Artist Feature: Ashmish

Ashmish is a freelance illustrator in Indonesia. He draws various tokusatsu character and is especially known for Kamen Riders chibis. The dynamic poses and colors he applies to the characters can bring them to life.

Would you like to give a little introduction of yourself to the readers?

Hello! I’m Ashmish, freelance illustrator (or simply a guy who just love to draw stuff) from Indonesia. Nice to meet you guys!

Can you tell us about your personal background and what drove you to become an artist?

I love doodling stuff since I was a kid, influenced by 90’s cartoons and tokusatsu shows. I guess what drove me to become an artist is the happiness of creating characters and stuff as I want them to be, and it’s pretty fun.

Did you grow up watching any kind of kaiju / tokusatsu (Ultraman, Kamen Rider) / Power Ranger shows or movies? Do you have a favorite?

Fortunately, yes! I grew up with Kamen Rider, Ultraman, and Power Rangers, especially Black RX, Ultraman 80, and the first Mighty Morphin Power Rangers because they aired in 90’s here in Indonesia when I was a kid. Those three shows were my favorite as a kid, haha. I usually pick up my pencil and paper to draw them after watching it, and when I was told to do my homework and learn for school, I just doodling stuff instead, bad kid.

What is it about the show(s) that inspire your works?

Cool looking characters, for sure! I really can’t think of anything else.

Do you have any formal training or schooling in the arts? If so, what was the most rewarding experience about going through a formal fine arts program? Would it be a path you’d recommend to aspiring artists?

I’m an International Relations graduate, and didn’t have any formal training or schooling in the arts because I live in a place that has no art school, and didn’t get the permission to go to art school outside my city. Depending on what you want to be like if you want to work on the art industry, I recommend that you go through a formal art school because it will be easier to get a job in the art industry. If you want to be an independent artist or freelance, I don’t think it’s really necessary to go into art school because the internet at this point has tons of knowledge from the basic to expert.

What special tools do you use for art / what is your favorite medium?

I mainly do digital art since 2009, I use my PC and a drawing tablet (Wacom Intuos CTL-480), with Paint Tool Sai as my favorite drawing software. I still use pencil and paper for sketching on the go and finish them digitally on my computer.

How did you develop your particular art style and what influences it the most?

I develop my particular art style by mimicking artwork from artwork that I like. The biggest influence is from the old PlayStation 2 game: Viewtiful Joe. Henshin-A-Go-Go, baby! That game has unique art style with stylized proportions and thick lines, and has tokusatsu references! I draw chibis and stylized stuff after playing that game and made my anatomy knowledge grow slower because I didn’t care that much about anatomy at that time, which is actually the most basic and important part of art. So if you’re new to drawing, please, learn about anatomy even if it feels boring and not fun!

Kamen Rider Cross-Z Magma Knuckle

Can you walk us through the process of creating a new piece of art?

It’s pretty simple, I googled for image references, then start drawing some rough drafts. After I got one I like, I continue to draw a rough sketch, then do the lineart, then color it. Sounds really simple, but it took hours, haha. You can watch me drawing on my YouTube channel: youtube.com/ashmishart

Do you have any upcoming projects or fanart you would like to share?

I’m planning to draw the rest of Build riders so I can make a poster like Ex-Aid’s last year, but I can’t really share the progress because I have a belief that sharing the progress before it’s finished can reduce the impact. So, we’ll see you soon!

Kamen Rider EX-AID

You may find more of his works on his blog, Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter. You can also support his Patreon for early access to his art.