were an exercise in problem solving. There was very
little creative joy built-in at the end of every mission until one day he
was handed a kid's show called “Madeline”. “It's funny,” Martiniere
adds, “because the only reason this show ended up in my hands was because
I'm French and the show is about a little French girl who lives in Paris.
This turned out to be very lucky. Because of the small size of my team I
ended up wearing the director and art director's hat as well as designing
characters, background and props, doing storyboards and writing. It was
extremely enjoyable. The show became a tremendous success and won numerous
awards. After that I knew it would be very difficult to have a chance like
that again. I decided that it was the right time to move on.”
Back
to Learning
Martiniere had a strong urge to go back to design, and, right on cue,
Landmark Entertainment hired him as a concept designer and illustrator to
work on two theme parks in Japan. The job was demanding but Martiniere was
able to refine his skills as a concept designer. After two enjoyable years
Martiniere went back to animation for a little while and directed five more
“Madeline” animated specials. During that period Stephan started to
establish some contacts with the film industry. Then he was contacted to
work on “Star Trek: The Experience”.
Photoshop
“Star Trek: The Experience” was a motion ride film in Las Vegas.
Martiniere was doing story boards and concept drawings and Craig Mullins was
doing the paintings on Martiniere's concept drawings. Craig was one of the
first using Photoshop as a painting tool in the entertainment industry.
“When I was shown Craig’s paintings my jaw was on the floor. The results
were immediately impressive. I knew this was what I was looking for."
Martiniere dived into digital painting with no hesitation. At the time, he
didn't know anything about computers or Photoshop. “I had just spent close
to $10,000 on computer equipment and I didn't know how to turn it on.”
With Craig Mullins' help over several months he learned very quickly.
“Photoshop created a major shift in my career,” says Stephan. He met
more and more people in different creative fields, and now with Photoshop
under his belt, a wider variety of freelance job offers came his way.
Films
Luc Besson's “Fifth Element” was the first major film Martiniere worked
on. Although his part in the project was minimal, it was the beginning of a
very fruitful career in the film industry. As Martiniere continued to
further his reputation in theme parks and animation he also established
himself as an illustrator and concept designer in the film industry working
on such movies as “Dragon Heart 2”, “Red Planet”, “Virus”,
“The Astronaut’s Wife”, “The Time Machine”, “Star Wars” (Ep 2
and 3) and “I, Robot”.
Book
covers
Book covers were something that Stephan Martiniere wanted to do for many
years. “As a kid I was buying sci-fi books mainly because of the cover
art. I was a huge fan of Chris Foss.” His first cover was for a story from
Jack Williamson Terraforming the Earth. “Doing book covers is one of the
most enjoyable and rewarding thing for me.” says Stephan, “As an artist,
book covers offer individual recognition. Coming from a background in movies
and animation where everything is part of a huge machine, you have no idea
where your work goes and how it's being used. It's rare when you can see it
all on the screen. As an artist it’s important to be able to show people
what you do and receive feedback. It validates your art and yourself as an
artist. Book covers are exciting because they are ‘undiluted’. What I do is
what will be on the cover and people see it a few months after it’s done.
There's a lot of satisfaction in that. In the process, there's also an
enormous amount of freedom and creativity. As an artist I am constantly
learning new things and exploring new graphic possibilities.”
Style
Stephan Martiniere's style is eclectic. He is very comfortable switching
from ‘cartoony' style to
realistic, from whimsical to science fiction. Martiniere feels this is due
to his ability to wear different “hats” in projects. “I always like
the creative aspect of things that have never been done before. It's what
drives me. The idea of devising completely new worlds and new ways to draw
elements is extremely rich and rewarding. Especially when it comes to sci-fi
and fantasy; it's all about dreaming worlds. That is my background and it
transfers into my art. It's a bit of American, Japanese and European styles
combined together in a melting pot.” The move to digital painting was
completely intuitive for Martiniere. A lot of his industry friends were
reluctant to move to digital because they had solid techniques as
traditional painters. But for him, it was very easy because, as he says,
“I had nothing to lose.” By the simple nature of doing concept design
all these years, Martiniere found himself using pencils, pens and markers,
then handing these concepts to other departments for coloring. He never
moved into professional color work nor did he develop a personal style as a
traditional painter.
Photoshop Techniques
Over the last several years, Martiniere has started to explore different
techniques in Photoshop. A process he calls a “scratching technique” is
outlined in his first book, Quantum Dreams. It is a technique based
on erasing or subtracting paint, as opposed to adding it. This technique of
erasing reveals layers built under. “Erasing a piece of paint with an
eraser in Photoshop creates a very aggressive line and precise shape” says
Martiniere. “It's like cutting a piece of paper. It's very direct, graphic
and spontaneous, almost impressionistic, reminiscent of John Berkey. My
experiments with Photoshop have somehow taken me to a place where I found
the satisfaction of a unique self-expression in digital painting.”
Games
In 2001, having established himself as an accomplished professional in the
entertainment industry Stephan was approached by Cyan, the company behind
Myst. “I had always admired what Rand Miller had created with the Myst
universe especially with Riven and Exile. At the time Cyan was working on expanding the Myst universe.
Rand Miller was looking for somebody that could bring a cinematic feel to
the new game.” Stephan was
hired as the Visual Design Director. “My role was to create a cinematic
vision and shepherd that vision through the production pipeline.” For three years, Stephan found himself involved in every visual
aspect of the project: designing environments, characters and props as well
as participating in the story. He
also found himself collaborating with a team of very talented people. “The experience was an extremely rewarding.” After Cyan,
Stephan worked for several other companies, including 3-DO, Pandemic, Disney
Interactive, Ion Storm and Naughty Dog.
Midway games
After producing “Psi-Ops”, Midway Games, the company primarily
responsible for games like “Mortal Kombat” was gearing up for its first
Next Generation game: “Stranglehold”, the
sequel to John Woo's movie “Hardboiled”. The compelling goal in the game
industry has been “convergence between film and game” and Midway was
determined to have a strong art team and somebody with a solid cinematic and
artistic experience to create and drive a vision. Once more, Martiniere was
hired as the Visual Design Director. “My role is much more comprehensive
at Midway than it was at Cyan. I'm
also working with a much bigger team. As the Visual Design Director I'm responsible for creating the
artistic and cinematic vision for the game and carry that vision through the
production pipeline. I am also responsible to bring a cinematic and
narrative feel to the project by doing storyboards and collaborating with
the cinematic team. “It's like having the role of both a production
designer and a director. “Says
Stephan. “ “It’s a very exciting and challenging role”. Looking back on his career, he says “It's like going full circle. I started 25 years ago at a turning point in the TV animation
industry with new markets, exciting possibilities and with aspiration to
grow as an artist. I now find
myself again, at a turning point in a new industry with even more exciting
possibilities. And still with
aspiration to grow.”
Related links: Stephan
Martiniere's web site
Article used with permission by Martiniere Inc. ©2006 |
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