With all the projects Walks tackles on a regular basis, he enjoys the process and likes to learn something new from each assignment. "Every job is different, and I try never to do exactly the same process twice," Walks explains. "Sometimes I use watercolor; sometimes I use acrylic. Sometimes I use an airbrush; sometimes I work traditionally."
For his Padmé Amidala poster that Walks created for Celebration III, Walks explains that he first likes to come up with the concept, and attempts to layout his ideas using a series of thumbnail drawings. "In this instance, I knew that I wanted a close-up of the lovely Natalie Portman, and that I wanted her to be, as Leia said in Jedi, 'Very beautiful. Kind, but sad.' I wanted her to be distracted and a little uneasy, and not really 'in the moment,' like there's a shadow across her heart, even when she's at her happiest."
Once Walks has a concept secure in his mind, he researches reference material that supports his ideas. "Sometimes this is as easy as using an existing photo, other times it involves building costumes and hiring models," Walks explains. "Since there are a limited number of
Star Wars photos available, and since the fans have already seen most of those, I find myself shooting models more and more often with my Lucasfilm stuff."
After Walks has his references, he begins to draw. "I do my best to idealize the photos -- making hands bigger, chests broader, etc," Walks says. "When I'm done, I have a complete black and white drawing with all of the values filled in. In the Padmé piece, I enlarged Natalie's eyes just a little bit, and (in the painting stage) I reddened her lips. Sometimes I'll draw the planes of the face in with sienna, so that when I add color, they're not as prominent."
Using an airbrush, acrylic paint, and many masks to prevent overspray, Walks then fills in the colored areas much like hand-tinting a photo. And then he finishes the work with colored pencils to add detail and highlights.
As Walks enjoys success from
Star Wars projects, and continues to work on a variety of upcoming illustration, he's quick to point out that he still sets high goals for himself as an artist. "My only goal is to continue to improve, not only as an artist, but also as a father, husband and person," Walks says. "I read a really cool quotation one time from Hokusai, a 19th century Japanese artist who began painting seriously in his forties. It kind of sums up how I feel about the artistic journey. He said, 'From the age of six, I had a mania for drawing the forms of things...but all I produced before the age of 70 is not worth taking into account. At 73, I learned a little about the real structure of nature...when I am 80 I shall have made still more progress; at 90 I shall penetrate the mystery of things; at 100 I shall certainly have reached a marvelous stage; and when I am a 110 everything I do, be it a dot or a line, will be alive. I beg those who live as long as I to see if I do not keep my word.'"
Walks' own advice to budding artist stems back from a philosopher who originally inspired him. "Joseph Campbell said it best, 'Follow your bliss,'" Walks says. "To put it simply, do what you love -- what you're meant to do. If you do that, happiness will follow, and if you don't know what it is that you're meant to do, spend some time finding out. I decided on the way home from the theater that rainy afternoon in 1977 that I would someday do exactly what I'm doing now, and if you could talk to the 12-year-old me, I'm sure he'd say he wasn't surprised that the adult me is a working artist," Walks smiles. "What is surprising, though, is that I've had so much fun on the journey to where I am. Every step on the road has been interesting, and I'd like to think that even my missteps have, in the end, made me a better artist and person."
To read more about upcoming projects from Walks, visit his official site.
