johnnywander

Chapter 9 / Page 5 pencils

OH lovely, company has arrived! 😊

This page was thumbnailed by me! Yay! It was a bit challenging to get Fortuna in there because I wanted Cameron large and completely centered in frame. She's hanging out in the back!

The figures got a bit messed with after the sketch phase so the features are off-kilter lol.... I got it in the pencils (but I'll probably make Cameron's face a bit less cute in the inks phase, I think I drew his eyes too big)

Right now we've been spen...

Chapter 9 / Page 4 pencils

Another page thumbnailed by Ananth! Thank you Ananth! I think I thumbnailed the next scene, or at least pieces of it. While we pass these files back and forth we're figuring out what strengths and weaknesses we have in our layouts.

The last page of the flashback! This one's a talky page, so a lot of this will be covered with speech bubbles. Now you will know what's hiding behind all the talk (it's Cameron's chest)

The Page Where Cameron Learns Something About Himself

SPX 2024 Program Guide!

YAYY this has been announced so I'll share my progress with you guys!

I was really honored to be asked to illustrate the cover of this year's Small Press Expo Program Guide, and was specifically requested to draw a dragon! Obviously I could not refuse!!!!!!

This year is the 30th anniversary of the show, so I wanted to do something in the design to celebrate that. Originally the idea was a dragon winding through the covers of 30 books, but once I saw the idea sketched out it looked...

Percy in Elden Ring DLC 6

Between the distraction of launching a video game and continuing health issues, I haven't had as much time as I'd like to play Elden Ring or journal about it lol - unfortunately chronic fatigue makes playing the reaction time game not very fun!

I was really excited to find Milady, the first 'light greatsword' I've come across from the DLC - in large part because I like personifying objects, and I like when a gigantic sword is a girl. :) We're friends now :) :)

FIELDS OF MISTRIA IS OUT!!!

We've talked about this occasionally, Ananth and I have been working on Fields of Mistria since 2019 and it finally was released on Steam in Early Access TODAY!!! 🎉🎉

 If you enjoy farming sims and are interested in seeing writing Ananth worked on and character designs I worked on, this is for you!! Unfortunately this is a PC-only game currently, but it DOES work like a dream on Steamdeck.

It's been amazing to see people finally seeing the work we'...

Animal Fight!!

I did this as a spot illo for [an upcoming project] and I'm pretty pleased with the final design! It came out a bit tattoo-esque, which I think looks cool. I punched up the colors with a really intense color overlay because the representation is supposed to be literary!! It's a metaphor!!!!!

Attached are also the references I used for the pose, I wanted to think about these old-fashioned book illustrations of animal fights in gladiator rings. Unrelated, I know everyone has alre...

Percy in Elden Ring DLC 5

HORSE BETRAYAL

I was surprised to discover these guys are ACTUALLY quite aggressive and WILL sonic spindash you to death if you get near them, I don't know why I was so startled by this happening in the everything wants to kill you game lol

Sorry this is a bit late!!! It was my dad's birthday so I was out of town for a bit and didn't have access to a computer! In extremely more important news, I went to the local goodwill near my folks' place and found a pair of leat...

Chapter 9 / Page 3 pencils

Sharing Chapter 9 / Page 3 progress pencils and the original thumbnail from Ananth! It's pretty obvious, this is a flashback to the first time Chiaki/Percy ever met Fortuna. I love drawing her!

I've been pulled onto other projects lately (which will hopefully be announced within a few months) and ALSO dealing with some more gnarly issues with long covid-- but I'm back on chapter 9 full time now, hopefully I'll be able to make quick progress. :)

Percy in Elden Ring DLC 4

Tall horse!!!! I love tall horse!!!! My new friend Tall Horse will surely never betray me*

*well,

Percy in Elden Ring DLC 3

Having a lot of "I'm just a little guy I'm just a birthday boy" moments while revisiting Elden Ring!! The game has been extremely generous with friendly NPC characters and I'm gonna hang back and cheer them on and and be a back-line buffer as often as I can get away with!!!!

BY THE WAY if you're interested in seeing extremely cool character design and have already played through the beginning of the Elden Ring DLC OR don't care about spoilers, I really recommend watching the way the Div...

Chapter 9 / Page 2 pencils

Chapter 9 is still trucking along! I wanted to share the second page of pencils plus Ananth's thumbnails! You can find the preview for page 1 over here!

Blessings be upon clip studio 3D modelers, I never would have been able to draw an ornate home office in top-down perspective with nearly as much efficiency if I didn't have access to them. The first panel alone probably would have taken me ...

Percy in Elden Ring DLC 2

OK OK OK I'm unfortunately really enjoying Elden Ring DLC despite being very bad at the game!!

I'm still right at the beginning and running around poking at all the small details. Delightfully, early on there is a little trash mob soldier camp that is a summoning zone for spirits! ALL the enemies in the DLC are super tuned up so the imps are not super effective anymore, but I still want them around because they're funny and my friends. And they're still good at fighting mobs of piddly s...

Ananth Hirsh and Tess Stone at ALA 2024!

Hi there! Ananth here! I'm posting this on the off-chance there are any librarians who follow us who will be at ALA 2024 in San Deigo! Tess Stone and I will be there promoting our upcoming Random House Graphic book GREATER SECRETS.

Come find us at booth 140! We'll have arcs of GREATER SECRETS to flip through, and we'll be giving away other books from out back catalog! Hope to see you there!

Percy in Elden Ring DLC 1

OH NO unsurprisingly Elden Ring has its hooks in me again U___U

I don't know if I'll be able to do anything like I was able to before since I'm still dealing with Long Covid issues (a full year now!) and I have to be pretty judicious about how I spend my work energy. But these are really fun to draw. ;__;

As always, I am truly horrible at this game and also the DLC is WAY harder than the base game lol. Farewell my friends ~ 🕊🕊

Chapter 9 Visdev: LEEDS

We needed a costume for Leeds for a section of Chapter 9, and of course we wanted to go as hard as we could get away with!!!

Originally the concept was "horse who is also a pilot", then "horse who is also a jockey" to "horse who is also a knight". Basically, any excuse to pair assless chaps with horse blinders. Running around with Leeds in Dragon's Dogma II has made me REALLY want to give Leeds a big fur ruff or cape because it makes his shoulders look enormous, but unf...