Oracle

Oracle

I've been busy for the last few months, and it's time to catch up on the cover art!  This is in oils for the House Wars Chronicles by Michelle West.  

This is the comp shown to the publishers.  Below are some of the photos I used for research or reference.

While I used to do a finished drawing before I start the painting, I was under a tight deadline and just enlarged the sketch onto the gessoed illustration board.  I started with the stag known as the Winter King, then moved onto Jewel, the rider, and the background of arches in the center triangle.  These aren't color corrected so they're pretty yellow.

Moved on to the Oracle and Evayne

The snowy trees and stars in the sky.

 And  with the black triangle outline and some gold inlaid designs on the Winter King's antlers, it's done.

Jody

www.jodylee.org

www.astudiobythesea.com

"House Wars: Battle"

My Drawing Board

I've finished the cover art for "Battle" by Michelle West and am turning it in today.  The center character is a master mage named Mairelon, who has risen into the air to fight a demon.  He has magically formed his armor about him and his sword, and since he has a special connection with wind and air, his sword doesn't look like it's made of steel, but of glass and swirls.  The field of sleepers concerns the problem the characters are contending with, which is a mysterious sleeping disease that has fallen upon the city of Averalaan Aramelas.  I hope I spelled everything correctly.  The strange butterflies in the air are the dreams of the sleepers, which if crushed, will kill the dreamers.  I didn't want them to be too pretty, so they are designed with bones, cobwebs, thorns, and points.  The finished painting is surrounded by my color rough, final drawing, and other reference.  I will take off the masking tape in a moment!

House Wars: Battle

It's been a busy month, between visits to various doctors, Crafts in Chelsea, Governor's Island, and my dear 80 year old mother visiting with me for three weeks.  But here is my latest preliminary sketch for my next book cover for Michelle West's "The House War" fantasy series.  People in Averalaan are falling asleep and not waking up and Jewell Markess ATerafin and her friends and allies are trying to discover the source of their illness.  Part of the solution lies in the powers of the dreams of the young seer.  In the dream roads she finds their dreams floating about like snow flakes or white butterflies, and captive to the plans of a strange figure called the Warden of Dreams.  That's the ancient wizard Meralonne APhaniel in the triangle, who is in almost all of West's novels - and we felt it was time he get a cover of his own.  Since the book isn't fully written yet even I don't know how it turns out.  I do try to read any book I'm given to illustrate, but many established authors don't have their novels finished when the publishers need art work for advertising, and so sometimes I only get first drafts, first chapters, or outlines to work from.

Now I'm off to complete the colored sketch, which will be used for the advertising for the book sellers.