Professional Development - Report [WIP]
Section 1: Professional Development Report
Researching Chosen Role, Industry Connections, Future Considerations
Throughout my first and second year at university I had hoped on becoming a concept artist for video games, however my interest has shifted towards the tabletop industry, more specifically the job role of TTRPG/board game illustrator. This role entails taking ideas made by game developers and creating visuals for a physical product. It combines the roles of a concept and production artist, requiring skills in both iterative concept design, composition skills and knowledge of formatting software like InDesign to create illustrations for physical game assets (Big red Illustration n.d.). It is also important to have communication and problem solving skills to interpret client Breifs(Big red Illustration n.d.). This role falls into the freelance artist category, meaning I can expect to have a salary of £300-£1000 per brief, however this is entirely dependant on the scale and complexity of the project (Pineisland Games 2021; Helmigh 2021) the figure above is roughly the amount for Tabletop roleplaying game illustrations. Talking more generally, I can expect a starting salary of about 22,000 annually (Glassdoor 2026).
Figure 1 - Annual Salary for Freelance Artists
With my skills at the moment, I am not quite at the level that large companies are looking for. I think I would need to work on improving some of my fundamentals such as anatomy and rendering skills but I do not think that this ambition is too far off for maybe 2-3 years time. Right now I am aiming for smaller companies and self publishing to increase my experience in the role. To supplement this, I anticipate taking on a part time job such as retail or warehouse work to ensure I am still getting an income. This seems like a fairly common route for many freelance artists. I already have some experience with self publishing TTRPG books so this should also help me in the future.
Figure 2- Tyler Jacobson, The Players Handbook, 2024
Figure 3- Kenny Heath, Gulf Calypso, 2026
I won’t rule becoming concept artist for games in the future, I enjoy the process of sketching and worldbuilding which drew me to these jobs in the first place, but I acknowledge how highly sought after the role of video game concept artist is. I wanted to find a job that was a little bit more niche and which relates a bit more to the type of media I routinely interact with . I have thought about Internships for illustration positions in larger tabletop games companies such as Warlord, Mantic and Games Workshop, I this would be a great option to get your foot into the door in the industry however I think my current skills and interest don’t align with their mostly war game focus. I feel my art style and content fits with tabletop roleplaying games much better as I enjoy drawing environments and characters from less combat oriented and gritty settings.
Last year, I took part in a handful of networking events within the tabletop games industry. This included 4 game jams ran by industry professionals (Building a better world game jam 2025; Appendix N jam 2025; One page RPG Jam 2025; Vaarn summer jam 2025) which allowed me to not only try my hand at creating and illustrating TTRPGs but also connect with others. This year I have already planned to take part in the Vaarn summer jam 2026 and will be on the look out for more as I think these are great opportunities to add to your portfolio and get experience working with client briefs. Last year I also attended 3 in person events, all of which allowed me to network with a lot of industry professionals. Two of these events I hope to attend as a seller this year. I attended the Notts Zine Fest, a local event based in the central library surrounding self published Zines, Tabletop Gaming Live, a doncaster based event that hosted large companies such as Mantic, Asmodee and Chaosium, and a local tabletop games market by the name of the Side Quest Market. I would also like to attend the UK Games Expo as I have heard that this is a worthwhile event for those looking to get into the tabletop games industry.
I have been building my instagram network (Instagram seems to be the most popular form of networking platform for tabletop industry professionals) and have also reached out to a few local gaming stores to enquire about stocking the games that I have made. My reason for doing so is to help build up a bigger following on my professional instagram account to increase my chances of employers finding me. I have also been following some important groups on Linkedin that relate to jobs in the tabletop industry.
Linkedin:
A handful of the accounts I follow on my professional instagram:
The final step I have tried to take is joining some Discord Communities specialized for games industry jobs, I am a part of the Into Games discord and several tabletop gaming discords.
When I am a bit more established in a job, I would like to go to the Trojan horse was a Unicorn program abroad, this looks like an excellent opportunity to network and build valuable industry skills.
In terms of industry trends, from going to these events and networking online i have found that there is a huge community of self publishing companies consisted of small teams who do almost all of the work to make a game themselves. As someone who is teaching myself how to make TTRPGs alongside illustrating them, doing this is likely going to be helpful in making myself more employable with my wider range of skills.
2. Research and Analysis into Your Chosen Artistic Direction
My artwork’s main focus lies in worldbuilding for games, my main inspirations come from tabletop games I have played and their rich settings and things that I personally find interesting. I combine these things together to build worlds of my own, Illustrating scenes from them and considering not only how they would look, but how it would feel to live within them. I am mostly a 2D artist and I would like to consider some of my work to be inspired by impressionism. From time to time I do work in 3D, using it as a tool to help me draw architectural pieces and complex scenes. This is a common technique that concept artists use to not only make drawing environments easier, but also much quicker.
Figure 5 - Fear Factory V (2022) - Mothership
Figure 6 - Barlows Lark (2023) - Amanda Lee Franck
Figure 7 - Vaults of Vaarn(2022) - Leo Hunt
Almost all Freelance illustrator jobs require proficiency in software like Photoshop, Indesign or clip studio paint (Twine 2026). At the moment I am still using a free software to draw called Firealpaca but I aim to look into Affinity to build skills in a more industry standard adjacent software. I am also teaching myself how to use Scribus which is another free alternative to industry standard formatting programs (ttgda 2024).
Section 2: Portfolio & CVs
3. Portfolio
As stated before, Instagram is by far the most popular platform to network and host portfolios for artists in the tabletop games community. Below are some examples of industry professionals and their accounts. Something I notice about almost all of them is how they post both the artwork by itself and the photographs of the books their art can be found in, this gives potential employers the ability to easily see the projects they've made and how their work translates into a physical product.
Using this as a reference, I made two accounts on Instagram to act as my main “informal” portfolio that I would share around to employers. My account Deadnaidd is my personal account where I showcase a range of artwork in my regular art style.
Business Instagram
Artstation accounts generally seem to be less popular in the TTRPG scene, only really being used by artists who also do generalised freelance work or larger companies. It is however, the industry standard for games, so making one would be beneficial to not exclude myself from being viewed by potential employers.I think for freelance artists this is a great option to more professionally advertise your artwork, and the analytics functions give you more of an insight then what you might get from Instagram's creator section or Itch's overview.
Artstation - https://www.artstation.com/deadnaiadd
I have also noticed that blogging is a popular form of networking and promoting artists work, so I have been posting fairly regularly on my own blog to cover as many bases as possible.
My portfolio
For my artstation portfolio I have selected 18 pieces of artwork covering both environment art, Character concept art and asset design, as well as some splash pieces. These are all from projects I have either previously published as zines or are university projects as these link to my skills showcased on my Linkedin profile. This range allows employers to see that my art style is flexible and that I have skills in most areas that would be needed for Tabletop games asset creation. I only included work from these projects that I thought represent the very best of the work that I can do, for that reason I also only posted finished pieces as you are only ever as good as your worst piece of work in your portfolio.
To improve my portfolio further, I would like to work on making more environment pieces and showcases of my work formatted to book pages so that employers can see exactly how my work would look in a published book. Overall, I also want to improve my anatomy and rendering skills to make my art more eye catching and of a greater quality.
4. Professional and Design CVs
Formal CV and Linkedin:
LinkedIn - https://www.linkedin.com/in/kenneth-heath-044713356/
- Evaluation of CV
Design CV:
[INSERT DESIGN CV HERE]
- Evaluation of CV
Critical analysis of your social media presence
o Strengths and weaknesses
Instagram allows a more interactive and sociable platform to showcase your art on. The "stories" feature is especially helpful in keeping a informal and personalised posts away from your more professional work (stone maier games 2021). The algorithm on this platform is very hard to get on top of, generally if you want your content to be seen you need to be posting several reels per day and regularly posting, which can be hard to do for many people (stone maier games 2021).
You should aim to keep your Instagram page relevant to the job position you're wanting to apply for, so make sure you have a separate account for personal posts and one for your portfolio. Much like you would for a portfolio, make sure your page and its posts represent you, only post your best work on your page, definitely still post your sketches and "less than perfect" work but make sure you do that on the Stories function rather than your main page.
o How does your online presence support employability – would establishing a personal brand enhance your prospects?
Reflect on how your CVs and social media align with industry expectations.
5. Tutor – Work-Like Appraisals, Career Plan Goal Setting, Project Management
(Covers LO6, LO7)
· Evidence of work‑like appraisals with your tutor:
o Meeting summaries, feedback notes, skills assessments and action points.
· Documentation of goals set during those sessions short-long term.
My trello board:
· A detailed career plan, including:
o The roles you’re aiming for
o Where you want your career to develop
o Skills you need to improve
o The methods and tools you’ll use (courses, practice workflows, networking, mentorships, software learning)
o Personal goals and the steps required to achieve them.
Additional research -
Below is a link to my blog posts containing extra research that I could not fit into this report
https://kennylycettgamesart.blogspot.com/2026/01/professional-development-personal.html
https://kennylycettgamesart.blogspot.com/2026/02/professional-development-portfolio.html
https://kennylycettgamesart.blogspot.com/2026/02/professional-development-cvs-wip.html
https://kennylycettgamesart.blogspot.com/2026/02/tabletop-gaming-live-doncaster-wip.html
https://kennylycettgamesart.blogspot.com/2026/02/professional-development-creating-my.html
References -
Websites -
Anon, n.d., Building your portfolio (Online). Screenskills. Available at: https://www.screenskills.com/starting-your-career/building-your-portfolio/build-your-games-portfolio/ (accessed at: 6 February 2026)
Anon, n.d. 13 RPG jobs in nottingham (Online). Glassdoor. Available at: https://www.glassdoor.co.uk/Job/nottingham-england-rpg-jobs-jobs-SRCH_IL.0,18_IC3527944_KO19,27.htm (accessed at: 4 March 2026)
Anon, n.d. Notts Zine Fest (Online). Visit Nottinghamshire. Available at: https://www.visit-nottinghamshire.co.uk/whats-on/notts-zine-fest-p1038141 (accessed at: 4 March 2026)
Anon, N.d. Tabletop Game Jobs Nottingham (Online). Indeed. Available at: https://uk.indeed.com/q-tabletop-game-l-nottingham-jobs.html?vjk=d7e9aad3fb8bdb01 (accessed at: 4 March 2026)
Anon, n.d. Tabletop Gaming Live 2026(Online).tabletopgaming. Available at: https://www.tabletopgaming.co.uk/tabletop-gaming-live-2026/ (accessed at: 4 March 2026)
Big red Illustration, n.d. Working with a Board Game Illustrator: What You Need to Know (Online). Big Red Illustration. Available at: https://bigredillustration.com/articles/working-with-a-board-game-illustrator-what-you-need-to-know/ (accessed at: 4 March 2026)
Blandy, D. 2025. Build a Better World TTRPG jam(Online). Itch. Available at: https://itch.io/jam/build-a-better-world-ttrpg-jam (accessed at: 4 March 2026)
Dank Dungeons, 2025.Appx. N Jam(Online). Itch. Available at: https://itch.io/jam/appx-n-jam (accessed at: 4 March 2026)
Glassdoor, 2026. Freelance Artist Salaries 2026 (Online). Glassdoor. Available at: https://www.glassdoor.co.uk/Salaries/freelance-artist-salary-SRCH_KO0,16.htm (accessed at: 4 March 2026)
Graculusdroog, 2025.VAARN SUMMER JAM '25 (Online). Itch. Available at: https://itch.io/jam/vaarn-summer-jam-25(accessed at: 4 March 2026)
Helmigh, S., 2021. TTRPG illustration artist guideline, blog 1. (Online). Artstation. Available at: https://www.artstation.com/blogs/suzannehelmigh/odvM/ttrpg-illustration-artist-guideline-blog-1 (accessed at: 4 March 2026)
Pineisland games, 2021. Board Game Illustration - A Guide to Hiring and Pricing (Online). Pineislandgames. Available at: https://www.pineislandgames.com/blog/illustration-a-comprehensive-guide (accessed at: 4 March 2026)
Stone maier games, 2021. Finding Your Style and Growing as an Instagram Board Game Content Creator(Online). Stonemaiergames. Available at: https://stonemaiergames.com/finding-your-style-and-growing-as-an-instagram-board-game-content-creator/(accessed at: 6 February 2026)
Thesidequestmarket, n.d. Thesidequestmarket (Online). Instagram. Available at: https://www.instagram.com/thesidequestmarket/ (accessed at: 4 March 2026)
Twine, 2026. Illustrator – Freelance (Remote) in Ipswich (Online) studysmarter. Available at: https://talents.studysmarter.co.uk/companies/twine/ipswich/illustrator-freelance-remote-18991420/?utm_campaign=google_jobs_apply&utm_source=google_jobs_apply&utm_medium=organic (accessed at: 4 March 2026)
Ukgamesexpo. N.d. ukgamesexpo(Online). Instagram. Available at: https://www.instagram.com/ukgamesexpo/ (accessed at: 4 March 2026)
Unknown Dungeon, 2025. One-Page RPG Jam 2025(Online). Itch. Available at:https://itch.io/jam/one-page-rpg-jam-2025 (accessed at: 4 March 2026)
Images -
Figure 1 - https://www.glassdoor.co.uk/Salaries/freelance-artist-salary-SRCH_KO0,16.htm
Figure 2 - https://cara.app/post/5754d7b8-907c-42e4-9ac1-0fbc4b11c0c4
Figure 3 - https://www.instagram.com/p/DVcW8KAgkTP/?img_index=1
Figure 5 - Fear Factory V (2022) - Mothership https://www.instagram.com/p/CjSoDE7uWPk/
Figure 6 - Barlows Lark (2023) - Amanda Lee Franck https://www.instagram.com/p/Cx8Mx8qLeLg/
Figure 7 - Vaults of Vaarn (2022) - Leo Hunt https://www.instagram.com/p/C53a2SbKVuP/?img_index=6
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