Interview for Miasma magazine

I was recently asked some questions by Finnish magazine, Miasma, about my artwork for Bloodbath. As you can see, it was a pretty sizable sidebar in the Bloodbath article itself! Since it is in Finnish...I will put the original questions that were asked of me here.

I'm not sure if anything was edited out, btw, so there may be an additional question or two here:
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So you won the Bloodbath contest. Tell me [a bit about the] choosing process and how you got the idea to submit your work?

I am a huge Bloodbath fan (and also a fan of the primary bands of the individual members) so when I saw the news post on their website, I knew that I could come up with something that was competitive. Illustrating metal album covers is an industry that I have always wanted to get into and I figured even if I was not chosen, it would be a good portfolio piece. 

Did they say exactly what you are going to create for them or did you have some freedom of creation?

Yes, the concept was entirely the bands. The original concept was simply to have a priest with a dog's head baptizing a baby in blood. After submitting a few rough ideas, they decided that they wanted disciples in the background as well. After receiving that initial concept, though, the realization of it was all on me.

Are you more satisfied with Unblessing... or with Fathomless cover? Do they came up the way you like?

I think the Unblessing cover is more striking initially, but I think the Fathomless cover has more subtleties that make it more interesting. Also, the Fathomless cover was a significantly more complex painting, so it's my favorite for that reason. 

The dogpriest, this character is now in both your Bloodbath creations. Is this creature going to be some kind of Bloodbath's own Eddie or Vic Rattlehead, ha?

I don't know of any longterm plans, but he is the theme of both covers (check the shadow on the right of the full Fathomless painting if you missed it), so I suppose it is up to Bloodbath if they want to feature him in some way on future albums. I think there is potential.

Do you think that there's going to be a lot of request from now on when you "famous" from Bloodbath? :)

I certainly hope so! It's definitely a desire of mine to do more album covers for other bands besides Bloodbath. I also hope to keep a relationship with them for future projects, so we will see!

Ok, let's talk a bit about inspiration, do you have to force the suitable art out of you, let's say in Bloodbath context, or do you actually just act as a tool of some dark forces, huh?

I am a huge horror movie fan, so I generally refer to my mounds of dvds if I ever have "artist's block" as they say. But for the most part I do very little sketching or thumbnailing. When I have an idea for something, I just start painting and the end result is usually very close to the way I initially thought of it.

I cant pinpoint any obvious source of inpiration among metal cover artists, but do you have some special favouriteS?

Michael Whelan (Sepultura, Meat Loaf) is actually my biggest influence of all time. My father bought me his art book when I was 13 years old and it completely changed my life. Obviously people such as Derek Riggs, Vincent Locke, and Edward J. Repka are also people I look up to now as well.

Do you actually listen much to death metal?

Absolutely, metal is my life! I listen to all kinds of metal, though....a lot of death metal a little black metal and some classic metal as well.

Anders told me that you work mainly in game business, not in the music bizz. So tell me about your projects in that field. Which is more fun, to do metal covers or game covers?

I have been in the video game industry for almost 9 years. It's "the day job", but it's a great day job. I've worked on FEAR and FEAR 2 for Monolith Productions and I worked on the first Spider-man movie game for Treyarch several years ago. I definitely prefer doing metal covers as it's related more to my interests. Ever since I was 7 years old I've been drawing dark and evil stuff. To be able to paint metal album covers is truly a dream come true.

You have also Transformers art in your page. Lovely! I was myself a huge Transformers fan in the good old days but haven't checked what's up in, let's say, 20 years. Do you still adore these robots? was the movie
letdown?

I am a huge geek with Transformers. I actually keep up on it more than the average person I'd say. I have more than a handful (or a room full) of toys from various generations all over my house. My wife is awesome, too, she completely supports my Transformers adoration and buying habits so I feel very lucky with that. As for the movie, I actually really liked it. At first I wasn't so sure about the design approach of the Transformers themselves, but that all changed after watching the movie. 

Now it's time to advertise your work. If some reader is interested in to obtain your piece of art to her/his upcoming musical release, what should he/she do?

My website is www.dustypeterson.net which is where I make all my major announcements about future projects, and it obviously has my gallery. 

There ya have it! Enjoy!