John & Mary

My good friend, fellow runner and fellow illustrator John Tomac married his beautiful wife Mary yesterday. It was a great ceremony and ended with a reception overlooking the Brooklyn Bridge. It fit perfectly with the graphic design of the entire wedding and their own story as a couple. The blue lights on the bridge and the gold lights in the reception hall even fit in with their color scheme.

Please wish the happy couple well by donating to John's fight against Leukemia.

Mind Control

Looks like one of my new cards was slipped into a new Magic deck a couple of months before I expected it to show up. For the Magic players out there, it's not a new card. Illustrator Mark Tedin did the previous illustration for the same card, and this is a new spin on the art.

But the best part is that one of my cards is finally sparking discussion:
http://forums.mtgsalvation.com/showthread.php?t=248892

Is the humanoid figure a Magic character called Jace? Some players say "yes," some say "no." Is the beast something that has appeared before, or something new? I know the answer, but I'll let the mystery continue ...

Sorry I haven't posted in a while. My nose has been pressed to canvas for weeks now. I'm taking a coffee break right now, so I decided to do a quick post.

Busy month!

May was the busiest month in my professional career. A cover illustration for Metal, Magic and Lore, two spot illustrations for Dungeons & Dragons, and two Magic cards. My last deadline was today, so the finals were shipped yesterday. Whew!

I have two big jobs in June. One book cover for Sourcebooks, and one book cover for Night Shade Books, both in the historical fantasy genre. Dave Palumbo hired me for the Night Shade job. Apparently, in addition to being a fantastic illustrator, he works as an AD. I won't say much, but I'll certainly be using my collection of historical costumes. Stay tuned, because I'll post new work as soon as I am contractually allowed.

But today, it's about time I catch up on everything. Invoicing, banking, cleaning, priming canvases, blogging ...

Hawk of May

Look what I found on Amazon. It's Hawk of May, published by Sourcebooks, and featuring my illustration! Its the story of Gawain, one of King Arthur's knights. On Wikipedia, I found an image of Gawain, as illustrated by one of my heroes, Howard Pyle.

I like having a (small) connection to Pyle. It makes me feel closer to the great ones.

Here's the process for my illustration, as seen in this old blog post.

Frank Frazetta

Frank Frazetta died today. If your worth as an artist is determined by the number of your imitators, he is surely unmatched in modern illustration.

Big-time reproduction for a big-time occasion

The piece I call Wind Spirits is the work that was accepted into Spectrum 17. I submitted it in the "Unpublished" category. None of my published work made it in this year.

The artists now need to submit high-res files. The files I create with my camera and lights are suitable for internet use and small prints, but for this occasion, I decided to get it right. Don Sigovich in Westport, Conn. does a phenomenal job of scanning and reproducing artwork. He does his best to match color and give his clients great prints. He's also a RIT grad. Here is the result of his process:

You can see that the resolution is pretty impressive. You can even see the canvas texture ...

Not a screensaver.

I'm really not a fan of this comic strip series(to put it mildly), but today's was apt.