Owen William Weber Illustration

Yesterday, I received my contributor copy of Elder Sign: Omens of Ice which holds the painting "Frostbite" that I painted for it last year.  The idea behind it was that it was a man who had been frostbitten in his hands and face, in a New England town in the early 20th c., I believe.  The AD wanted him screaming and being brought into an ambulance.  I love doing this type of stuff, but I'm never given these types of assignments, so I was very excited.  And a word to the wise, don't google image search "frostbite", it's truly awful to look at.  Here is the sketch that I came up with: Frostbite Sketch, 12" x 8", Pencil. The AD thought the screaming mouth was a bit too much, so I closed it and went ahead with the painting.  Here is the final: Frostbite , 12" x 8", oil on paper on masonite, 2015. ©Fantasy Flight Games Another piece that I just finished and then immediately sold was my "Irish Elk" piece.  This animal w...

Sound the Alarm! , 12"x12", oil on paper on masonite, 2014. This is a piece I painted for Fantasy Flight Games from about a year ago.  It was painted for their "Escape from Mt. Gram" deck for their Lord of the Rings LCG.  The description was just to depict a goblin ringing a bell of sorts made from the armor of past victims.  I hadn't really done any evil creatures in a very long time, so I wanted to really show that I can handle the darker side of Lord of the Rings.  Also, I had recently dove head first into Death/Black Metal music and I was really jonesin' for a good demonic painting to paint. Sound the Alarm! sketch , 12"x12", pencil, 2014. I had a great time working on the sketch, and the Art Director liked how it looked, so it was approved for the painting stage without any changes.  As you can see, I kinda get a general composition worked out, but I do a good amount of improvising during the painting stage.  Also, I don't do colo...

It has been a very long time since I have updated this, so I'll have a couple more posts coming up soon.  This one will be about a commission for an upcoming Lord of the Rings deck called "The Wastes of Eriador" from Fantasy Flight Games. It was a pretty straightforward project, here is what the AD sent: Description: Ally. A Guard of the Citadel, dressed in silver with a helm of mithril, bearing the carved wings of sea-birds. He stands guard next to the open gate leading into the topmost tier of Minas Tirith, where we can see the leafless White Tree of Gondor standing prominently behind him. So here is the drawing I sent: Honour Guard Sketch , 10"x10", pencil on Strathmore 400 series, 2014. This was approved, so I went ahead and did the final using oil on masonite. The AD liked it, but wanted me to enlarge the arms and the chest.  I digitally did all the changes, and here is the final image: Honour Guard , 10"x10", digital and oil on...

Greenseer's Raven , 12"x 10", oil on paper on masonite, 2014. ©Fantasy Flight Games When it rains, it pours.  I have always found this statement to be strangely true.  I may go a long time between jobs, but once I get a new commission a couple others will follow.  And like yesterday, when I have news to tell (like a blog post that was well overdue) a couple other tidbits came to my knowledge within an hour or so. Firstly, a card commission I have been waiting patiently to show for the past year, has finally been released!  It's called "Greenseer's Raven", and it is part of the "Secrets and Schemes" deck of the A Game of Thrones LCG from Fantasy Flight Games.  I was very excited to get this commission last year; firelight and animals are always fun to paint.  There isn't much of a story behind this one though, I found reference of a raven, and just improvised from there.  I tried to work in as many diagonals with the tree branches a...

Hello Again, So this time I will be showing the process of painting the latest card of mine that has been released.  The new Lord of the Rings LCG expansion pack from Fantasy Flight Games, "The Road Darkens", has become available, which has my "Leaf-Wrapped Lembas" card. When I received the assignment, around this time last year, I was immediately excited.  I had been wanting a good excuse to do a highly detailed bread still-life, in the tradition of 18th c. Spanish painters like Luis Meléndez.  I then researched what Tolkien was intending his Lembas bread to be similar to; it turns out he was thinking of Bannock bread.  Luckily enough, I told my wife about this, and she instantly whips out her obsession: Yvette van Boven 's Cookbook, Homemade Winter .  She has a great recipe for Bannock bread.  So we quickly fried the bread that night; fried, because it is cooked on a pan over the burners.  It looked great, I was quite happy with the outcome o...

Ashemark Councilor , 13"x10", Oil on Paper on Masonite, 2013. ©Fantasy Flight Games. Last year, I painted this piece for the A Game of Thrones LCG from Fantasy Flight Games.  It was released within one of the newer decks, "Prize of the North."  This guy is a character completely made up for the game, Ashemark gets barely a mention in the novel.  This character is supposed to be a lordling with allegiance towards the Lannisters, hence the lion banners on either side of the archway.  I'm happy with how the piece came out, but I have no real personal story to tell along with it, so I thought I'd just show a couple process images along with this painting.  This was my main reference picture.  No too much to say, I did many poses with this "staff", and this one seem to have a good diagonal positioning.  The art director also put in the description that it should look as if the character is hindering someone from entering the archway, this seem...

Swarming Mosquitoes , 11"x11", Oil on Paper, on Masonite, 2013. ©Fantasy Flight Games I have been meaning to post this painting for quite some time now, since the card it was painted for came out a month or two ago, sorry if you have been waiting with baited breath.  The description for this commission was to show swarms of hazardous mosquitoes attacking a random ranger in the Dead Marshes.  In order to approach this kind of painting, where the motion of the character swatting at bugs, I couldn't just pose my model in a static position and take a picture.  So my friend, Scott Murphy, came over, dressed in full ranger garb, and flailed around as I held my finger down on a rapid fire setting on my camera.  In a matter or minutes, I had about a hundred pictures from which to choose.  There were some great shots that really showed the motion I wanted, this being the best, in my opinion. This card is part of The Lord of the Rings LCG from Fantasy Flight Game...

Silver Lamp , 11"x11", Oil on Paper on Masonite, 2013. ©Fantasy Flight Games A new card of mine from the Lord of the Rings LCG from Fantasy Flight Games has just been released.  This one is called "Silver Lamp".  The original concept for this image was for it to be a character piece of Haldir of Lórien.  He was to be finding the fellowship in the forest surrounding Lothlórien and lighting their faces.  I guess the Art Director was fond of my design for the lamp, so they changed the card from Haldir to "Silver Lamp".  I myself am very happy with this card.  This is part of The Voice of Isengard set. I should have another piece coming out in the Dead Marshes Nightmare deck in the next couple months, so look out for that. There is also a nice piece that Master of Lore wrote up about this piece on his blog, so if you have a few minutes, you might want to check it out: http://masteroflore.wordpress.com/2014/04/25/artist-spotlight-owen-william-web...

I was just alerted that this piece was released quite a while ago.  I had a really good time painting this piece for "The Black Riders" deck in The Lord of the Rings LCG.  Barliman is a sweet, lovely man, one of the people worth fighting for.  I think I came on to this piece as a last minute addition to fill up the deck.  There was a much quicker due date than most,  so this one is quite small.  I stare at it every once in a while (in the pile of paintings standing against my wall) and it makes me happy.  I'm quite proud of this one.

This is a painting I did back in 2012 for the new A Games of Thrones LCG Chapter Pack called The Horn that Wakes.  I had a great time doing this piece.  Evil characters are so much fun to design and create.  Happy Valentine's Day!

Gen Con was a blast this year! It was so much fun to finally have a booth of my own this year.  It was a very different experience, for the first time I didn't see much of the actual convention.  In the past I have walked through everyone's booth at least once or twice, this year I probably saw a quarter of what was there.  It was great to hear all the compliments from the attendees, and I loved drawing on people play mats and signing cards!  That was truly an amazing experience!  It was wonderful to see past friends and make some great new ones.  Here are a few pictures from the weekend. Sarah at the booth on wednesday Me and my Booth Elisabeth Alba and a true leg man My first play mat sketch This woman had unicorns covering her play mat Another Play Mat My view all Weekend Right before I left for Indianapolis, I was given the new Star Wars: Edge of Darkness Expansion pack from Fantasy Flight Games.  ...

Gondorian Shield, Oil on paper on Masonite, 13" x 11", 2012. ©Fantasy Flight Games I finished this piece for Fantasy Flight Games way back in January of 2012.  The project just kept getting pushed back.  Now it has finally come out in the Lord of the Rings: The Steward's Fear deck.  I really loved doing this piece, I felt like I really loosened up my brush strokes and the palette was exactly as I envisioned it in my head.  This was the first Lord of the Rings piece I've ever done.  I've always thought that I was never worthy or that I wouldn't be able to paint a more interesting image than any of the great artists that have made Lord of the Rings imagery.  But when I got this assignment, it was almost a relief that I wouldn't be depicting some climactic scene from the novels.  I can do Gondorian Shields.  And I'm very happy with how I depicted this item for the game.

Soon after I finished the Warhammer: Invasion pieces, I was asked to contribute to the Valar Dohaeris deck in the Game of Thrones LCG.  The AD asked me to do a character card of Shireen Baratheon.  She is the daughter of Stannis Baratheon and she has Greyscale on her cheek and neck.  The AD wanted an image of her looking up at a giant at The Wall, and he wanted it from the perspective of the giant. Final Sketch ©Fantasy Flight Games Final Painting ©Fantasy Flight Games I am pretty obsessed with the Song of Fire and Ice series, so this was a true honor for me.  This might be a fairly minor character, but just the idea that George R.R. Martin had to give the final OK on the image just makes me so happy.

I just saw that my card, Purged by Flame, has been released on the Fantasy Flight Games website, so I figure it's fine to do a post.  I did this at the same time as the last image I posted, Boon of Tzeentch.  It was a super fun to do, I love to do flames, elves, and purging, so it was right up my alley.  It started with the drawing: ©Fantasy Flight Games The main focus of the piece was the gauntlet in the flame, so I went with a more severe perspective to put that up front.  I got the ok from the AD and so I moved on to the final painting. ©Fantasy Flight Games After sending the image to get accepted by the higher-up's, they thought the armor needed to change, helmet needed to be gone, and spear needed to get changed to a shield.  So after painting in those changes, this is what came out:   ©Fantasy Flight Games I thought I was going to change the final image back to the original, because I loved the helmet so much, and I put so mu...