Ryan Ottley

Ryan Ottley (also known as Uncle WYA) is an American comic book artist and penciller. He is best known for work on Image Comics' "Invincible". Ottley is the artist and co-creator of the webcomic strip "", and it was through this webstrip that Robert Kirkman first encountered Ottley's work and then offered him the job of penciling "Invincible".

In an interview [ [http://www.projectfanboy.com/vb/showthread.php?p=3199 Project Fanboy Interview] ] with comic book website Project Fanboy, Ottley discussed how he got into the comic book industry after being fired from his previous employer as a warehouse worker. Ottley attributes this to "motivating" him to pursue a career in comics and began actively building exposure for his work on the internet through the websites digitalwebbing.com and penciljack.com. The artist appeared in several issues of an independent comic anthology, "Digital Webbing Presents". Robert Kirkman saw posts from Ottley on the Penciljack website, searched for other work by the artist and contacted him about a position drawing for the Image Comics' title "Invincible".

In the same interview, Ottley expressed his opinion on the "submission process" used by many aspiring artists, when he said,

I was talking to a DC editor once at a store signing that said in the last 15 years of working there they've accepted ONE artist through submissions, and I've heard Marvel is even less. It just doesn't work that well. The best way is get your name out there on your own somehow.

Ottley's work is mostly admired by his fans and contemporaries for his use of caricature and ability to dance the line between simple realism and cartooning. Contrary to this, Ottley's early amateur work was quite detailed when he started drawing portraits at age sixteen. His sketches still retain a broader use of hatching and rendering, although he has also been noted for what some label absurd and often humorous sketches.

References

External links

* [http://www.ryanottley.com/ New Official Site]
* [http://wya.deviantart.com/ Deviantart Page]
* [http://www.unclewya.com/ Now Quasi-Defunct Official Site]