yabookportraits - Tumblr blog

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A little reminder that we have a discord server! It’s very small and not really active at all currently but it could be a cool place for artists & people who want to see & share book fanart!

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Realized I never posted the fully colored version of Valka, from Gwen C Katz’s AMONG THE RED STARS!

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hi! can i use your felix ever ever redraw in a journal spread? i'll be posting on twitter (with credit ofc) :)

go right ahead! For the record: you can repost all of my art, re-use it, do whatever, so long as you credit me and aren’t going to sell it!

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and the final version!! It’s not really a chibi anymore but OH WELL

WIP for a chibi version of Bree form Tracy Deonn’s upcoming novel, LEGENDBORN.

idk chibis are easy to draw and fun, plus they end up making cute stickers? 

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WIP for a chibi version of Bree form Tracy Deonn’s upcoming novel, LEGENDBORN.

idk chibis are easy to draw and fun, plus they end up making cute stickers? 

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Can you do Crier from Crier’s War or Citra from the Arc of a scythe trilogy?

I actually just got Crier’s War from a friend so as soon as I finish reading it, I SHALL!

And I also need to read Arc of a Scythe so I might do that one too.

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I found this image on Unsplash  and it was too perfect not to use. Now that I look at it outside of my Cintiq, I can see some sloppy brushwork around the roses from when I used multiply to make their shadows pop and soft light to make the lights stand out more and am too lazy to go back and correct it so MEH

Re-draw of FELIX EVER AFTER’s cover, a book by Kacen Callender!

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I mean, it’s not exactly fanart, but it’s a YA book and it’s a portrait, so... Yzabel of Aragon, sapphic saint and MC of ACOR!

New portraits of Yzabel of Aragon in black and white and color!!

Yzabel is the main character of my novel A CURSE OF ROSES (fka A Miracle of Roses). When we first meet her, poor girl hasn’t been able to eat properly in a while, since all the food she touches turns to flowers. And to find a way around it, she starts looking for a certain Enchanted Moura, who may or may not be trapped in a stone somewhere nearby…

You can pre-order #ACOR from several places now! Link in bio! 😉

#amor #amiracleofroses #acurseofroses #authorlife #authorart #portraits #yzabelofaragon #digitalart #books #bookart #artistsofig #authorsofig https://www.instagram.com/p/B–Ofl1hDHM/?igshid=okor87rw9jdv

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As the Portuguese like to say, I’m “edging the coals toward my sardine”--ie this is for my own book. Realized I hadn’t posted Fatyan’s portrait yet! And have a crap wallpaper, because, why not? Mina El Hammani was the base for Faty, because she’s my dream cast, and also, if I don’t use references, all my faces look the same. Add A MIRACLE OF ROSES on Goodreads: https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/48562504-a-miracle-of-roses

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Leyla McQueen, from London Shah’s debut, THE LIGHT AT THE BOTTOM OF THE WORLD!  I worked closely with the author on this one, and it was a lot of fun!

Add it to Goodreads! http://bit.ly/GoodreadsLight 

 And you can preorder here:  http://bit.ly/INDIEBOUNDLight https://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/the-light-at-the-bottom-of-the-world-london-shah/1130510436;jsessionid=6548ED6AB8280B307B45F703D2AC56B6.prodny_store01-atgap18 http://bit.ly/AMAZONUSLight

Backgrounds and references from Unsplash.

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Asta, from Carly Heath’s THE HEATHENS OF MUSKOX HOLLOW! I had the absolute blessing to beta read this book and it’s such a stunning novel, with great queer characters, and written in gorgeous prose.

Add HEATHENS to GR: goodreads.com/book/show/4841…

And a shoutout to Stef Sanjati for allowing me to use her likeness for this picture!!

(background and pose ref from Unsplash)

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Reposting from my main!

But also, is it fanart if you’re drawing your own characters from your own book 😂

Portrait of Yzabel, the main character of my f/f YA Historical Fantasy, A MIRACLE OF ROSES!

#artistsoninstagram #portraitpainting #digitalart #fanart #AMiracleOfRoses #yzabelofaragon https://www.instagram.com/p/B3RnjkpB9_E/?igshid=17gfio4vb2ho5

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This is a great initiative! I’ll remind everyone I have requests open, and you can always @ me on Twitter and Insta (@pinguicha over there)

I’ve been terrible about art and reading in general—blame it on a soul-crushing depression—but I have some WIPs for a Reign of the Fallen, Mask of Shadows, and probably a lot more gathering dust on my hard drive.

Hello fellow book fanartists! I had some thoughts the other day, along the lines of: 

I wish there was more fanart for xyz diverse/queer books!

There must be more artists that consistently do fanart for books that don’t have much/any fanart, but I can only think of a handful….

I should organise a zine specifically for fanart of diverse books that don’t have any fanart!

I have never even been in a zine, let alone organised one…..maybe not….

Anyway, I don’t think a zine is the way to start but…..something? a hashtag? a monthly challenge thing? A twitter/tumblr account to reblog stuff?  Even just finding more fanartists I don’t know about would be cool tbh! (this applies more to twitter/instagram, rather than tumblr where it’s somewhat easier to check tags)  If designers, people who make edits, bloggers, fic writers, wanted to get in on this somehow i’d be into that too!!

Whatever it is, I’d want it to focus on books where the main character/s are canonically queer, trans, poc, not just major side characters or subtext. Also books by ownvoices/marginalised authors - I do notice that the most popular m/m books that have a lot of fanart are ones written by white women, rather than ownvoices m/m books (especially those by poc), for example . (I’m not hating on people who do fanart for those books either - just pointing it out!)

Actually, I drafted this post ages ago and have just been too busy to do anything with it, but I decided to make a twitter (currently @diversebookart) for retweeting art on there - so that exists, at the very least! Keen for other things to happen if other people are keen to, though! (and if you post your book fanart on twitter please @ it to me so I can rt it!)

I’ve also definitely noticed in the last couple years that tumblr isn’t the best place for book fanart unless it’s got a pretty big fandom - which is generally not the books I’m talking about here. And on twitter and stuff, it’s rarely tagged and gets lost after a few days. I definitely understand having more motivation to do art of more popular things, especially for those of us who are freelancing (and getting more attention on social media can be really important for), but maybe a hashtag could help that stuff not get like, seen by the author + a handful of people and then nothing after a week. idk. Basically I want to do something that a) creates more fanart for books that don’t have it and b) boosts artists work when we make it! No like, obligation to do certain art of certain things

I’m posting this here because I don’t have any other blog for this sort of thing, but I’ll definitely talk about it on twitter (@layahimalaya and @aroaessidhe are my art and fandom accounts, but also @diversebookart since I’ve made that now) 

Anyway!!! This is just some thoughts, but if anyone else has some thoughts, let me know???? I could make a group chat on twitter, or maybe a discord server, if people are into that. I tagged a bunch of people off the top of my head (& also looking through art i’ve rebblogged) who either have done book fanart of some books with barely any fanart, or some people who do fanart of more popular but still diverse books. Some people who only do like 5% book fanart, too. Feel free to ignore this if you want and also tell me if I missed anyone obvious!!!

EDIT: I also made a discord, check the notes for the link

@nellasbookplanet @ace-artemis-fanartist @may12324 @yabookportraits @lesyablackbird @phantomrin @ghostbeeish @caitabellart @monolime@vinnie-cha @linovadraws @gibbarts @aymmidumps @emieclat @vulpyx @tonftyhw @itsiparwing @benevolenterrancy @rowatree @taratjah @oblivionsdream  @moonlit-sketches  @alexisc-art @hyperhs @drisrt @whitefire17draws

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Four different versions of my Sadie and Mattie portrait: faded photograph, black and white, sepia, and the one without textures. I really loved this book, can’t you tell? :)

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And another I accidentally posted on my main. I blame it on all the painting I was doing.

Autumn and Ivy, a commission for Meredith Tate. They’re her main characters for upcoming THE LAST CONFESSION OF AUTUMN CASTERLY.

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Accidentally posted it to my main acc. OH WELL

Merik WIP. In case you’re wondering “why all the black and white recently”?

Because of my crap eyesight, contrast in adjacent colors is basically lost on me. It’s why I sometimes use garish colors when less saturation would do: I literally cannot tell the mid-levels apart most of the time, not unless I squint until my eyes water.

The solution was to work on black and white first, so I can better see the levels, then color it. Julie Dillon has an excellent, simple tutorial, where she explains her process from going to black and white and into color. I’ve been following it, and not only am I getting faster, the colors end up SO MUCH BETTER.

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Sadie and Mattie, family photo style. From @summerscourtney masterpiece, SADIE.