It is with a heavy heart that I bring you this news. Today a close friend of mine informed me that Greg Martin, Sonic the Hedgehog American box art illustrator has passed away. If you have followed my posts then you have already seen some of his seemingly unlimited work. I understand that not everyone here is a fan of the direction he took the character but no matter your thoughts on the artistic direction he applied to Sonic his influence can not be denied. Above all else I want everyone here to know that Greg was a kind and a generous man with a wonderful personality. The world is a poorer place without him. You can view some of his other works here. http://www.gregmartinstudio.com/ This is my 20th post so I do not know if I will be allowed to stay and follow up to this post. Should this be my last post here and you wish me to respond you can respond to the link below. My friend Dan knew Greg better than I did and he had this to say about Greg on Nintendoage. http://www.nintendoage.com/forum/messageview.cfm?catid=5&threadid=117907
This is in fact your 18th post. Anyway did he pass out recently? Well, I'm a not a fan of his Sonic art but it wasn't bad anyway. Shame to know he's gone :/
He died back in May but we only just found this out today via a mutual friend. The post count when you view my profile was at 2 posts higher than the count next to my posts. I'm not sure which one is accurate.
Oh, this is really sad news I have a soft spot for some of his art ( mostly Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles ones, but some Sonic too),it's very sad to hear this
Man, this guy did allot of my childhood boxarts, thats a total fucking shame he wasn't allowed to credit himself. do we at least credit him here on the wiki? Hopefully the Site Staff are working on an article for his passing.
Very sad news, I'm sorry to hear of his passing I liked his box art, it was unique and his style was bold and usually action-oriented.
Wow, my brother and I were commenting on his Sonic art just yesterday. I remember seeing his art on Sonic cartridges and boxes prominently on my pre-adolescent times. I may not personally prefer that art-style today, but his art presented the face of Sonic to millions of gamers across the Western Hemisphere. He did the job well. RIP Greg. Respect.
Sad to hear this, his covers are pretty deeply rooted in muh nostalgia. Always reminds me of happier times when I think back on first picking up Sonic 3's box and seeing that cover. I'll probably forget your name tomorrow, but I'll always remember your work fondly. Rest easy man.
I was planning to post this in the sprite thread but I Think this is a more appropriate place to have it Poor man, I really enjoyed his Art style, Its a sad way to start a day off RIP Greg
Just imagine where Sonic would be if the original box art were like American Megaman. He really played an important role in getting the fandom's heart beating.
I'd love to get a fully comprehensive list of his works (and other artists which worked on Sega-related covers) http://segaretro.org/Greg_Martin I just get the impression there's more. p.s. same applies to his Japanese counterpart. Very rarely were these people actually credited for their works, and yet it's so much more interesting to me than the pre-rendered CGI tat of most video game box arts post-1995 also reasonable quality scans (or high quality photos) of the artwork sans all the Mega Drive branding or whatever
Sad to read this, it looks like he did many other cool covers I didn't even suspect were his work. =( Cover artists need to get more coverage (pun unintended).
That is sad news. I mean that guy did create some visual pieces of my childhood gaming. While I do prefer the original Japanese style more, there is no doubt that people still loved Sonic's westernized look back in the day too. Also, I've never seen that drawing of Knuckles punching through a brick wall. Anyone know if that was used for something?
I would like to know if Greg Martin did the Sonic 2 ( Master System & Game Gear) cover art. He did the Mega Drive/Genesis ones, and the regular art of the first Sonic 8 bit game ( not the cover art it seems, but the poster art who was used to promote it). Did he do the Sonic 2 art too? he one with Sonic in a hanglider... It's possibly my favourite classic american Sonic art
I'm really sad to hear about this I always liked his Sonic artwork, but I didn't realise that he'd done art for so many other covers as well (some of which are for games I have fond memories of playing when I was a kid). Yeah, it's a shame that they weren't credited; there certainly was a charm to the classic box-arts and it'd be nice to put names to some of them.
Here are some Sonic sketches that Greg did for Sega. Just scanned these in and left the nasty watermarks out.
Man never knew one man did the artwork of so many games. Man, Greg did the artwork of so many childhood memories of mine, its sad knowing I never knew who made that art when he was alive. RIP
