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Post by LaFille on Sept 16, 2006 3:17:35 GMT
 The artist, from Wikipedia: John Howe (born August 21, 1957 in Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada) is a book illustrator, living in Neuchatel, Switzerland. One year after graduating from high school, he studied in a college in Strasbourg, France, then at the Ecole des Arts Décoratifs.
He is best known for his work based on J. R. R. Tolkien's worlds. Howe and Alan Lee were the lead artists of Peter Jackson's The Lord of the Rings movie trilogy. Howe also re-illustrated the maps of The Lord of the Rings, The Hobbit, and The Silmarillion in 1996–2003. His work is however not limited to this, and includes images of myths such as the Anglo Saxon legend of Beowulf. He also illustrated many other books, amongst which many belong to the fantasy genre (Robin Hobb's books for instance.) Howe also contributed to the film adaptation of The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe by C.S Lewis. In 2005 a limited edition of George RR Martin's novel A Clash of Kings was released by Meisha Merlin, complete with numerous illustrations by Howe.It's worth going to sneak in his website; there are tons of stuff in there: www.john-howe.com/  |
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Post by LaFille on Sept 16, 2006 3:18:15 GMT
I’ll begin with some (a minuscule sample...) of his probably most known pictures...  The Eye of Sauron  Appeared in: Highbridge Audio Collection: The Lord of the Rings & The Hobbit J. R. R. Tolkien Collection The Silmarillion Audio Edition - Germany |
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Post by LaFille on Sept 16, 2006 3:20:32 GMT
Gandalf The Grey  Approximately 45 x 65 cm, 1989 The 1991 Tolkien calendar The Lord of the Rings One volume edition Grafton Books, January 1992 “Originally done for the calendar, Gandalf has travelled a long way since. This painting is emblematic of many things, and I have a lot to say about it, so bear with me!
It all started with a photo of a tree, and a desire to have a go at doing Gandalf. Everything came fairly naturally, though I did a lot of fiddling with the pose and angle of view before I was satisfied.
Once it was more or less laid out, the background was worked up in a succession of washes, each time going back over the whole thing to subdue the details and push them back into the distance. (This is going to end up being a how-to session, hope you're still with me) Once through the mist and down in the grass, things are easier, it's much simpler to control deeper tones than light ones. Much of the grass was done with a fine pen, and the nearer grass is done with pencil crayon on a dark gound. The tree and the airbrush to block in the gathering darkness of the storm came next. I do occasionally use a lot of airbrush, but always over top of brush work, otherwise airbrushing is fine for cars and plate glass, but there's not much warmth in it. (I don't much care for doing mist with the thing either - it's just too mechanical.)
Which leaves Gandalf. As I'd taped him over, I was naturally stuck with the predetermined silhouette, but with the exception of the hand holding the staff, which is far too weak, the rest worked out. I long despaired of ever getting some movement into him, he seems so monlithic with the huge cloak and skirts of his coat, but he eventually got striding. Most of his motion comes from the tree and the raindrops and the layout.
(I have this thing about rain, by the way... I always try to draw it at the same angle falling in the same direction. There is no meteorological excuse, it's of course part of landscape symbolism, more of a mythological shorthand than anything else.)
The picture has since become very popular, thanks to its association with the one-volume edition of he Lord of the Rings and more especially thanks to Peter Jackson and his obsession with the ridiculous hat...
Here comes the end of the story; in 1997, at a show of my work at the Médiathèque de Sedan, in the French Ardennes, the painting was stolen along with 10 others during the night of May 18 to 19.
It was never recovered. See The Great Art Robbery in the FAQ section.”
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Post by LaFille on Sept 16, 2006 3:22:00 GMT
The Mûmak of Harad  Large version here!The Mûmak of Harad 43.5 x 69.0 cm, 1995 The War of the Ring by Christopher TOLKIEN The History of Middle-Earth Volume 8, HarperCollinsPublishers, "For ages and ages I kept a photograph of some sunlit rocks near a murky pond, hoping that some day an illustration would come from it...
The archers of Faramir's band are taken from The Medieval Soldier, and the Mumak from memories of those wonderful mammoths that Frank Frazetta engraved so deeply in my mind that I'll never be rid of them...
I do regret now having put the hobbits in their tree to the upper left, it seems much too contrived, but they usually seem to get cropped or covered by a text block anyway."
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Post by LaFille on Sept 16, 2006 3:23:44 GMT
The Dark Tower The Dark Tower 47.3 x 47.3 cm, 1990 The 1991 Tolkien Calendar “Originally done for the calendar, this painting was reprinted on The Two Towers (September 1991), both hard and paperback. The calendars in the early '90's were quite a big format, spiral-bound, and more or less square. A frame with two facing vignettes of Sauron's army filled in the edges to accomodate the dates along the bottom.
I can't honestly remember the starting point, but I had (and still do) a collection of photos of the skulls of small animals - mice, rats, small birds - that an art school classmate and I had piled up and photographed. (Don't ask me to justify piling up and taking pictures of skulls, it's one of those things thats comes naturally to art students.) From these snapshots, I had done a painting of the Nameless Isle, from the Dream Quest of Unknown Kadath, by H. P. Lovecraft. (Don't ask me why I did that either...) Like many things, some paintings are a dry run, and I knew I had the foundations of Sauron's tower Barad-dur. Naturally, it was much easier to draw the bottom of the tower and leave the top to the imagination, and in truth it took Peter Jackson to finally push me to consider the summit. As for the Ringwraith and his fell steed, they came more or less with the landscape.”Appeared in: Collins Modern Classics: The Two Towers Collins Modern Classics: The Two Towers The Two Towers - hardcover The Two Towers - dust jacket The Two Towers - paperback The Two Towers - Bulgaria The Two Towers – Holland The Two Towers - Poland (paperback) The Two Towers - Portugal The Two Towers - Spain The Two Towers – Sweden The Two Towers - Sweden (paperback) The 1991 Tolkien Calendar John Howe Monography Hands On Fantasy - Denmark The Lord of the Rings Part 3: The Return of the King - Highbridge audio edition/front The Lord of the Rings Part 3: The Return of the King - Highbridge audio edition/back The Lord of the Rings full-cast dramatization - Germany The Two Towers -Sweden, CD audio edition Middle-Earth Collectible Card Game Binder II I.C.E. Starter Deck display box - Dutch Lord of the Rings Bubble Gum package 3 - front Lord of the Rings Tutti Frutti Bubble Gum Rossomahar - Imperium Tenebrarum Myth & Magic - Japan The Lord of the Rings - Bulgaria John Howe Artbook The Lord of the Rings full-cast dramatization - Germany (2nd edition)
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Post by LaFille on Sept 16, 2006 3:25:02 GMT
Smaug the Golden  Smaug 39.4 x 56.4 cm, 1990 The Hobbit by J.R.R. Tolkien Grafton Books, 1990 "This was my very first commission for an actual book cover for one of Tolkien's books. I initially did a terribly bad sketch of Bilbo and the dwarves in the dark forest that the editor rightly refused. Smaug seemed a logical second choice. Making his chin rest on his feet, like some enormous dog curled up before a fireplace took some cautious bending of his long long neck." Appeared in: The Hobbit - paperback The Hobbit Centenary edition - paperback The Hobbit or There and Back Again The Hobbit - France The Hobbit - Iceland The Hobbit - Norway (hardcover) The Hobbit - Norway (paperback) The Hobbit - Norway (Book club edition) The Hobbit - Portugal The Hobbit - Spain The Hobbit - Sweden (hardcover) The Hobbit - Sweden (paperback) Crystal Eyes The The Hobbit: BBC Audio English edition - Germany
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Post by LaFille on Sept 16, 2006 3:25:59 GMT
A Song for Arbonne  Dimensions: 69.4 x 47.0 cm 1992 A Song for Arbonne Guy Gavriel Kay HarperCollins Science Fiction/Fantasy October 25, 1993 ISBN - 0-586-21677-4 Appeared in: A Song For Arbonne A Dark Way to Glory The Cycle of Oak, Yew, Ash and Rowan Volume 1: To the King a Daughter Kingfishers Children's Books 2005 Fanasy Encyclopedia Een Lofzang voor Arbonne
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Post by LaFille on Sept 16, 2006 3:27:05 GMT
Red Nails  Red Nails 2001 "Red Nails has to be one of Howard's best stories - creepy, claustrophobic and tragic." The Conan Chronicles - Volume 2: The Hour of the Dragon Robert E. Howard Gollancz - Fantasy Masterworks no. 16 April 26, 2001 ISBN 1-85798-747-0
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Post by LaFille on Sept 16, 2006 3:28:02 GMT
Beowulf & the Dragon  Dimensions: 99.8 x 49.9 cm 2004 "Apologies that this is so small - the original is more than a meter long, thus hard to fit into 540 pixels of space..."
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Post by LaFille on Sept 16, 2006 3:29:36 GMT
The Tawny Man Book 3: Fool's Fate  Large version here!Icefyre and the Stone Dragon Fool's Fate Book Three of the Tawny Man Robin Hobb HarperCollinsPublishers/Voyager October 20, 2003 ISBN 00-0-224728-3 "How many times have I said I love Robin's work? One more time certainly won't hurt... Robin's worlds are wonderful realms for an illustrator to wander in.
Who else dreams up islands with razor-sharp cliffs jutting up from wild surf, cloven by glaciers spilling down into the sea itself? And then to make it even more fun, adds fighting dragons... not many, let me tell you."
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Post by LaFille on Sept 16, 2006 3:30:50 GMT
The Farseer Trilogy Book 3: Assassin's Quest - The Stone Dragon  Large version here!Assassin's Quest Robin Hobb HarperCollinsPublishers Format: approximately 80 x 45 cm 1996 Appeared in: The Farseer Trilogy Book 3: Assassin's Quest - hardcover (dust jacket) The Farseer Trilogy Book 3: Assassin's Quest - paperback The Farseer Trilogy Book 3: Assassin's Quest - Holland
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Post by Shan on Sept 18, 2006 3:41:47 GMT
John Howe, great artist, Fille. This guy is good, really good. My favorites out of the ones you posted are "The Mûmak of Harad," "The Dark Tower," "The Tawny Man Book 3: Fool's Fate," and " The Farseer Trilogy Book 3: Assassin's Quest - The Stone Dragon." I love the lighting in "The Mûmak of Harad" and I love the way it is framed. Very good all around. "The Dark Tower," the detail is great, and the the Ringwraith and his steed add the perfect touch to the painting. Love it . "The Tawny Man Book 3: Fool's Fate" I just like the way it is done. |
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Post by Gray Lensman on Sept 18, 2006 16:22:15 GMT
John Howe does some really good stuff. Good idea, Fille. I'm not sure I have a favorite here as such. I'm drawn more to The Eye of Sauron, The Dark Tower, and Fool's Fate more than the others. I like pretty much all of them, though. |
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Post by LaFille on Sept 19, 2006 1:24:52 GMT
Glad that you both like; this guy has made quite a bunch of pictures... I'm even not through his website only yet. And I realize that there are a lot of pics that I already knew but not that they were from him. It seems to be the case for most people. It must be because of his name...  My favs in these lasts are the eye of Sauron, The Mûmak (had this one as wallpaper a while ago... of course, not knowing the artist), Dark Tower and the Stone Dragon. Beowulf must look great as a bigger pic, though.  Until now there are more pics from him that I like than not. And there are lots. And his comments are funny at times. It's a pain to choose which to post. ;D |
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Post by Galadriel on Sept 19, 2006 20:00:32 GMT
My favorite is the eye of Sauron really, I like the way the eye is in the ring. Ganadalf the Grey is well done too and Smaug the Golden really looks gorgious too.
Well done Fille
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Post by LaFille on Sept 20, 2006 1:45:29 GMT
Cool that you like them too, Gal. I agree with you, the eye in the ring. Plus, it seems to be in my fetish palette... amber and red (or amber and blue... or amber an dark green... I'm so full of patterns ;D ). The colors in Smaug are a nice touch as well. The picture of Gandalf, I'm not sure anymore if I really knew it before. He has like 3-4 Gandalf pieces like that that look like each other quite much. Because he was asked to use the first one(s) a lot, and copyright issues to publish them and so... I think that this one is probably known more: Gandalf Returns to Hobbiton. |
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Post by Galadriel on Sept 21, 2006 16:00:15 GMT
Thx Fille, Return to Hobbiton is even nicer then Gandalf the Grey, but all in all, I like that man's art. His Gandalf looks like he should be looking (do I sound a bit off here?) ;D
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kuja
Newbie
What the?!
Posts: 54
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Post by kuja on Sept 21, 2006 16:39:59 GMT
If only i could do pictures like that... ^^
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Post by LaFille on Sept 22, 2006 0:43:09 GMT
You said it, Kuja. I think we're not alone in this case too... |
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Post by LaFille on Sept 22, 2006 0:47:55 GMT
Thx Fille, Return to Hobbiton is even nicer then Gandalf the Grey, but all in all, I like that man's art. His Gandalf looks like he should be looking (do I sound a bit off here?) ;D Hehe, I hope... He's the one who illustrated a great bunch of Tolkien stuff and did the concept art for the LotR movies. Still, he's so misknown that he sometimes couldn't even get places for shows related to projects he participated to... ;D |
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