Symbiote September 2014 Contest Results

September 2014 ended last Tuesday, and with it the second annual Symbiote September art contest and challenge. For 30 long days, participants drew one symbiote character every day in honor of one of Marvel's most popular alien species and its all-star members: Venom, Carnage, Toxin, and many more. Though the turnout was less than spectacular with only three fully-committed participants (including myself)—which were two more from last year's count—and one or two occasional participants, this year's event was by far much better.

This year's event focused primarily on each artist's creativity, and suffice it to say everyone delivered! We only had two contestants in this year's contest, which worked out quite nicely for determining who received which of the two prize packages—a brand new feature to this year's contest. So without further delay, it's time to announce the winners of the two prize packages!

GRAND PRIZE

Winning Artist: Christian Rafael McDonald, deviantART username blacksuitchris

Christian has been a comic book fan for a long time. Born with Asperger's Syndrome, Christian immediately had a vivid imagination. His first comic was Venom: Lethal Protector #5 and it started his love for comics, art, writing, and symbiotes especially. This lead into Christian's dream to become a comic book writer and artist with established writers and artists such as Cullen Bunn, Dan Slott, Mark Bagley, and Declan Shavely as inspirations, and he hopes to work on Spider-Man and Venom comics. Christian tried his best to perfect his skills by both constantly drawing and writing fan fiction to perfect his craft, but it's his friends and family that are key to his dream to join the comic book industry. Recently, Christian joined the YouTube channel DYKComics as its writer/researcher, and through this he now has better connections to artists who, too, are fans of comic books.

Prize: The complete 3-part AXIS: Carnage series debuting in October and the complete 6-part Venom: Lethal Protector series on comiXology.

HONORABLE MENTION

Winning Artist: Rich W.S., deviantART username AraghenXD

A known symbiote geek, Araghen can’t get enough when it comes to drawing them and giving some lesser known symbiote hosts new life through art and fan fiction. It’s only irony, though, considering it’s coming from a guy who once admitted that Venom scared him as a child.

Prize: The complete 3-part AXIS: Carnage series debuting in October on comiXology.


Congratulations to our two winners! Don't forget to check out the entire #SymbioteSeptember2014 gallery on deviantART and give the other participants some love. If you missed out on the fun, don't worry! Symbiote September will return next year, and it will be bigger, badder, and even gooeyer than before. Upwards and onwards!

Check back every Friday here on A Dose of Venom for new Venom-licious articles and follow The Venom Site for all of your symbiote news, reviews, and point-of-views!