Hicham Habchi
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Where did you grow up? At what age did you start thinking about pursuing an artistic career?
I was born and raised in Casablanca, Morocco. I started drawing at quite an early age, reading comics, and playing video games in my spare time. Those hobbies swiftly become a passion, and this dedication was transformed into a real artistic job and career.
Did you go to an art school or are you self-taught? How did you develop your skills?
I did Fine Arts in high-school and followed it with a diploma in multimedia & 3D/graphic design. Fine Arts was the first step in the journey of skill development to help build and develop the academic aspect and the artistic foundations. However, part of my journey was also being self-taught, doing comics and character design since character creation was more of a new artistic matter at that time.
Have you always been supported in your artistic path or has it been challenging to let your family and friends understand your choice?
As I’ve mentioned in my last answer, when I was looking into pursuing an artistic career, the challenge was to learn things in art, and concept art was the first challenge since it was a new artistic phenomenon back in those days. My family was really supportive of me choosing art in general as a career goal, and did help me to shape up that passion to an academic and professional level.
What was the strongest influence you had when you were growing up ( artists, movies, cartoons, comics, etc.. )?
Certainly stuff like video games, comics/mangas, and anime/animated shows had a huge influence on my style and artistic choices growing up. All these cultural references had an impact on my work and are I believe are strongly reflected in my art style.
Did you have a favorite subject to draw when you were a child and do you still have one today? If you do, what makes it so special?
I was always fascinated by comics when I was a kid, I used to collect many cool comics, from DC, Images and Marvel, etc... and this passion was translated to making my own and creating new characters with new costuming, style, snd superpowers. What makes it so special is the transformed path from a simple fan to a senior artist who does character design, visual styles, comic work, and artistic decisions/directions for well-known brands and entities.
What is your process in creating your art and what are your favourite tools?
Definitely the creative development side of it! Creating new characters always demands a sort of visual research that consists of creating mood boards, brainstorm ideas. Creating a piece of art is always a challenging task, it requires dedication and hard work. I don't actually have one favourite tool because I do use dozen of them depending of the final result that I’m trying to achieve. I believe creativity is the strongest asset you can use in art, the tool is an addition to help shape those cool ideas you have in your mind!
What part of the creation process is the most fun and easy and what part is the hardest?
I don't normally see the creative process as two sides of a coin, the creative development is always fun especially when you dig deep and explore new territories in your artist's decisions. However, there might be a challenging factor that sometimes gets you out of that creative process: a lack of dedication or the burnout feel can happen sometimes, and could lead into an art block. That might add some difficulties to move forward.
What is a typical day for you, and who are the people you work, collaborate or share your creative time with?
An ideal day is one that starts with a small and basic idea and becomes a huge collaboration with a creative team, being able to work with a talented group of individuals and creators. It always helps to learn more and get the chance to talk and share ideas and collaborate with other artists and creative minds.
What are some of the things you have learned from other artists with whom you have worked or whose work you have seen?
I learned to be consistent and adopt a ritual of work that helps me progress and level up. I had the chance to cross paths with so many artists, talented co-workers who eventually became friends in this industry. There’s a lot of them to list them here, but they all made a big impact in my artistic journey from both a professional level, and personal artistic taste.
Is there something that you have designed that you are most proud of?
There are many designs and projects that I’m proud of. I can’t really point out to one in particular because I feel that every project is a new challenge from which you learn from, and help you gain more experience and new skills.
Do you have a long-term career goal? What would your dream project be?
Definitely to develop one of my personal ongoing projects, and have the budget (and the full creative control) to build it as a game, an animated show, or comic book. Working on a story, crafting multiple characters, and define a universe for it would be one of the dopest things I can think of from an artistic standpoint.
Working in-house for a company or freelancing: what suits you best? And why?
I tried both sides and I do prefer the in-house style instead of freelance, as you can focus more on the art and creative side and build styles and characters concepts with a team, rather than acting as your own company and multitasking, which could lead to a burnout.
What advice would you give to an artist who is dealing with an artist’s block? How do you boost your imagination and keep yourself creative?
My piece of advice to artists who deals with consistent art blocks is to allow themselves to accept making mistakes and take a break to recharge physically and mentally. Nowadays some artists tend to overwork themselves to achieve certain levels or try to please their audience, and this could hurt their creativity in the long run. Each artist has his own pace, allow yourself to do something else, and try some different aspects of creation and different mediums for creation. Take a walk, visit new places…. do what you love!
Concept art, animation, illustration, comics, you name it. There are so many careers and when you are very young, sometimes you know only one thing: you simply love to draw. In your opinion, what should a young person take into consideration to make the right decision when choosing an artistic path?
I can totally relate. I was always inspired by characters in films, games, and comics but I didn't know there were so many different artistic career paths, but I knew that I wanted to draw cool characters with a specific aesthetic: heroic figures portrayed in dynamic poses, showing their super abilities in a modern urban or fantasy fashion. At the time it wasn't really so specific but I already had this north star, so to speak, and I knew I felt very strong about it and I only needed more practice to get there. So my suggestion for the new generation of artists would be to ask themselves: what is my north star? What inspires me on a daily basis? This will help you shaping your career path and it will give you the strength to achieve your artistic goals.
Finally, where can we see your art online and get in touch with you? How can we buy your creations and support your work?
You can follow me on social media such as Twitter ( @hichamhabchi ) , Instagram ( @pyroowdaily ), and see my work in progress and professional work on Artstation ( artstation.com/hichamhabchi1 ). Right now I'm also running a Kickstarter project for my art book! You can follow and support me on the LINK below. Go check it out!
Thank you, Hicham :)
KHAT: The Artbook by Hicham Habchi
KHAT is the brand new book by Hicham Habchi! A concept artist and comic artist born and raised in Morocco and currently living in California. He worked on many well-known IPs such as League of Legends, Overwatch, Borderlands 3, Batman Comics, Spawn Comics, currently working as Principal Concept Artist for Riot Games.
