He gets lots of ink

Iron Artist Fridolfs, a Hoover High School graduate, was interested in art inhigh school but did not take an art class until his senior year. Hewas more interested in music. "Art was always something I enjoyed on the side, but I was notsure what I was going to do with it. All my electives were music. Iwas a trumpet player in the marching band," Fridolfs says. Hewas talented enough to earn a music scholarship at Fresno State. He graduated with a bachelor of arts degree in English in 1998.Fridolfs was leaning toward a career as a writer. But his love ofart continued to grow. While in college, Fridolfs would gather withother students to draw comics. There were plenty of artists but noinkers. That's how Fridolfs took his first steps toward hisprofession. Fridolfs finally got serious about art after graduating fromcollege. He moved to the Los Angeles area to take a year of artclasses with an emphasis on animation at Associates in Art schoolin Sherman Oaks. For more than a year, Fridolfs tried to land a job with one of theanimation companies but had no luck. Fridolfs fared better with thecomics industry. For years, he had sent samples of his work to allof the major comics publishers. In 1999, he got a call to ink 11pages of a Wolverine comic. "At the same time I got the job to do the Wolverine pages, Igot a jury duty summons. When I called Marvel to tell them I mightbe late, they said I should send the pages back. I told them Iwould get the work done," Fridolfs says. Since then, Fridolfs has been able to make a living as an inker,including work on the Wildstorm Productions anthology comic bookGen-Active. That's where he first worked with Nguyen. "Derek adds to the story's overall feel by translating anamazing amount of energy and dynamic in his line work," Nguyensays. "And I believe due to the fact that he's an amazingillustrator himself, his attention to the details, characters, andtheir gestures is what really makes our work come together sowell." Although the drawings of the penciler and the work of the inker aredone separately, the process is a collaborate effort to make eachcomic as dramatic as possible. Fridolfs loves the freedom of thejob. He is mailed a stack of 22 pages for an issue of a comic book.He has a month to work on the project before another one arrives inthe mail. "I can work whenever I want to. Sometimes I will get startedlate and work through the night," Fridolfs says.