Meet the Nordic design student who will be drawing for Marvel

This is my childhood’s dream coming true. I love drawing super heroes, robots and ninjas.

“My head is about to explode! This is my childhood’s dream coming true. I love drawing super heroes, robots and ninjas”. These are the words of a very excited Emil Friis Ernst, the 20-year-old winner of the Adobe and Marvel student competition.

A self portrait Emil did when he heard that he had won the competition.

• Currently a student of Graphic Storytelling at The Animation Workshop, Denmark’s new world class cartoonist school in Viborg, Emil is already making history – he will be the first cartoonist from the Nordics to contribute to ‘The Avengers’ and his ‘Avengers’ story will be printed and distributed in comic book stores across the United States. But that’s not all: Emil also won a ticket to San Diego Comic-Con and a one-on-one portfolio review with Marvel professional comic book artists.

True to his Nordic roots, one his greatest inspirations is Danish artist Teddy Kristiansen, a former guest lecturer at The Animation Workshop and famous for his ‘House of Secrets’ and ‘The Sandman’ artwork. His other big idol is Jason, AKA John Arne Sæterøy, originally from Norway and one of Scandinavia’s most prominent artists of alternative comic book series like ‘Mjau Mjau’.

Emil has a uniquely European style

Emil was very focused on winning the competition but he knew what would make him stand out would be his unique style. So when he tagged his best original work on Behance with #MadeThis and #Marvel, he paid special attention to select the works he knew would appeal to American comic book fans but still were drawn in his own distinctive ‘indie’ style.

An example of Emil’s unique visual style.

We’re not the only ones saying it. “The jury told me I have a unique style”, according to Emil, who is the only European among the winners. All three other winners are from the US. So what happens next? Right now, Emil is busy drawing his ‘Avengers’ cartoon in Photoshop CC and working towards his dream: to do more work for the American comic books industry.

If you want to learn more about Emil’s work, feel free to check him out on Tumblr and see his latest projects on Behance.