Forging Dragons By John Howe

John Howe is a fantasy art legend in my mind and one that has created several paintings and art pieces for such iconic imagery of The lord of the rings aswell as several other fantasy worlds and realms.

And forging dragons is his book which delves deep into the dragon design, more like a process of the way he works giving notes and advice on certain techniques and thoughts of each project within his book. With detailed illustrations and sketches throughout he attempts to evoke the atmosphere of diverse dragons and provide a history of sorts to the dragons mythology with extracts from some other sources which serve as examples for which John can illustrate how he tackles a certain dragon in a different way.

One of the most fascinating things about Johns art is that it is easy to get caught up in seeing his artwork being processed and feeling the desire to draw along with him as you are reading. I find this true a lot with some of the other top fantasy artists, that I just want to get started straight away and almost skip past reading the book, but then I realize I have to read on.

Watch this short video with John giving a little personal introduction to the book Forging Dragons



The exploration of dragons as myth is the fantasy stuff of dreams and it is the imagination of drawing dragons that appeals to many especially from an artist who seems to do it almost effortlessly.

John Howe is an artist to study if you are interested in the intricacies of watercolour painting as he is a master of watercolour, as I once read a book about the process he used for a Lord Of The Rings Gandalf painting for which he built up lots of glaze layers or washes and created a misty fog effect before creating more detailed shades of paintwork at the foreground with Gandalf being the off centre focal point and here is that painting.

See some more of John Howes Work on Lord Of The Rings Concept Paintings

Popular John Howe LOTR Paintings
More John Howe Lord Of The Rings Paintings





Waterstones John Howe - Forging Dragons Synopsis and Review

Epilogue Fantasy Art Gallery

I often am a browser at times and can just spend hours on end looking at the many galleries on Epilogue - The Fantasy And Sci-Fi Art Gallery To look at other fantasy art is the most inspirational thing any artist can do. Of course just like Elfwood there are a mix of professional artists and just fans of the genre but as an artists I believe we can learn from the art of anyone, professional or not.

As you'll find new ideas in the strangest of places, take Youtube for example there are various videos which are from excellent artists and then from people whose drawing may not be perceived as good, but I say rubbish, the very fact that any artist is having a go means they are celebrating the fact that they love the art form of fantasy art and that is good enough for me and inspiring to watch no matter what the result turns out like.

The good and well intentioned forum users in the Epilogue forum entitled The Common Room is a fabulous place to see others work unfinished or not and to discuss each others work.

In addition to the fantasy art forums there is a tutorial section that goes through many things any artist might need to know about certain things like selling your fantasy art on Ebay or commissioning art and many more helpful resource articles.

So if you are into the mechanics of fantasy art and want an extra outlet for your work then Epilogue is a friendly place to get to know other artists and highly recommend getting to know people there.

The Fantasy Art Of Amy Brown

Amy Brown is a fantasy artist and she sketches, paints and creates fantastical images of fantastic fantasy fairy creations. Amy Draws Faeries with a beautiful eye for detail and the fantasy wonder of these delicate creatures and she has many books and ornaments designed by her, but perhaps my daughters favourite is the Amy Brown Fairies Coloring Book.

Amy's fairy artwork has been published in a book entitled The Art of Amy Brown and also a volume 2 featuring more wonderful artwork and Amy has become something of a specialist in drawing and painting fairies and this is a good example to specialize in an area and then build on that success, although quite largely Faery Art has remained her top priority she has been known to dabble in a few other fantasy genres of the art form, but again she is a fairy artist first and foremost.

I suppose one of my favourite pieces of hers(and there are many!) has to be Rose Spell it just has so much to say and the atmosphere of the piece is just really soothing with two fairies stood releasing rose petals into the wind and the stony pillars contrasting against the skies background and the red dresses of the fairies become the focal point with their wings spreading out at the back of them.

Amy has been painting and drawing faeries for years and professionally for nearly twenty years and was inspired by many other artists like many artists should be as well as films of fantasy and creative inspiration. Whenever I think of fairies I simply think Amy Brown.



Other Fantasy Fairy Art Websites

Fairyworld
Fairie Amber
Flower Fairies

Also, check out Kirstens Fairy Art Blog

The Way To Draw Fantasy Trees From Real Life

I often go out on a nice sunny day or a terribly rainy day and just take photos of trees and get some great looking reference photos of trees to draw from (I may get some strange looks from people, but who cares?)

Trees and their winding, twisting branches with all that fine detail tree bark that is highly textured just makes me want to draw trees and branches all day long.

Like everything that could exist in a fantasy world it is quite often that what you draw is an exaggerated version of a real life scene or visual.

Look at the photos below and see some of the view points you could possibly draw your trees from. Taking photos really does help you with angles and composition and gives you a valid starting point to draw the trees.

When drawing a tree, the only thing you need to get right is the roots and main trunk of the tree, because once it looks balanced then you can begin to draw all the branches and then the leaves.

So once again the planning of the structure is of great importance.

See the next post on how to draw a tree based on some of these photos above tomorrow, until then take some photos of the things you see.

Tools And Materials For Creating Fantasy Art

When it comes to materials and art equipment it becomes a personal choice as to what you are comfortable with working with, the artists tools can come in all shapes and sizes and you'll find at first that you won't need a lot to start off, but your equipment will grow over the years and you'll eventually have use for quite a bit of kit as your experience improves.

Pencils - Using pencils become a habit when you learn to draw at every available moment, so the choice of pencil you choose to use are your own, but I would recommend the Staedtler range as these are professionally produced but saying this it's handy to get cheaper pencils and stock up too. So pencils are cheap if you get them from any other place than an art shop, in packs they are obviously more expensive if they are the quality ones, but as I said an artists choice of art equipment is a personal one.

See some of the best available pencils below.



Mechanical pencils are also worth a shot because of the fine lead and there is no need for sharpening, just remember to refill on the lead when it runs out.
Again the more time passes the bigger your toolbox(art materials that is!!)

Pens and markers - When the part of the drawing comes to inking you will need a range of markers and pens for this process, the part of pen and ink drawings demands the light and dark to be finalised at this stage so having a grasp on what pens and markers might do the job effectively here is the important thing.



For markers I use anything from bingo markers to permanent markers to black in large areas that need shadow and these are fairly cheap from the pound shop or dollar store. But I have invested in some magic markers as these are the industry standard, well, in comic book art anyway.(and if you have noticed my art style is comic book inspired!)

Fine liners and other specialist pens come later as your toolbox expands(steady now)

Lastly paper is a necessity when it comes to drawing obviously, so any types of good quality paper is a must, but personally mixing and matching quality with the cheap paper is a good practice to split between the sketching of draft drawings and superb masterpieces.

I recommend Strathmore sketch pads for their range of paper sizes alone and a couple of cheaper alternatives.