Thursday, July 15, 2010

Artist Profile: Richard James Bennett Lamas

Richard James Bennett Lamas, credited simply as Richard Bennett, is a former comic book artist and current freelance film concept and storyboard artist from Uruguay. He was a storyboard editor on the 2009 film Star Trek. [1] He previously worked on the Star Trek comic book crossover title, Divided We Fall for WildStorm Comics.

Bennett broke into the comic book industry in 1990, penciling and inking the Cyberrad series for Continuity Comics. Not long after, he began freelancing for Marvel Comics on various X-Men titles and then had a brief stint at Image Comics before joining WildStorm Comics in the mid-1990s, where he worked on a wide variety of titles.

In 1993, Bennett joined HBO where, before departing in 1997, he did background and character design work for the first season of the animated Spawn series. From 1998 through 2003, Bennett attended the Art Center College of Design in Padadena, California, graduating with a BFA in Illustration. He also studied in Film Transportation and Product Design.

While attending college, Bennett continued providing artwork for a number of comics, video games, and films. He did keyframe sketches for the 2002 HBO movie Live from Baghdad (starring Bruce McGill) and worked on designs for the character of “Happy” (played by Anthony Edwards) for the 2003 independent film Northfork.

Since then, Bennett has been a storyboard artist on such films as AVP: Alien vs. Predator, Alien vs. Predator: Requiem, 300, Zodiac, and Fantastic Four: Rise of the Silver Surfer. He also did conceptual art for the CBS series Numb3rs. More recently, he was a conceptual illustrator on the upcoming Paramount Pictures release, The Curious Case of Benjamin Button.

Official Site: http://www.richardbennettart.com/richard.htm