UDON: The book sprang from a brainstorming session I had about ways UDON could commemorate and enhance Street Fighter's 20th anniversary in 2008. We've created a large UDON book each summer for release at conventions and, especially with that anniversary on hand, we wanted to create something special.

UDON's Art of Capcom, released in 2007, had a small "Tribute Gallery" of new illustrations done by our artists that went over really well with fans and retailers alike, so I expanded upon that idea. If this was going to be a party, we wanted everyone we could invited and eating cake with us.

SFD: How many contest entries did you receive, and how many made it into the book?

UDON: Our e-mails servers were pounded with over 1300 art submissions in one month, the majority of those on the last few days before our fan art submission period wrapped up. We'd originally anticipated taking 40-50 fan submitted pieces but that's now blossomed out to 160.

SFD: From my understanding, you had to expand the book to include more fan art? How was this decided?

UDON: While we were filtering through the incredible number of pieces submitted, it became clear we had far more professional quality artwork than we anticipated receiving. The scope of the book expanded as more professionals contacted us asking to contribute and our "slush pile" of openly submitted pieces grew. We'd originally envisioned a mid-size art book but now it's just as thick as The Eternal Challenge and UDON's Art of Capcom, which I think surprised everyone here at the studio.

SFD: Who were the judges and how did you decide on which fan art would be included?

UDON: There were 4 main judges filtering through the submissions and narrowing down our choices:
Francis Mao – Creative Director at Capcom
Erik Ko – Editor-in-Chief at UDON
Matt Moylan – PR Manager and Designer at UDON
Myself, Jim Zubkavich – Tribute Editor/Project Manager at UDON

Beyond that official channel of judging, many of our other UDON artists chimed in with their thoughts and preferences as we went, echoing our choices on artwork that really caught their eye.

SFD: Which character(s) were submitted the most?

UDON: Chun-Li centered pieces were the most numerous, by quite a large margin. As the standard bearer of the Street Fighter ladies and with a Chun-Li movie in production, we had expected this right from the get go.

We assumed Ryu or Akuma would be next on the list but were surprised at the number of Blanka and Zangief illustrations we received instead. From there, it evened out with most of the original SFII cast.

One of many pieces in the Street Fighter Tribute book!

UDON: Definitely the classic SFII line up. Street Fighter III had a lot of love with the fans as well, particularly Ibuki and Elena.

SFD: Along with Huang Jia Wei, can you name for us few other pro-guest artists who were invited to participate?

UDON: J. Scott Campbell (Gen-13, Danger Girl) has a piece in the book. So do Adam Hughes (Wonder Woman, Cat Woman, Tomb Raider), Sean Galloway (character designer on the new Spectacular Spider-Man show) and Gabe (artist on Penny Arcade), amongst others.

SFD: As of today, how many unique page views do you have on your Udon Crew Deviant Art page?

UDON: Let's see here… *Checks DA stats* Our deviantArt site has over 1.9 million unique pageviews, almost 7 million if you count repeat views and refreshes. The amount of traffic the site has generated really blows us away.

SFD: What of this Tribute book do you think would excite fans the most?

UDON: I think it's going to grab attention as such a unique gallery of "fan art" all in one place. The book is a high end coffee table style art book mixed with a pop culture icon. I don't think there's ever been anything quite like it in video game circles, let alone one officially sanctioned by the official company behind the game.

Looking at the many, many locations of the different artists featured in the book, there's a real sense of Street Fighter's global reach and interest as a property. They really are the "World Warriors" after all.

SFD: Along with Okami for the Nintendo Wii, can you name any other titles that are planned as prizes?

UDON: Not yet, unfortunately. As soon as we can, we'll let you know.

Was your art piece not chosen for the Tribute book?
Share it with the community on our official Art Page!

UDON: We haven't finalized the print run yet. That will depend on the pre-orders coupled with our convention estimates. We expect that will be similar to the print runs we did for Eternal Challenge and Art of Capcom. With that in mind, we expect the book to sell out before Christmas.

SFD: When and where will the book debut?

UDON: Street Fighter Tribute will launch at San Diego Comicon as part of Capcom's "Street Fighter Celebration" content. We'll be selling books all week long and both the Capcom and UDON booths will have a rotating schedule for artists signing the book. It's going to be wonderful chaos.

SFD: Thank you very much. Any last words for the community?

UDON: Thank you so much for your art submissions and support. We're all incredibly excited about seeing this book in print and celebrating 20 years of Street Fighter goodness. With the positive response we've already received from the fan community and Capcom, we expect even more exciting projects to come down the road.


Click HERE to order your book now!