If you like Metal Gear, chances are you've heard the name Ashley Wood before. While these days the Australian artist is kept busy with things like comics, art books, toys, TV and movies, he's also had a long-running and very successful stint as an artist for Konami's blockbuster stealth franchise.
What's cool about Wood's Metal Gear work is that it spans mediums. While men like Yoji Shinkawa (who we'll feature here in good time) were designing the actual Metal Gear games, Wood was working on comic books based on and around the series. Then, when Konami decided to make games that used his signature visual style, he got to make some Metal Gear games of his own.
In 2006, Wood provided the artwork for the Metal Gear Solid digital comic on the PSP, and in the same year supplied the cutscenes for Metal Gear Solid: Portable Ops. Four years later, he would do the same thing for Metal Gear Solid: Peace Walker.
Wood's distinctive style has been with the franchise for so long and across so many formats that, in a rare feat, he's even got an art book based just on his Metal Gear stuff.
In the gallery above you'll see a cross-section of his Metal Gear work, from old comics to the more recent PSP games.
You can see more of Wood's stuff, both Metal Gear and beyond, at the various links below.
To see the larger pics in all their glory (or so you can save them as wallpaper), right-click on the "expand" icon on the main image above and select "open in new tab".
Fine Art is a celebration of the work of video game artists. If you're in the business and have some concept, environment or character art you'd like to share, drop us a line!
Ashley Wood [Personal Site]
Ashley Wood [Personal Blog]
Ashley Wood's Art of Metal Gear Solid
threeA Toys [threeA]
You can contact Luke Plunkett, the author of this post, at plunkett@kotaku.com. You can also find him on Twitter, Facebook, and lurking around our #tips page.