When Stephani approached me to produce a cover for this book I knew it would be a Challenge.
However, in the end, I feel I produced one of my best covers. The story’s conflicts characters and environments meant I had plenty to work with. The influences of Frank Frazetta and Todd Lockwood, as well as Alan Lee and Peter A. Jones, are very prevalent in this painting, though I’m always trying to add my own twist.
If you want to check the book out, go here.
Bryan Choi and Erica Carson write these kinds of women incredibly well.
Women with complex backgrounds and motivations, who are determined to achieve their goals. Set in an utterly convincing world engaged in wars and power struggles, magical powers and weaponry salvaged from a bygone higher tech age, the tension and excitement of these books is incredible.
Once again you can probably see the influence of Frank Frazetta and Todd Lockwood, as well as Alan Lee and Peter A. Jones.
With these covers, I’m doing my best to push the envelope.
Action, intrigue and amazing vistas are all considerations so for this image, I imagined the Starcruiser Polaris bursting out of a nebular, guns blazing, and I set about it. After a few false starts, this was the result.
I love the idea that space has so many things we don’t understand, so many things we can’t even imagine (though I’m trying). I’m utterly awestruck when I think about this stuff and even more so when I’m asked to illustrate some of these incredible ideas by fine authors like Richard.
I do my utmost to infect the viewer with these feelings too just as my favourite artists did to me. People like : (in no particular order ) and I have to thank them: Todd Lockwood, Jim Burns, Chris Foss, Chris Archilleos, Peter Elson, Roger Dean, Rodney Mathews, Frank Frazetta, Peter A Jones and many more, without whom I would be painting landscapes.
This cover wraps the set as one book and so is no doubt a bargain you should not miss.
I meant to post this when it came out, but I got very busy… I hope you enjoy it.
From the Interview:
“A doodler from an extremely young age, encouraged by the freedom to do as he pleased at school, Keith Draws has been an artist at heart for his entire life. Inspired by the sci-fi, fantasy and superheroes that amazed him as a child, he has gone on to create art for bands, books and games.
With a new sci-fi novel series proudly displaying his artwork on the covers and a crowdfunded superhero anthology in the works, Keith is more in demand today than ever before. He has mastered the art of telling a whole story in just a single frame, using shape and colour and detail to create intriguing and captivating pieces that draw you into everything his named is attached to.
We spoke to Keith to find out how he developed his skills and where they will take him next.
Kirstie: How did you get into art?
Keith: Drawing and painting is something I always enjoyed but it became something more when I started school. At the time the school were running an experiment (it was in the ‘60’s). The whole infant block was open plan and the idea was that kids could enter and leave any lessons they wanted to at any time. So of course, I would wander off and draw pretty much all the time. It’s all I remember doing for those two years. More…”
Just found out “Union Station 1, 2 and 3” bundle, hit number one on Amazon’s “Humorous Science Fiction” Chart! And “Union Station 1″ is number two! ” While Union Station 13″ is number Four on the chart. Just wow…
Well done E.M. Foner!
“I’ve seen your work for E. M. Foner’s Union Station series and I think your style is exactly what I am looking for. I have the concept for what I want, based on an event in the book, and it does include a beautiful woman which I want to be sexy, innocent, funny but not sexual. That is why I think your work on Union Station is spot on.”
I liked the sound of this and after reading the book the image almost created itself in my mind. It’s an unusual book that tells the tale of a very different alien abduction. The protagonist has a lot of extraordinary experiences to deal with and uses his razor-sharp, yet gentle wit, to carry himself (and the reader) through the journey of a lifetime.
Guerin’s original idea was to have one of the main characters posed as I’ve shown her in front of the shuttle and while I liked this I was afraid it wouldn’t indicate enough of what the reader would experience so I decided to feature some of the more spectacular scenery from the book too and after I’d worked out a layout, we both agreed this was the way to go.
I’m sure if you care to look you’ll see some of the influences there. My buddy Jim Burns (he’s so good at alien tech and aliens in general that I always have to look through his stuff just try and get into that headspace) , Chris Foss (for the sheer massive scale he can imbue in his work), Peter A. Jones ( for the dynamism and the colour), Todd Lockwood (whose painting technique and compositional sense astounding to me) and I’m of course trying to channel a little Frank Frazetta there (and I feel like maybe I succeeded a little this time).
I have to admit to being very pleased with the end result.
I’ve been working with E. M. Foner for a few years now.
He writes science fiction and Fantasy with a light comedic twist. In this case the cover for “Meghan’s Dragon” was to feature a young girl and her Dragon (who happens to also be extremely hungry all the time). And I have to indicate the humor found in the story.
Comedic illustration is never the easiest thing to do but when it’s done well it can be hilarious.
Mort Drucker
For me, there is nobody better at this than Mort Drucker (famous mainly for his work in Mad Magazine).
So when faced with this challenge I looked at what he does. And what he does is incredible, he sets up situations and then punctuates the joke using the characters facial expressions. I also looked at the Dragons created by Todd Lockwood, which are all pretty scary and used that as a direction to avoid! So with that in mind, I set about working on ideas and after several roughs and some to and fro between the Author and I/we finally settled on this.
My indicator that it works is that my kids laugh at it and immediately make up stories about what’s going on… Mind you, They are both under 9 years old and they laugh at my jokes too, so maybe that’s not the best guide… Anyway…
It’s probably the first time ever that I’ve welcomed people laughing at my work! Maybe I’m dragoning this post out a bit so I’ll end it here.
This is the second cover for the new series of science fantasy/dark fantasy books by Brian Choi and Erica Carson. If you want to buy the book or want to know more about the Authors :
Today “Twelve Foot Ninja” Release their New album “Outlier”
And I produced the cover art. Credit where credit is due though, TFN always have very strong ideas and without their direction this cover would not have worked half as well.
And this is their new single which I also did the cover for:
I’ve been working with TFN since 2010 and in fact they were probably the main reason I was able to move my focus to illustration.
Initially they asked for artists to send a couple of comic panels as samples since they were intending to produce a comic and or graphic novel. I don’t normally do this, but for some reason I had a good feeling about this work and so I produced the following.
TFN sample P1
Two incredible things happened. First the amazing Liam Sharp (currently the lead artist on Wonder Woman for DC) and blew my mind with this comment on my deviant page and I have to say that is probably one of the most inspirational moments of my life. A moment when it felt like all the effort was worth it after what seemed like an eternity of losing battles. I’m happy to say that we also became friends (even if it is only on social media). If Liam had not left that message I suspect I would have gone down another path.
Me feeling awestruck. Liam Sharp
It only gets better… After I’d given up on hearing back about the samples, Stevic from TFN got in touch with me and told me I’d got the Job.
From that point on I worked with the band mainly through Stevic and Dave MacGregor (their manager who they work very closely with). things went well. I worked on a lot of concept with them, finally deciding on the look of the Twelve Foot Ninja and we produced the cover for their second CD
Now we moved on to the next major project. The album “Silent Machine”
Silent Machine Cover
It had 12 tracks and each would have it’s own 6 page comic making up a graphic novella to go with the album.
I produced all the art and wrote the adaptation from the original plot/novel. But I had to tie the stories in with the songs. They pretty much gave me a free hand so long as I stuck to the plot; and the songs are very inspiring which made it a lot easier. It was a hell of a job, on a tight deadline, but we did it!….And I’m very proud of this work. Here are some pages.
I’ve worked on lots of other projects with them over the years and they have done a lot to help me out through some difficult times. They are great people and I doubt I’d even be doing this if it wasn’t for them.
Oh and I’m also working on another new project with them right now so watch this space, it’s going to be awesome!
Twelve Foot Ninja
Outlier
All art produced for “Twelve Foot Ninja” is copyright “Twelve Foot Ninja” and is reproduced with permission.
