Imagine that you’re a struggling artist.   You’ve got undeniable talent, your friends all think you’re great at what you do, and your family’s supportive of you… but no one else seems to be paying attention to your work.  One day, you upload a photo of your latest creation—a hand-drawn movie poster—to your websbite, and something you’ve always hoped would happen finally does:  a few key people notice the poster, share it with others, and now all of ‘em want to pay you for a copy of it.  Over the course of one frantic day, you go from being almost completely unknown… to having an inbox filled with questions, PayPal receipts, and maybe even a few offers for future work.  It’s what you’ve been hoping would happen, but are you prepared for it?

This is what happened to artist Alexander Iaccarino over the past month.  His take on the animated 80’s classic Akira put him on the radar of hundreds—if not thousands—of art collectors recently, and in the time since he’s had to adapt to his newfound success.  With a brand-new poster (based on Sony’s upcoming The Last of Us) debuting this weekend at the Penny Arcade Expo, Iaccarino sat down with Limited Paper to describe what it’s been like (and to help us give away a few copies of that new poster).  Meet me after the jump, folks.