Interview: Jon Sibal's Path to Viral Automotive Artist

If you've been following modern car culture within the past decade, then chances are you've seen the work of a brilliant artist without realizing it. That artist's name is Jon Sibal. Born in the Philippines, Sibal followed his passion for art and cars which led him to a unique dual career that has allowed him to flex his talent in multiple ways. When Sibal is not working with companies like Toyota, or Formula Drift teams like Papadakis Racing, he is inking comic book pages for the likes of Marvel and DC.

Someone like that has a story. Sibal was gracious enough to take time out of his extremely busy schedule to talk about how he went from watching anime to working with the heaviest hitters in the automotive and comic book industry.

Andrew Beckford

Jon Sibal: That's a good question. Nobody has really asked me that. It feels weird looking back. I've always been into cars and I've always looked at cars because I wanted to draw them.

I was learning how to draw through manga and anime stuff. Of course, those are just cartoons or comic books and stuff. In real life, I feel like cars are somewhat of an equivalent to those robots that you can actually see and drive. From that moment on I was starting to build my interest in cars and then going to the Import Showoff in Pomona at the very first one back in '95 I think it was. That was insane because you got to see so many different variations of cars and modification levels and stuff.

Then, I started attending races like IndyCar. The Grand Prix of Long Beach was awesome. It exposed me to a whole different world again. So every time I attend an event for cars I've never been into, that just fuels my passion and interest in car culture.

AB

JS: Drawing was just a fun hobby for me. I wasn't thinking as a young kid, "I wanna do this as a career!" I was watching all those old-school anime shows likeMazinger Z,Robotech, andMacrossin the Philippines and trying to draw those characters. It was just fun to do.

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I wasn't thinking long term. It only really became an idea to do this as a career much later down the road when I was already building my own car. I thought, "let me create my own design for a body kit," because I wasn't satisfied with what was already out there. So, I was photoshopping what I wanted to do to my car and showing it to the body shop and telling them "this is what I want."

That worked out well, and then people picked up on it and would ask me, "Hey, can you do the same thing for my car?" From that, I thought "Hey, I can get paid for drawing cars and stuff. That's kind of cool!"

So yeah, it was like a hobby that turned into a career.

AB

: Right. The root of it all is just the love for art. I got into comic books because again, I just wanted to learn how to draw better. Then, I got hired as a comic book inker and that gave me some extra money to fix up my car and stuff. My art just fueled my interest in the car world. So it's all kind of in-sequence where my love of art led to doing comic books and then comic books led to doing automotive art.

AB

JS: Sure. There are two different processes, right? So, if I'm just doing artwork for myself, like for some social media post. Then it's just whatever inspires me at the moment. You know, if it's something that I saw on TV or on the news, that's kind of interesting. For example, remember that meme when people were stacking crates?

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It was so funny. I thought "how could I apply this in a car culture setting?" So, I put a McLaren 720S on a stack of crate boxes and that blew up. But that was just fun for me.

The process for working with clients is completely different. The way it works is that we usually have a meeting about what they're envisioning. My job is to extract as much information from the client so that when I create a rendering for them, it will be as effective as possible for what they're using it for. Once I have that, then I go straight to 3D modeling. There are no sketches involved. We just go straight to 3D modeling and designing straight from the computer and create the photo-realistic renders after.

AB:

JS:I always get excited anytime something that I create becomes reality. When I'm inking a comic book and then it gets published. I'm holding a comic book in my hand live, you know, in the flesh.

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That's always such a rewarding feeling. The same thing applies to car stuff. Whenever we design, whether it's just a livery design or a full build with a body kit that we've designed. Seeing that move around, make noises, race, and win even. That's the best.

AB:

JS:Yes, the deadlines are always crazy! In the comic book world, it is very brutal. We're always under deadline. If one part of the process lags, it slows down everyone else along the line. So if I lag, anybody after me like the colorist, the editor, and the people that write all the word balloons will now have less time to do their part. So, the deadlines get very, very, brutal.

With automotive work, see the exact same thing, where we get clients that would ask us "Hey Jon, we, we need this rendering, and we need this by tomorrow." And they're calling as if I'm just waiting for them to call. Like there's nothing else that I'm doing at the moment.

Deadlines are a killer, whether it's comic book work or automotive, it's just part of the job.

AB: new Nissan Z

JS:I've learned to find ways to execute an idea or rendering to get the point across and to have fun.

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There are moments where I think just like with any artist we get into a zone. You get into a zone where everything seems like it's flowing. You just keep on attacking it and everything lines up and you produce something that's actually pretty decent.

Then there are other times when you try and try and nothing works for hours or days, and then you just have to step away from the computer. But when it all works together, it's a beautiful thing.

AB:

JS:I think anytime that we have to design something that is not just a concept, but a real-life build. That's very tricky because there are so many factors that we have to consider. When creating a design rendering for a social media post or meme, the details can be there, but not necessarily all factors considered. Which is different If you're designing, for example, a body kit.

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For example, Ryan Tuerck's Toyota Corolla for Formula Drift. When we got the 3D model of the Corolla—which wasn't even out yet at the time—my job was to make sure that whatever I designed on this car needed to make sense because this car will be driven and driven hard. So, I can't have all this funny aero stuff that doesn't work. We need to make sure that the car is put together well so that the race teams can service the car easily.

That's a lot of time and thinking that you gotta go through to make sure that you design something that fits within specifications but it's also pleasing to the eyes.

AB:

JS:The builds have continued to grow exponentially, meaning people are going extremely crazy. So widebody wasn't such a new idea, even back then in the '90s. The widebodies these days are nuts. Like, not just like the design, but like the width. Things that I would never expect could work in real life, I'm seeing.

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For example, Daigo Saito had this Hakosuka (AKA "Hako") GT-R and I think Miura-san from Rocket Bunny and Pandem designed fender flares for his Hako. It was so wide! Like, ridiculously wide. I'm like, "no way that would work." Then, a few weeks later, I saw a video of Daigo drifting that car. It was aggressive as heck!

It's just one of those things that I could never have imagined and predicted. Comparing what I'm seeing now to how it was from back in the day, the execution—not always the quality—but the extreme levels of where people take their builds today is insane.

AB:

JS:That's a good question. Young minds are just pregnant with creativity and stuff. Combine that with the powerful tools that are available now and it's hard to limit what we can do. Kids can just create a concept inGran Turismoand show that to the client. It's not just static, actually moving on a racetrack, you know? The possibilities are endless.

AB:

JS:I love questions like this because it's better than somebody asking me "what's your favorite rendering you've ever done?" The reason why I love this question is because it's almost like a picture of what my goal would be like in the future.

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That's always a mystery to me because I feel like I've reached all my goals in the sense that I was able to work with all these builders, and creative people, up to the OE level. I never thought that it was even possible for somebody like me that doesn't have any formal training. I just kind of studied from and graduated from YouTube university.

Being in the position where I'm at now. Are there other things that I want to do? Of course, there are a million things, but the essence of it all is like being able to work with creatives, cool people, and cool builders on projects. That's the goal for me. I always want to be working with creative people. I think that's the way I look at that stuff because it's a never-ending fulfillment of goals in that sense. If I limit myself to working with this person or that company, then I reach that goal, what do I do next? I think it's more about making sure I continue to work with top-level people and on quality projects.

That pushes me and challenges me to do things that I didn't think I could do. It pushes me to learn new techniques and styles. It's all about growing. To me, I think that would be a nice goal.