Chalker did this piece for the 2009 Chicago Artists Show. It's titled "Just Married".

If you picked up the latest issue of the Observer with the headline, “Welcome to the Dull House”, referring to the rather uneventful Dallas mayoral race, then you’ve seen Jason Chalker’s work. He designed the cover art.

The graphic designer/illustrator lives on the border of Preston Hollow’s west side and grew up around Northwest Highway and Inwood.

Coming of age in the Star Wars generation, most of his work is inspired by horror, sci-fi and pulp-era concepts from ’40s and ’50s adventure magazines.

“Star Wars was my biggest influence,” Chalker says. “I was in third grade when it came out. It’s so visually mind-boggling, and I wanted to capture it.”

He designs posters, logos and animation among other things. He also operates The Manly Art Blog: The Art and Ramblings of Jason Chalker. One of his latest posts talks about his creative process behind the Observer cover. His blog’s tongue-in-cheek name started as a reaction to “safe art”.

“You’re never going to see a housewife hanging my art in their house. It’s more for a man cave.”

Although, Chalker says the most surprising thing about his work is how many women actually like his pin-up art.

“In general, I try to do realistic women and leave most things up to the imagination.”

He just tied the knot a few weeks ago with a local watercolor artist, Lisa Ficarra. She’s about to begin work on four elaborate murals for the nonprofit Vogel Alcove.

The groom's cake a Chalker's wedding

Chalker has plans to set up a booth with his work at the local Comic Con convention May 21-22 in Irving and is also traveling to the convention in San Diego. While he doesn’t read a lot of mainstream comic books, he does go out of his way to read one of his all-time favorites, “Hellboy”.

“The art is beautiful, and it’s got a great story. But it’s usually based on whether I like the artist.”

Another claim to fame—Chalker worked as one of the animators on the rotoscope film, “Scanner Darkly”.  He’s also been selected for the upcoming Spectrum, an annual juried book that showcases the best in “contemporary fantastic art”.

“I’ve been drawing all my life. My parents always supported me. Very recently, things have been falling into place for me.”