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London Book Fair 2018

I’d never visited the LBF before, so it was an interesting experience taking part this year and having some of my art …

Cyber Tiger!

I’m going to work into this some more, probably with brush and ink. It’s intended as an enemy encounter illustration for a …

Confronting the hunt

The last of my Hunt of Smoke and Shadow series, this is an illustration from the closing chapters of Nevermoor and I …

Escaping the hunt

What do you need most in an emergency? How about a giant clockwork spider powered by magic to escape in? Yep, that …

The Hunt of Smoke and Shadow

Nevermoor : The Trials of Morrigan Crow by Jessica Townsend has been a recent source of inspiration for me. The Hunt of …

Hotel Deucalion

One of my illustrations inspired by Nevermoor : The trials of Morrigan Crow by Jessica Townsend. I completed a couple of silhouette …

Airship

I followed up the Northern Lights drawings with this digital piece. Based on the airships in the story, I wanted an excuse …

Witch and her cat

This website needs more cats. Even this wee kitty makes all the difference. The drawing, by the way, was intended for a …

Canvas prints

Wow – I must be doing something right, because I got a repeat customer! I also got a lesson in canvas printing …

Wow – I made it!

I reached the Undiscovered Voices 2018 final lineup! Well, firstly a big thank you to Working Partners Ltd and especially to Chris …

Drawing Excalibur

I’ll be writing a longer blog post in regards to Undiscovered Voices, but this is the work that got me to the …

Camlann

I completed two pictures from the Arthurian legends for Undiscovered Voices 2018, and this was the companion piece to my competition entry. …

The stone table breaks

My second Narnia piece and another painted silhouette. I’ve toned down the bright yellow in the sky and I’m glad that the …

Edmund and the White Witch

Drawn – appropriately – over the Christmas holidays, I’d originally planned to illustrate scenes from Voyage of the Dawn Treader which is …

Lyra

I returned to Northern Lights because it gave me an excuse to try a silhouette and cityscape combination – another experiment at …

Iorek Byrnison

An evening holiday drawing that earned enough good feedback to make it into my portfolio. I got some praise for the pen …

Toad hog!

My second Wind in the Willows piece. As well as captuing the action, I also wanted enough static detail to expand on …

Ratty and Mole

A departure from my fantasy work, this was one of a series inspired by the first Undiscoverd Voices 2018 brief. I wanted …

At the bonfire

Another dark fantasy piece. This one was directly inspired by the Dark Souls series of videogames – itself inspired by the Fighting …

Brigand

My monster illustrations were a trip back to my childhood spent reading Steve Jackson and Ian Livingstone’s ‘Fighting Fantasy’ series. The silhouette …

Red Riding Hood sets out

My final Red Riding Hood piece for now. This is close in composition (though it has fewer frames) to the drawing that …

Railhead – The Damask Rose

I’m still kicking myself that I met Philip Reeve and completely forgot to bring my copy of Railhead along to get signed. …

Quidditch

The last of my Harry Potter images for now. This was another earlier piece that I drew to test out ideas for …

Perseus and Medusa

Intended as an interior book illustration, my intention with this was to play around with perspective using silhouettes. The scene shows Perseus …

I’m on the longlist!

Now, firstly, the important stuff. Is ‘longlist’ even a real word? Every spellchecker I use says ‘no’ (but they also say spellchecker’ …

That December feeling

Well, it’s getting close to the close of 2017 and it’s been a rather interesting year. Aside from getting lots of extra …

Expecto Patronum!

I returned to Harry Potter for an action based scene to illustrate. This one gave me the opportunity to play around properly …

History of Magic

Another silhouette piece and an illustration from Harry Potter and The Chamber of Secrets. I chose this scene because it’s character based …

Theseus and the Minotaur

Preparing for the 2017/18 Undiscovered Voices Competition (yes, I’m giving it another go), I decided to move my work in a new …

Going climbing

As well as my myths and legends illustrations, I also had a go at drawing some other children’s book scenes with brush …

Baba Yaga

One of the last of my Inktober works, I used my ‘Once upon a time’ poster as the jumping off point as …

Little Red and the wolf

My final Red Riding Hood ink drawing for the time being. This was my experiment with coloured inks that I’d forgotten I’d …

Red Riding Hood Revisited

I revisited the Red Riding Hood story after completing my previous pen and ink drawing from the story. I much prefer the …

The soggy bad wolf

I was inspired by ‘Inktober’ last year, and started to work on a series of brush and ink illustrations. This was one …

Witch

One of my Inktober fairytale sketches. I was exploring ways of adapting the style that I’d been playing around with for …don’t …

Hogwarts

Now for sale on Etsy! Oh god, I’m officially a Harry Potter fan artist / tribute artist/ whatever… I put a hold …

New York, New York!

Now for sale on Etsy! Okay, it’s eBoy influenced, but it’s also got the Flatiron building and the Empire State, and the …

London Calling 2!

Now for sale on Etsy! I’ve returned to pixel art, at least for the time being, following a portfolio review. And I’ve …

2017 Booklists

I’m not sure where the geometric idea came from – probably just the requirement to differentiate the lists as much as possible …

2016 Booklists

These designs ended up looking really striking and allowed for the covers to be a decent size. The tidy design made them …

This is My Dream

This is My Dream is the 2017 Tower Hamlets Creative Writing Competition, and our first to get Arts Council funding (thanks to …

The Mummy

Another of my hark backs to Fighting Fantasy. I’ve now taken to colouring in the pen and ink fantasy creatures series, and …

Troll

Edited to add colour. Trolls and ogres are some of the most varied fantasy creatures in terms of artists’ and writers’ interpretations. …

Harry Potter Sketch

I’ve been running in ever decreasing circles since a portfolio review earlier this year which could be summed up as “we like …

Going back to pixels

Well, I took part in a portfolio intensive critique earlier this year via my SCBWI membership, and it was an eye-opener for …

Red Riding Hood

My entry for the Tommie Depaola 2016 award. I wanted Red Riding Hood to have an eastern European look to her. The …

Let’s dance

A return to Inn from the cold and a change of media. I’m probably going to have to digitally colour this one …