Shawn Martinbrough draws the line
The making of a superhero comic book artist.
Our series “How I became a …” digs into the stories of accomplished and influential people, finding out how they got to where they are in their careers. (Editor’s note: This interview has been edited for brevity and clarity.)
Shawn Martinbrough’s work on iconic characters such as Batman, Captain America, Luke Cage, the Black Panther and Hellboy has been seen around the globe. From his work on the “Thief of Thieves” to helping create characters seen on movies such as “Deadpool” and “Justice League,” there’s no way you haven’t seen his work in some capacity. USA TODAY caught up with the artist, author, TEDx speaker and art educator.
Question: What’s the coolest thing you’ve ever done?
Shawn Martinbrough: Recently, I was invited to a comic book convention in Portsmouth, England, the Portsmouth UK Comic Con. It’s a really small shipping town about an hour outside of London, and it was really awesome to go to the first one that they held. It was great to see a bunch of fellow comicbook writers and artists, some people that I know and most people that I’ve been a fan of for a long time.
Also – attending the world premiere of Marvel’s “Black Panther” movie.
Q: Who has been your biggest mentor?
Martinbrough: I would probably say my mom and my dad. (They) are two completely different personalities. My mom is very organized – she is very, very tightly wound. And my dad is more of a socializer, more of a people person in that way. Having both personality traits sort of guide me through life has been very descriptive of my character. I can be very outgoing but also can be kind of controlling and very introverted as well.
My professional mentors are two African-American artists, Gil Ashby and Michael Davis. I met them when I was in high school, and they gave me the yin and yang of being an artist. Gil Ashby was a purist – he was like, “You have to learn how to draw, you have to learn how to draw anatomy, perspective, etc.” Davis was all about, “This is a business, this is a hustle, (you) have to learn how to sell yourself.” That really gave me a big leg up professionally.
Q: What does your career path look like, from college to now?
Martinbrough: I went to a performing arts high school in New York City. I was an art major. Then, I went and got my BFA in illustration. I was determined to get professional work in comics before I graduated college, so I got my first job working for Marvel Comics in 1992. I was a junior in college.
From then on, I went on to work for Marvel, then I worked for Milestone Media, then I worked for DC Comics, then I worked for Dark Horse Comics. That led to working with Robert Kirkman, the creator of “The Walking Dead” series and his company Skybound Entertainment. I’ve been working with them for the last five or six years on a series called “Thief of Thieves.”
Q: What’s your favorite project that you’ve ever worked on?
Martinbrough: For me, it’s always exciting to visualize a completely new kind of story. For example, one of my favorite projects was drawing “Luke Cage Noir” for Marvel, which set the classic character of Luke Cage – who was created in the 1970s, he was a Blaxploitation-type character – and I got to reimagine him in the 1920s. That was a special project.
Then I did a project with Geoff Johns. He and I worked together on a littleknown mini-series called “The Morlocks,” which introduced a new group of mutants that were set in Chicago. He wrote the series and I illustrated it, and several of our characters have been adapted into television shows like “Gifted” and movies like “Deadpool.”
Another project I worked on, which was really cool, was the Black Panther – it was, like, the end of the series back around 2010. It was called “Black Panther: The Man Without Fear.” That was an awesome opportunity, to get to draw a classic character like the Black Panther.
“Thief of Thieves” has been really great, because I’ve drawn 42 issues of it, and over the course of 42 issues we’ve taken the character around the globe, because he’s a globetrotting thief and he steals precious artifacts and pieces of art. I’ve drawn him having adventures in Venice, Italy, London, Rome – right now, we’re in the Middle East.
Each project is awesome in their own way because it sort of takes me into a different place.
Q: What does a typical day look like for you?
Martinbrough: I make the very long commute from my bedroom to my studio in the condo that I share with my lovely wife. I tend to work from about 9 in the morning to maybe 1 or 2 in the morning, and it really depends on if I’m in the zone. Sometimes I can actually work until about 2 a.m. or 3 a.m. I have to go to bed before the birds come out and start chirping.
During the day, I’ll take breaks – ride my bike to get some exercise or go to the gym. Since I sit on my butt all day at the art table, I’ll have to balance that out with some kind of physical activity. I’ll try to take breaks between drawing to sneak out to a movie, because that’s like the best sort of recharge for me with regard to visual imagery.
Q: What has been your biggest career high and your biggest career low?
Martinbrough: (Low) Being at a point where you can’t get work. As a freelancer you always will hit a dry spell, where people are like, “Oh, I love your work but I don’t have anything for you,” and you’re not making money, and that sucks.
(High) One would be my art book, which is called “How to Draw Comics: The Art and Technique of Visual Storytelling,” published by Random House. That sort of summed up my entire experience from learning to draw to becoming a professional artist in one book.
Q: What advice would you give someone who wants to follow in your footsteps?
Martinbrough: Study. Art is like boxing – it’s like muscle that you constantly have to train, and you constantly have to improve.