We caught up with the brilliant and insightful Sam Lotfi a few weeks ago and have shared our conversation below.

Sam , looking forward to hearing all of your stories today. When did you first know you wanted to pursue a creative/artistic path professionally?

It was pretty early on, probably around the age of 6 or 7 when I discovered comic books and like most kids growing up in the 80s I watched tons of Saturday morning cartoons. I read everything I could get my hands on and constantly drew all my favorite characters from those sources. Comics like, Donald Duck, X-Men, Incredible Hulk to animated cartoons like Masters of the Universe, TMNT and Ghostbusters. It didn’t take long for me to notice the credits in those comics and cartoons and I realized people actually get to make this stuff as a job. Much to the chagrin of my parents, I was determined to be a comic book artist or animator and thankfully I’ve been lucky enough to do both.

As always, we appreciate you sharing your insights and we’ve got a few more questions for you, but before we get to all of that can you take a minute to introduce yourself and give our readers some of your back background and context?

I grew up in San Antonio, TX in a family of 4 with one younger sibling. From the age of 6 I was always drawing my favorite characters and making up my own comics; I was the quiet kid sprawled out on the living room floor with my comics, action figures, and tons art supplies around me.

I fell in love with libraries early on because they kept books there that I’d never seen before filled with amazing stories and I couldn’t get enough of them, in any format really, but it was comics and animation that really sunk their hooks in me. I wanted to pursue a career where I could make stuff up for a living and share the stories and images that filled my head.

I started in comics just after high school, I slapped together a portfolio, made lots of calls to various publishers and finally discovered Antarctic Press, a local comic book publisher. They liked my work enough give me shot and I illustrated covers for their monthly anthology comic MANGAZINE, I wrote and illustrated articles for their tutorial series, HOW TO DRAW MANGA and finally I had the chance to create, write and illustrate my own comic book, REHD.

It wasn’t long before I wanted to pursue animation; I set about teaching myself how to animate, learning from various animation books and seeking advice and feedback on my work from animation professionals at San Diego Comic Con and other animation studios in California. I learned a lot from many gracious professional who took time to share their wisdom and practical advice that I still use today. I discovered Powerhouse Animation in Austin, TX, got hired as an animator, so my wife and I moved up to Austin.

Powerhouse was a smaller studio back then, so we had the opportunity to wear many hats and work on lots of different types of projects from commercials to video games and educational materials. I did everything from animation, storyboards, character designs and more; it was a great environment to grow creatively and I learned a lot while I was there. I got the chance to work on lots of great projects with clients such as Disney, Sony, DC Comics and many more.

As great as it was working in animation with a team of highly talented people, I felt I was missing that personal creative voice in my work. I left Powerhouse to work as a freelance artist and bounced from project to project for a bit. I also worked as the character designer and storyboard artist on the short animated film RED TAPE, which was the winner of Best Short Animated Film at the Burbank International Film Festival directed by David St. Clair and produced by Joe Rothenberg Animation.

A friend suggested I try out for the DC Comics Talent Development Workshop in 2016. The interview, portfolio review and testing process took several months, but in the end I was 1 of 8 artists selected out thousands of applicants and it felt fantastic, like I got my letter from Hogwarts or something.

The workshop was taught by legendary comic creators Klaus Janson, Andy Kubert and Jim Lee! I learned so much during that workshop, it really pushed the quality of my work up a few levels. I was able to meet the editorial staff and get to know the editors I still work with today at DC. I got the opportunity to work with some great writers at DC on some of my favorite characters like Superman, Flash, Harley Quinn, Doctor Fate, and others and that work opened the door to work with other publishers.

Since then, I’ve worked on various comics with the other publishers as well: BOOM! Studios, Dark Horse Comics, IDW, Dynamite and 1First Comics on some of my favorite properties: TMNT, G.I. JOE, MASK, Army of Darkness and others.
However, I’m most proud of my two most recent books, MOSELY co-created & written by Rob Guillory from BOOM! Studios and YOUNG ALFRED: PAIN IN THE BUTLER written by Michael Northrop from DC Comics. I had the absolute best time working with those creators and hope to continue working with them in the future.

For you, what’s the most rewarding aspect of being a creative?

It’s continually rewarding on many levels. The process of making art and creating stories can be simultaneously exhilarating and infuriating, but rewarding when you’ve finished the journey though a particular piece of art or when you get to share it with others; when they experience your work or connect to it in a way that brings just a little bit of wonder or escape from their day to day. If your work can show them that there’s the hope of discovering new things or helps them see their world from a new perspective; there’s nothing more satisfying than that.

In your view, what can society to do to best support artists, creatives and a thriving creative ecosystem?

Consume the art and works of artists you enjoy in every way you can and then go out of your way to discover more creatives and their works and consume all of that! Rinse and repeat. Joking aside, lots of artists have set up Patreon or other subscriptions to help support their work, so consider supporting them financially or if you can’t, then you can help by sharing their work on social media and let others see what you love about their work.

Setting up art festivals or events on a regular basis in your community would be a huge help, why limit art festivals or conventions to just once a year, why not have them monthly or every other month or quarterly? This would give lots of creatives and people a chance to share their work with the public and society will have even more opportunities to support and enjoy the works of many creatives.

Contact Info:

• Website: SAMLOTFI.COM
• Instagram: @slotfi
• Facebook: Sam Lotfi Comics Art
• Twitter: @slotfi

Image Credits
Sam Lotfi