1.17.12
Here are the first 2 covers in a series I have been doing the covers for Penguin Books, called "The Treasure Chest" by Ann Hood .
You might notice in the links there are slight changes to the cover art, from what was originally given for sales purposes. They were slight revisions , which is normal especially when publishers have high expectations for an author or book. Hopefully it won't be too long before I can show you the other two covers for this series.

Thanks for checking!
S.

links to the books:
promo vid
Book 1
Book 2

Here's a cover I did for "The Selfish Giant" being published by Oxford University Press. It may be a while before I can show the interiors since publish date may be a bit away.

I'm also posting the sketch they didn't go for, but I strongly prefer it. At least it can now exist on this blog.

Thanks for checking in- I'll try to update soon.-S.

ink , acrylic on mylar

After the cover, I was asked by Templar to create some character designs/ images for promotion and such. This was really fun , and I wish publishers did this with every book. It's really great being able to explore characters that you might not get the chance to illustrate for the cover.

I also have to give Katherine Roberts and the fine folks at Templar UK praise for the character development of Rhianna.  This is one of the few times that I have ever been asked to make a character less attractive and a bit grittier. You can see the development in the top sketches below. 

Thanks for stopping in!

-S.

Pendragon Legacy  : Sword of Light
This is the first book in a series I am working on for Templar UK.  Excited to see how this reproduces, since they were planning on using acetate overlays and other fancy packaging.  Thanks for checking in!

New York Times cover collaboration with my close friend, Mark Pernice / Matic .  This was literally painted within a few hours. No sketch-just straight to paint (eh..digital paint). Mark developed the concept and helped me tweak the painting with great art direction and design.
Since this was going to print on newsprint, I needed that expertise so we could get the image to reproduce optimally. My colors and values were too dark and muted at first, as you can see below.

this is before Mark made the necessary adjustments

this is our finished illustration

                                                                               
Can also check the online version to the article > here
and be sure to check out Mark's amazing work- the man is a beast! > MATIC

also....
I was recently asked to do a brief interview with artist Khuan Tru > here
There are lots of other artist interviews there as well , with some names you will likely recognize.

thanks! -s.

Haven't had hardly any time for personal work but I really wanted to finally give the new version of Art Rage a whirl. It's been out for awhile ,but I hadn't gotten around to the upgrade.

This image isn't entirely ArtRage- but a good deal of it was.  I jumped from ArtRage, to Corel Painter, and Photoshop just to see how they all interacted together. It's tough to determine how long this image took  - since I only dabbled a little here and there on work-breaks.

It doesn't  replace the big programs, but the price is good and I really love the oil brushes in the program. Definitely recommend to those oil painters who  miss a bit of that feeling when working digitally. I'll try to get a process gif going soon ,but it's pretty busy right now! I'll do my best though. Thanks for looking!-S.