Freerunners: Behind the Xtreme Art
by Shannon Fay
Freerunning means being always on the move, interacting with your environment in the most graceful and dynamic manner as possible. Try and keep up as we talk to artist Jennyson Rosero about the upcoming Seven Seas manga Freerunners!
Hello again! What have you been up to since we talked to you in April?
JR: I've been doing Freerunners and a few side projects here and there... for Seven Seas, of course. A lot has happened to me personally and it has affected my schedule to be honest but I'm getting there.
How did you come to be the artist of Freerunners? Was there anything about the series that specifically made you want to draw it?
JR: Well, for 2 years, I was doing No Man's Land. And as we all know, there's only one female character there, Amanda. Before No Man's Land, I was really known for my sexy girl drawings so I kinda missed that with No Man's Land. Freerunners gave me an outlet to do them again. I missed drawing women... and sadly, I think I forgot how. I'm trying to get that back with Freerunners. Hehehe! And freerunning is just amazing, if I can't do those moves in reality, but at least in my drawings i can.
So I take it you don't do freerunning?
JR: Nah, freerunning scares me. I'm not being a wuss about it, if I train, I know I won't be scared doing all those crazy things. I used to do rollerblading and learned how to do some stunts with it. But now that I draw for a living, I'm too scared to lose or break my drawing hand. If that happens, what then will happen to me? I can't live without drawing. This is my life.
What kind of research did you do on parkour/freerunning to help you draw the series?
JR: For reference, I watch videos and look at pictures. Seeing them move is really different than just still pictures. Man, they're amazing! I wonder how they started to think that they can live through a fall that's about 5 stories high. They're crazy and I respect them for that.
Could you tell us a little about freerunning? Though it's gaining in popularity, a lot of people still don't know what it is?
JR: I'm no expert on freerunning. They say it's an evolution of the human body but when I think about it, (puts on my eye glasses...) we evolved from an ape to what we are now, and now, we're evolving into a more advanced kind of man, with characteristics of both ape and man. Haha! Just playing with the idea. But freerunning/parkour is a lifestyle. It's being free and using the urban landscape to express their defiance to the restrictions of society and the human body. That's how I understand it. I could be wrong... but how can I be, I read this somewhere on the internet. Haha!
Was it hard to draw urban settings again after drawing a western?
JR: It's not hard to draw modern landscape since I started doing things like this. It's actually the other way around, I found it hard to draw settings for No Man's Land. But the transition has been okay for me.
Can you tell us about the characters in Freerunners? Do you have a favorite one to draw?
JR: Each character has their own unique personalities. I'm sure each one will have a fan. As for me, my favorite is Yoshi, the Japanese in the crew. But Steep has been modeled after me *cough* so I don't have a choice but to treat him as my favorite character to draw. Hehe! But Yoshi is more interesting to me, design-wise. Steep looks simple because he is, hopefully, with the progression of the story, we see him evolve into a much more interesting design. His simplicity was intentional. As for other characters, you'll have to wait for the book to come out.
Speaking of books coming out, while there are a lot of people anticipating Freerunners, there are also a lot of fans looking forward to No Man's Land Vol. 3. Any idea when it might be released?
JR: Yeah, people have been asking. Right now, I'm busy with Freerunners, but ready to start doing NML Vol. 3 even as we speak. I'm just waiting for the script so I can start on vol.3. I can't wait, I miss it.
Sounds like you're a pretty busy guy. Do you have any free time to play video games or watch movies anymore? Have you seen any good ones lately?
JR: Well, as much as I love video games, I really don't have any time for that. Playing a good game really takes up a lot of time. I used to finish games I like in a day or two so it wouldn't interfere with my schedule. Right now, I don't play any but I might check out Capcom's OKAMI when it comes out. Also, I don't have a PSP and I don't play games on my PC. Movies, that's a different story, they're much more enjoyable for me. I love movies and it just takes two hours of my time. Star Wars made me watch movies differently. Recent movies I enjoyed were X-Men: The Last Stand, Superman Returns (on IMAX, no less) and V for Vendetta (on DVD). Coincidentally, they're all from comic books. I loved the first Pirates of the Caribbean.
On your DeviantART site there's a lot of really nice fan art. What are some of your favorite series to do fan art for?
JR: I'll draw anything I like. If it inspires me to draw, I'll do a fan art. I really don't have any favorites because the reason why I did them was because I liked them at the time I was doing them. But during my early years drawing manga, I really loved drawing Mai Shiranui...who's nowhere in sight in my DevArt gallery. Weird. I don't do mecha much though, I never really enjoyed drawing them. It's just too much work. I'd get obsessed with the idea of how they move, the joints and stuff that I would over think the mechanics and the possibilities of movement, etc. It's just impossible. I love drawing mechanical stuff though (not robots), having studied architecture for a couple of years.
Has working on Freerunners affected your style very much? Not that John Parker's going to take up freerunning, but has learning about parkour changed the way you draw action sequences?
JR: Well, I can't say since I haven't touched No Man's Land yet since starting Freerunners. But I think it changed a little bit. The pacing is definitely faster with Freerunners. I'm still learning since I'm used to drawing just covers and pinups so sequential art isn't natural for me. I'm trying though.
When can we expect to see Freerunners on Gomanga.com?
JR: Well, let's just wait and see about that. I'd love to show Freerunners to our audiences but right now, it just isn't ready yet. I do hope it's worth the wait!
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