Orion Rezner

My good friend and client Michael Ploof has a new series. This is the cover for the first book.

The Valentine Circle

This was actually not for a book cover. The client wanted a companion piece of art for his book. We both really liked how this turned out.

Aspects of Fantasy RPG Book Cover

Cover for an RPG Book for Steve Bode which he has released here: http://rpg.drivethrustuff.com/product/131485/Aspects-of-Fantasy

It was a pleasure to paint. He wanted something dark and moody just like what I love to do.

If you're wondering what the girl in this painting is thinking, then I did a good job! She is indeed, conflicted.

This was a piece I did based on a short story written by Leena Likitalo from Finland. Leena's Facebook

She is a wonderfully fun and sweet woman that I had the pleasure of working with for the L. Ron Hubbard's Writers and Illustrators of the Future Contest. We were both finalists, her a writer, and me an illustrator. The next task was for me to illustrate the book cover for her winning story, and this is it. Twelve writers' stories and twelve artists are featured in this latest anthology: Writers of the Future Volume 30 on Amazon

I went on to win the Golden Brush award with this piece, and I am eager to live up to the honor I've been given. 

And here are the three paintings that I submitted to become a finalist in the contest. These are all personal paintings.

Wicked new cover art! This is the sequel to Faces in the Fire which I also painted the cover for about a year ago. Donnita L. Rogers is writing the books and the dragon eye was her idea for the cover. What a great idea--it really paid off I think.
Check her out here: http://donnitalrogers.com/

Another cover...

And a sequel for Claudette Marco. Man, this turned out nicely!

New book covers

Here is one I really like that I did for J.D. Brink. He really is an excellent writer and making his covers cool is really easy!

A cover and a map for Ann Goldfarb's book. You'll notice that I didn't use any of the three roughs that I showed her. That happens sometimes! 

Another cover for friend and repeat client Todd Shryock. 

Awesome new book cover. I am really proud of this piece. I think it really shows the progress I am making in expressive color and edge control(traditional painting mimicry). J.D. was a pleasure to work with and I hope to do his sequel very soon.

J.D. had me painting this awesome landscape of a swamp with blood-colored marsh and these devilish creatures made of plants. The silver-skinned man grinning about impending danger was my favorite part though.

You can see his book for sale here which doesn't have my new cover art on it yet: http://www.amazon.com/Tarnish-J-D-Brink-ebook/dp/B00DYHK754/ref=sr_1_7?ie=UTF8&qid=1386869132&sr=8-7&keywords=tarnish

And his website here: http://www.jdbrinkfugitive.com/

As always, I enjoy sharing the WIPs and roughs with you. That first color rough is pretty rough!

Freyja, Norse Goddess

Alex James commissioned me to do this cover for him and we both liked the outcome. Yet another great client to work with. I hope I will get to do sequels for all of these authors!

I was asked to help with another independent book cover and map for the book. These are for Claudette Marco. She was a pleasure to work with. I really like how this cover turned out and I consider it a step up in the quality of my work. http://www.claudettemarco.com/

So I met a guy who wanted to make a graphic novel and he liked my artwork. His name is Todd Lally. I told him I don't do sequential art, and in fact, I don't like sequential art. I told him my complaints about graphic novels being mostly tiny, rushed, crappy frames of telling every unnecessary piece of  the story as it unfolds. I said that it would be a cool idea to try more of an illustrated novel with some more polished, large paintings that are actually worth painting. And here is the first one!

Another cover for Todd Shryock--friend and repeat client. 

New Book Cover

I met Sam Barone through the Arizona Authors Association. He liked my style as a new approach for a short story book he was ready to release. And viola, we have Rogue Warriors #1.
As usual, I'm including my roughs and a WIP for your viewing pleasure :D

Girl in a Tree

My largest painting to date. It's 4ft. x 3ft. I wasn't convinced that I would like painting this large but I did! Definitely my most ambitious oil painting so far. It was a first step in doing more ambitious pieces.

Girl in white and girl in blue

Here are a couple of my new paintings. I'm excited to begin this path into figure paintings. I haven't painted anything figurative since school and that was all academic. I'm already having a blast experimenting with expressive color and style.

Hummingbirds

I enjoyed painting a couple hummingbirds several years ago that were on 6x6 panels. I still enjoy painting birds and I hope to do more. These new ones are 12x12. I'm also experimenting with expressive colors, backgrounds, and compositions of negative space.

Hope you like them too!

Fantasy map!

Painting these maps is so fun! It's just totally different from the other illustrations I do. The main and obvious difference is that there is 2/3 painting, and 1/3 design. I don't normally like design--adobe illustrator makes me want to club baby seals after about 5 minutes, but the minimal design used in tandem with painting the little trees and mountains is really cool. I had a blast on this.