Those among us who have followed the development blog may recall the time when we put out a call for artists, aptly titled, “Calling All Artists”. We didn’t specify why we were looking for artists, but in the coming weeks you’re going to see why we did and what the artists who responded created in the form of fan art.

Continuing towards Cave Story’s March 22nd (2010) launch we’re going to be showing some of this fantastic artwork and while asking these very talented artists questions about themselves and how they created these works.

Raymond Teo is an indie game developer and artist from Singapore. Previously, he's released games on flash and Xbox Live Indie Games. His lastest game, Tobe's Vertical Adventure is available there. I'd check it out if my third 360 wasn't broken...

I've asked everyone so far, but how did you get involved in artwork?
It's something I've always been doing since young. Like every Asian kid, my brother and I used to spent most so much time on Dragonball and NES, and eventually, when lessons get bored in class, you doodle in your textbook. As time past, I realized my drawing is better than my 40 other classmates, and I figured that drawing is my thing.

I only read that Nicalis was requesting for submission a couple of weeks after the deadline, so I write in to Tyrone to check if I could still squeeze in an artwork. I don't usually does fan art, but it was Cave Story, and I just had to be part of it somehow.

What are your tools of the trade?
That will be my Wacom Intuos 3, Adobe Photoshop and Adobe Flash.

What kind of advice can you offer someone interested in getting involved with artwork and digital media?
The technical skills are your basic, but it's your aesthetic that sets you apart. But if you're a beginner and still honing your skill, it's definitely a good idea to know your basic shapes well. Basic shape allows you to create super deform characters too, which is lots of fun for a start.

What is your experience with Cave Story? When did you first learn about it?
I learn about Cave Story when I was researching to work on my first game 2 years ago. I was going through a giant list of indie games, but I couldn't spent more then 15 minutes on each one of them. As I continue on my research, I realize coming across discussion about the same title time and again, so I dig it out and gave it a shot. It was over the top, and I couldn't believe the game was the work of a single developer. I played the game for a few days, but stopped when Nicalis announced that they are making a HD version, and had waited till today :)

You feature two of the main characters in your painting. Did this composition come to your head instantly?
The honest answer would be - as I was already late for the submission, I figured I shouldn't spent too much time doing it. Back then, I thought the game was gonna release soon, so I plan to do something simple and achievable. There was another thought though, that was to make everything looks clean, simple and classy, which is something different from most other fan art.

The circle paint behind was meant to be a "dot" or a "hole", to symbolize the "cave". But I didn't realize until today that it is also a "quote" :)

How long did it take you to put together?
I worked on and off for over a period of 2 weeks. Most of the time goes into research as I meant for it to be a redesign of the main character and Curly Brace.

Can you tell us a little bit about the process of creating it? Do you have any work-ups or anything we can see?
There's only two tiny sketches , as I have a problem to stay faithful to my source material. Most of the drawing were done straight in Flash, part by parts, and later composed to work. Here's a look of how they looks like when break apart (see attachment)

Where can people find your work?
You can check out my blog at Rayteoactive. It's a little messy and slow with updates as I'm busy with my game these days. On the other hand, you can check out my game's devlog on squarespace, which gets a more regular update.

What's your latest painting?
It's "Party Game". Coincidentally, it's also an art exchange for two fellow indie developer, Jajitsu and Ishi. The artwork features our game's character gathering up to play some party game :)