fantasy | this northern boy

Commissions

Stilted-City

I’m now happily accepting a new round of illustration commissions. If you’ve ever wanted to own some original art – and like my work – now’s your chance.

Commissions

If you would like to buy an original drawing, email me at rob [at] thisnorthernboy [dot] co [dot] uk , and you can request one of the following:

A robot
An Astronaut
A Spaceship
An imagined place
Something else entirely

What you’ll receive will be a black and white pen drawing, on an A4 sheet of good quality, 220gsm cartridge paper. The artwork will be approximately 240mm x 160mm in size, centred on the paper so you can frame it easily if you’d like to. If you would prefer a colour illustration – let me know and we can have a chat.

You can also request for the illustration to be landscape or portrait in orientation.

Any other requests – type of landscape, style of robot etc. can be made, but there’s no guarantee I’ll be able to take this into account. I know this sounds a little strict, but I only want to accept commissions that I’ll enjoy drawing right now, and in return you get a lovely surprise when you open your finished illustration.

What will this cost?

I charge a flat rate of £60 including post and packaging for the UK, and £60 + post and packaging for the rest of the world.

When you email me to request a commission, if you can include the address you’d like it shipped to, I’ll work out the cost of postage and let you know. If you’re happy with the overall cost I can accept payment by PayPal.

When will you get your drawing?

I’ll aim to complete and post all illustrations within three weeks of receiving payment.

What might your commission look like?

Well, it could look a little like these…

The Day of the Dead. £40.

The City and the Tree

The Copse

The Astronaut.

3 Comments

January 2, 2016

2015: By the numbers.

Happy New Year everyone, and thanks for your continued support on this blog, and across Twitter and Instagram, over the last twelve months. Every like and comment is very much appreciated.

2015 was a pretty big year for me. After drawing more and more often for the last few years, I finally made the decision to try and start earning some money from illustration. I didn’t expect to get a book published full of my illustrations – and to be featured in another, or to have produced so many private commissions. While illustration only managed to contribute a fraction of my income for the year, it was a much better start than I could have hoped for.

My challenge for 2016 is to build on that success and hopefully get another book published – this time one that only has my name on the cover.

2015 by the numbers

On the blog…

39 blog posts written

40,533 page views

10,126 visitors

621 likes

154 comments (99% of them nice!)

Most popular blog post – Imagined Places – 568 views, 13 likes, 7 comments.

On Instagram…

361 posts

103,744 likes

Almost 7,000 followers

My most liked image – Tentacled Island – 1,132 likes

My favourite images on the blog for the year…

8 Comments

November 18, 2015

Beneath the Sea

I recently completed a commission for Max in Canada. He’d seen an illustration I did a while ago – The Island – and asked me for a new version.

The picture below show some of the process, from initial inky thumbnail sketch, to the final coloured illustration.

If you’d like to commission an illustration from me, message me here or on social media.

Initial inky shapes.

Tentacle details

Onto the illustration proper – outlines.

Adding flat blacks and thicker lines to create depth.

Detail goes in with a very fine pen initially.

I always get carried away at this point.

Inks complete.

Final image, ready to send to Canada.

This, and most of my illustrations are drawn on heavy, but smooth cartridge paper. I use Copic Multiliners, a Pentel Pocket Brush and Copic Ciao Markers.

5 Comments

September 11, 2015

New Commissions

I’m now happy to accept a new round of illustration commissions. Over the past few months I’ve completed over 40 commissions, so if you’d like some original, affordable art to hang on your wall, here’s how it works…

Commissions

If you would like to buy an original drawing, email me at rob [at] thisnorthernboy [dot] co [dot] uk , you can request one of the following:

A robot
A Spaceship
An imagined place

If there’s something in particular you’d like, that isn’t one of the above, just let me know – it might be something I’d be interested in drawing for you.

What you’ll receive will be a black and white pen drawing, on an A4 sheet of good quality, 200gsm cartridge paper. The artwork will be approximately 240mm x 160mm in size, centred on the paper so you can frame it easily if you’d like to.

You can also request for the illustration to be landscape or portrait in orientation.

What will this cost?

I charge a flat rate of £60 including post and packaging for the UK, and £60 + post and packaging for the rest of the world.

When will you get your drawing?

I’ll aim to complete and post all illustrations within two weeks of receiving payment.

What might your commission look like?

Well, it could look a little like these…

: Astronaut

: Stilted City

: Steampunk Spaceship

: Spaceship

: Island

: Cityscape

: Heavy Droid

: Lighthouse

2 Comments

July 31, 2015

Steampunk Spaceship

My most recent commission was for a spaceship, with some steampunk influences. I wanted to keep it very much like one of my spaceships though, so it’s kind of an amalgam of my asteroid belt clippers, and some weird alt-history Victorian airship.

I’m pretty happy with the way it turned out, it was one of those rare illustrations that just flows nicely all the way from initial doodles right through to the final ink.

Finished Steampunk Spaceship.

Work in progress.

Initial sketch.

4 Comments

July 20, 2015

Imagined Places

I’ve drawn a fair few cityscapes and imaginary places over the last few months, some of them purely personal, some have been commissions, some have been posted here before, some haven’t, so here they are collected in one place.

The first, City on the Edge of Nowhere, is one of my favourites.

City on the edge of nowhere.

: Stilted City

: The City and the Tree

: The City and the Tree II

: The Light on the Rock

: Stilted City II

: Sky Town

: Two Sides of the Street

: Stilted City III

: Stilted City IV

: The Island. 4788 likes on Instagram.

: Sky Town II

: Nobody Gets off this Rock

: Fragment of Laputa

: The Giant’s Ring

: Slater’s Bridge

: Stilted City (coloured)

8 Comments

June 3, 2015

Commissions update…

Recent commissions

UPDATE: Due to demand, and the amount of time I’m spending on each commission, I’m increasing my prices. My standard commissions, as described below will now be priced at £60.

••••••••••••••••••••••••••

I recently announced that I’m accepting illustration commissions and the response was fantastic. I’ve completed over 40 illustrations so far, and still have a few more booked in. If you’d like to own some original art by me, here’s how it works…

I am now accepting commissions.

I’m keeping things quite strict though, so this is how it will work if you’re interested in owning some original art.

If you would like to buy an original drawing, email me at rob [at] thisnorthernboy [dot] co [dot] uk , you can request one of the following:

A robot
A Spaceship
An imagined place

What you’ll receive will be a black and white pen drawing, on an A4 sheet of good quality, 200gsm cartridge paper. The artwork will be approximately A5 in size, centred on the paper so you can frame it easily if you’d like to.

You can also request for the illustration to be landscape or portrait in orientation.

What will this cost?

I’m going to charge a flat rate of £60 including post and packaging for the UK. And a rate of £60 + post and packaging for the rest of the world.

When you email me to request a commission, if you can include the country you’d like it shipped to, I’ll work out the cost of postage and let you know. If you’re happy with the overall cost I’ll accept payment by PayPal.

When will you get your drawing?

I’ll aim to complete and post all illustrations within two to three weeks of receiving payment.

What might your commission look like?

Well, it could look a little like these…

: Imagined Landscape 1

: Imagined Landscape 3

: Spaceship 1

: Robot 1

: Robot 2

So if you’d like to own some original art, and support me as I work at being an illustrator – drop me an email now.

Thank you,

Thisnorthernboy

May 26, 2015

Some recent commissions

I recently started taking commissions, on the themes of robots, spaceships or imaginary places. It’s been a pretty good response so far, and it’s been really enjoyable creating work to order – but on subjects that I love.

Here are a few recent illustrations…

: The Tree and the City

: The Light on the Rock

: Sky Town

: Stilted City III

: Droid 4

: Robot One

: Robot Two

: Easter Island Robot

5 Comments

May 18, 2015

Illustration Timelapse

I filmed a few time-lapse videos while I was drawing a recent commission. It’s of a stilted city, similar to a couple I’ve drawn before. I’d already sketched it out in pencil before I started filming, but I’ll try and do the whole process from start to finish at some point.

The first shows me putting in some initial lines with a fine pen. This is how I usually start inking any of my drawings. It’s basically outlining all the main elements at this point.

Illustration timelapse 1/4 from thisnorthernboy on Vimeo.

The second shows how I add a nice thick line to foreground elements, to areas I want to highlight, and in this case a key line around the whole illustration.

Illustration timelapse 2/4 from thisnorthernboy on Vimeo.

In video three I add detail, texture and any odd little bits of grit and noodling I feel it needs. All with a very fine 0.03 pen.

Illustration timelapse 3/4 from thisnorthernboy on Vimeo.

Lastly I add in some clouds and birds in the distance. I love drawing clouds. I actually added a couple more bits of detail after this – drawing in some barnacles and seaweed on the submerged bits of the drawing.