Deadnaiadd - Art and TTRPG stuff!

  Mood board- The look I am hoping to capture for the action cards is emulating the look of cave paintings, although this is very different compared to the other art within my game, I think it still fits thematically and allows me to try out a new technique and make my game more unique at the same time. To copy this style, I put together a mood board of specific images of cave paintings I found interesting so that I could draw inspiration from the colours used and the way figures are constructed to use within my own work. Action Cards: Group 1 - I created all 11 unique action cards over the span of a week, to do this, I split them up into groups that I would complete on each day. "Me Take" - As this was my first card in this style, it took a few iterations to find something I was happy with. I had a clear idea of what art should be on this card, as it is the "Me Take" card, I thought a hand reaching out and grabbing a resource would be the clearest for players to un...

 Employee card feedback - I recently joined a discord server of professionals in the tabletop industry to get some advice on how to improve my work, one of the people in the chat suggested trying out some alternate layouts for the employee cards as they looked a little cramped. Using this feedback I made two alternate versions, one with a solid stone background, and one with a more realistic stone background. Of these two, I think number 1 looks a lot more cohesive to my game's cartoony style. The individual I got the advice from also agreed. I also asked some of my peers what they thought, I think I agree with them that it was much easier to read, however I personally liked the separation of the artwork and the text using the stone frame. To reach a middle ground of finding something that doesn't blend in with the characters whilst also keeping the separation of text and artwork, I created another version of the original employee card design with a light grey background as opp...

 Thumbnails- Krabb the lookout was by far the most fun of the bunga characters to design. I wanted most of his face to be concealed as I had such a strong idea for his final card being him peeking out of some shrubbery with only a pair of binoculars showing. Of these designs I agreed with the feedback I got that number 9 was the most interesting and made the most sense for the lookout character trait. I also like how it makes him hardly distinguishable as a Neanderthal, rather he is just a heap of fur with a hat and binoculars, which is very charming. Feedback- Almost all the feedback I got agreed that design number 9 was a winner, so that was the one I chose in the end. Final card- As stated before I had such a strong Idea for his card, Here he is peeking out from the bushes, really leaning into his Lookout character trait. Sketch You can see in his final design I actually swapped out the rock binoculars for wooden binoculars, I decided to do this as this made more sense in terms ...

Appraisal 1: 20/03/2026 What role have I chosen to focus on and why? In the future I would like to become a tabletop games illustrator for either TTRPGs or board games. My reason for choosing this is that it is a more niche job than concept artist, which gives me more of a chance to land a job and I generally have more of an interest and experience in making and playing tabletop games compared to videogames. How can meaningful connections be made with industry contacts and how have I been doing that? A great way to make meaningful connections is through conventions, markets, networks online that host jobs and give opportunities to talk to professionals. I have attended a few conventions this year in which I spoke to some professionals from Chaosium, Mantic and other smaller indie companies. When talking to professionals I tend to ask them how I can improve my work and be more employable, and with joining the UK Tabletop Games Network I have the opportunity to get advice and feedback on...

What is my goal? My goal long term is to become an illustrator for tabletop games which slots into the Freelance label. I would also be looking into doing concept work for small Indie games. I think generally I would like to stick to the indie games industry rather than triple A just because I feel my personal artistic ability lines up more closely to that direction.  Physically, I would like to remain in either Nottingham or Sheffield, though I wouldn't mind moving somewhere like Leamington Spa or Bristol to look for games jobs. If I could work freelance and not have to move to an urban area that would be preferred, but truthfully I will go wherever the jobs are. Maybe far in the future I might consider moving abroad? I like the idea of moving to either Norway or Sweden, but I'm not specifically aiming for that. How do you plan to work towards this? I think the most important thing for me to do right now is locate where the jobs I want to do are, I need to do a lot more networ...

Thumbnails: Rok the Gatherer With Rok the gatherer I wanted to try out some more unique hairstyles. I really liked the look of hairstyle 1 and 4 as I thought these had the most interesting colour differentiation. I think 1 or 9 reads the best as being a caveman. I did try out a shorter style on designs 3 and 7 however I felt these read more as "medieval peasant" than caveman. In the end I thought the hair of number 1 and the outfit of number 2 was the most interesting.  Of all of the different animal prints I noticed the wolf print was the most popular, for this reason I opted for the dinosaur print for Rok just to make him more unique. I did also test out a thylacine print however it didnt stand out as much as the green dino print did. I think as well the earthy tones fir best with his colour pallet overall. Maarsha the Needler As for Maarsha the Needler, I wanted her outfit to feel both stylish and practical as her main two qualities is representing the trendiness attribute...