Kamome Shirahama

She did the character designs for The Elder, part of the Star Wars: Visions short film series released in 2021, and she wrote the 2022 manga adaptation for it. She has also provided illustrations for the Pokémon Trading Card Game. She has won and been nominated for multiple awards, including the Eisner Award, the Harvey Award, the Kodansha Manga Award, the Manga Taishō, the Daruma d'Or Manga at the Japan Expo Awards, the Mangawa Award, and the Prix Babelio.

• Name — Kamome Shirahama • Native Name — 白浜 鴎 • Born — May 7 • Education — Tokyo University of the Arts • Notable Works — Witch Hat Atelier • Awards — * Daruma d'Or Manga (2019) • Eisner Award (2020) • Harvey Award (2020) • Prix Babelio (2020) Kamome Shirahama is a Japanese freelance manga artist and illustrator. She is best known as the creator of her Witch Hat Atelier series. She has created variant covers and other illustrations for Marvel Comics, DC Comics, and stories in the Star Wars franchise. She did the character designs for The Elder, part of the Star Wars: Visions short film series released in 2021, and she wrote the 2022 manga adaptation for it. She has also provided illustrations for the Pokémon Trading Card Game. She has won and been nominated for multiple awards, including the Eisner Award, the Harvey Award, the Kodansha Manga Award, the Manga Taishō, the Daruma d'Or Manga at the Japan Expo Awards, the Mangawa Award, and the Prix Babelio.

Shirahama was born on May 7. She graduated from the design program at the Tokyo University of the Arts. She works using analog tools such as pencils, pen and ink, and colored pencils rather than digital tools. Influences on her work include The Lord of the Rings and Harry Potter novels, which she read in junior high school, as well as the Art Nouveau and Art Deco styles. Her art style has multiple influences, including Alphonse Mucha, Mœbius, Hayao Miyazaki, and Moto Hagio. Her debut story was Watashi no Kuro-chan, published by Enterbrain in Fellows! in 2011. She made her multi-part story publishing debut with Eniale & Dewiela in Fellows! in 2012. The series ran for two years, ending in July 2015, and was collected in three volumes released in June 2013, June 2014, and July 2015. The series was translated into French and released by Pika Édition in 2019. She began doing variant covers and other illustration and concept work for Marvel Comics, DC Comics, and Star Wars comics in 2015 after her art was noticed at New York Comic Con, working on titles such as Star Wars: Doctor Aphra, Deadpool, and Batgirl and the Birds of Prey. Witch Hat Atelier began serialization in Kodansha's Monthly Morning Two manga magazine in July 2016. When the first collected volume was released in January 2017, the manga was so popular it became hard to find copies in stores. In June 2022, her Star Wars manga short work, The Elder, was published in Big Gangan. She also did the character designs for the animated version of the story. Starting in Late 2024 with Scarlet & Violet: Surging Sparks, Shirahama has also provided illustrations for the Pokémon Trading Card Game.

• Noises: Kuro to Kin no Akanai Kagi. Kōshiki Visual Book (April 2011, Ohzora Publishing) • Kuro to Kin no Akanai Kagi.: Kindan no Tobira (July 2011, Enterbrain) • Batgirl and the Birds of Prey, variant covers for issues #1-19, 21-22 (2016–2018, DC Comics) • Star Wars: Doctor Aphra, cover art for issues #5-6, 9-13, and collected volume #2 (2017–2018, Marvel Comics) • Star Wars: The Last Jedi, cover art for issue #2 (May 2018, Marvel Comics) • Nightwing (2016 series), variant cover for issue #52 (November 2018, DC Comics) • Shazam! (2018 series), variant cover for issue #6 (June 2019, DC Comics) • Wonder Woman (2016 series), variant cover for issue #63 (January 2019, DC Comics)