Tuesday, July 27, 2010

The Ominous Studios website is near!

As related in my previous post, Bart Sears has recently announced the creation of his new company - Ominous Studios. And what good is any new business venture without a fancy new website to go with it?

The folks at Ominous Studios have been working tirelessly to get the website up and running and what I have seen looks fantastic. And as a treat for you, dear Searsians, I have once more been granted permission to give you a sneak peak at what the site is going to look like.

So here is the 'About Us' page.

Ominous Studios - About UsAs you can see, Ominous Studios has a broad spectrum of artistic works on display, from comic work, character design, children's books, game artwork and promotional pieces. It is also a great example of Ominous Studios' adaptability and program knowledge, with everything from pencils all the way though to the latest digital art programs on display.

And this is the 'Clients' listing, featuring a close-up of one of the companies cooler characters- Raaman.

Ominous Studios - ClientsSo there you have it. Parts of the website will be available to view imminently, and I'll be pointing to it as soon as it is right here!

So don't go too far...

On another Ominous Studios related matter, hopefully a lot of you are busy working on getting your artwork together to submit to Ominous Studios. The gang will be more than happy to look at your work, with one simple proviso, you have to follow the Submission Guidelines, and that means that they want to see 6-10 of your chosen pieces of art. You can include a link to your website if you have one, but you MUST have those 6-10 pieces, not just the website link. The guys at Ominous Studios said "Time simply doesn't allow for us to go through each site selecting and printing artwork."
But they are really looking forward to seeing what you guys can come up with for them!

Thursday, July 15, 2010

Ominous Studios is here!

Of all of the interviews, articles, reviews and news I have passed on to you, dearest readers, through this blog; nothing (and I mean nothing!) compares to this!
A few of you might know, through Facebook no doubt, that Bart Sears has set up his own company, called Ominous Studios. This studio has been coming for... well, years, really. But the reality of it really only became apparent this year, and particularly the last few months.

So what is Ominous Studios, I hear you ask? Well, it can be summed up with this sentence - "Quality Concept & Creation for the Entertainment Industry."
What on earth does that mean? It means that Ominous Studios is an artistic and Intellectual Property house, where projects will be undertaken and both 'resident' and freelance artists will provide their services for a negotiated fee. It is also a place where many Intellectual Properties will be on display, in a variety of formats such as web comics and short films, to name a few, and these Intellectual Properties will often be available for Purchasing Rights and Distibution agreements.

But what about the Ominous Press characters of old? Will they have a place in this studio? The short answer is - YES! The project is a closely guarded secret, but not for too much longer. And what you are going to see, whilst different, is far superior to what has come before.

But now, as an exclusive to this blog (if only by a few hours!), I can announce that Ominous Studios is officially open for business and is accepting submissions to fill it's existing contracts!

And here are the submission guidelines for those interested parties-

As stated above, you'll need to sign a release form when submitting to Ominous Studios (as is common with pretty much all companies now), so below are the forms for any interested parties. The first is the international A4 size, the latter is the US equivalent.


So get creating folks, and have the chance to be a part of this historic occasion!

On a personal note, I have been unbelievably privileged to be involved in some small way in helping both Bart & Michelle at Ominous Studios in getting things together. Sometimes it has only been a bit of advice, or somebody to bounce ideas off of, or even just a spot of proof-reading. But it has been an utter thrill from the very beginning. Bart and I have been discussing Ominous storylines since the first time we emailed each other, all of those years ago, and it is quite amazing to finally see things coming to fruition.

Naturally, there will be plenty of announcements to be made in the near and far future, so check back soon.

An interesting thing...

This morning, whilst searching the internet for something completely different to do with Bart Sears, I came across this little nugget.

"...And I DO remember the Capullo Wizard stuff. He's awesome. My favorite will always be Bart Sears. So much of my understructure is based upon his work in Wizard years ago."

So who wrote this quote? Well, If you browse the internet for mention of Bart, you will come across many similar posts by amateur artists and aspiring artists alike. But this? This was acclaimed comic artist Dave Finch talking!

I can't recall another time when such a popular creator has praised Bart to such a high degree.

The quote is directly related to Dave's Gnomon Workshop Figure Drawing tutorials. You can see some nice frame-grabs and the quote itself here.