Screentone Cowboy

I haven't really had a chance to do any sketching before in Manga Studio, I just went straight to work with it to ink my latest book. This here cowboy is the first sketch I've done with the program. I've used screentone before, but only the physical stuff.

Best-Loved Irish Legends

I haven't had a chance to post these before, these are a couple of the illustrations from Best-Loved Irish Legends. The deadline was really tight on it, it worked out at about 2 days per spread (which is two facing pages to you non-publication types). I put loads of work in to make sure the illustrations were still good quality.

My New Book: Best-Loved Irish Legends

Here's a preview of my latest book, of course the writer thinks it's her book as does the editor and all the publishing house and maybe even the printer, but really it's my book. Look at it sitting there on my desk, yep, definitely my book!

Aw, I'm so happy with how this came out. Emma did a great job on production. Me kissing up? A little, but it's true all the same. She talks about it here on the O'Brien blog, what a sycophant I am, that is.

It's out on the 7th September.

I like to wear my hair up

This is a quick sketch done in Painter.

The Fairy Tale Book

These are some of the illustrations from my most recently published book. I'm really, really happy with how these came out (of my hands, my talented, talented hands!).

I'm currently working on a book in colour for O'Brien Press, which I'm really enjoying.

Here's The Fairy Tale Book on Michael O'Mara's website.

Copyright Michael O'Mara.

ASBO Fairy Tales

At the moment I'm illustrating a book of regular fairy tales, which is a bit weird after illustrating these anarchic versions.

ASBO Fairy Tales on MOM's website.

One new book and two slightly older ones published by Michael O'Mara

I've just finished illustrating a new book for Michael O'Mara. The deadline was pretty tight, but I got it finished in time, phew.

Below are the previous books I illustrated for Michael O'Mara. The bottom two illustrations for the books were done in the style of Anne Anderson as requested.

The Nursery Rhymes Book on MOM website.

The Games Book on MOM website.

Images copyright Michael O'Mara.

The Henny Penny Tree

After working on Ice Dreams, I illustrated The Henny Penny Tree by Siobhán Parkinson for O'Brien Press.

This was a wonderfully fun story to illustrate. It's a warm quirky tale about three sisters who are given coins by their Uncle Fergus. At first Littlest doesn't know what to do with her copper coin.

Here it is on their website.

These images are copyright O'Brien Press.

Ice Dreams illustrations

These are some of the illustrations I did for the book Ice Dreams, written by Grace Wells and Published by O'Brien Press.

Grace's story is warm and witty and just fantastically written. The village of Moutsouna is in trouble after their only source of income, the ice factory, shuts down. The twins have a plan to save the community, but it will take everyone working together to pull it off.

Here it is on O'Brien's website.

These images are copyright O'Brien Press.

Line and Wash

Little Mermaid