hannahmcgill

[hannahmcgill]

Cronch cronch cronch....

[img id] Digital art of a small monarch butterfly caterpillar creeping up a milkweed leaf and eating it as it goes. The style of the art is crisp thin outlines with cel shading. The caterpillar is peach with black rings around its body, a black face with shiny eyes, and little bitty nubs for antennae. The milkweed leaf is rendered with seafoam/aqua tones. The watermark on the image reads: 'http://hmcgill.art'. [/id]

#art #caterpillar #digital art #my art #entomology #science #sciart #butterfly #illustration #artists on tumblr

[hannahmcgill]

Here is Margo, after I was thinking about Lying Cat from Saga

(As far as detective work goes, she is about as hardboiled as an egg)

...

(I do still work on Warlock'd, but it's honestly been a lot of pointless suffering and I hope that suffering gets resolved soon...)

[img id] Digital art of a barn swallow character named Margo perched in the dirt. The style is thin, delicate black lineart with cel shading that follows a clear light source. Being a barn swallow, Margo is deep blue with semi-iridescent feathers, and orange patches on top of her head, around her throat, and along one wing wrist. Her feet are blue and her cream belly is largely hidden by the wings and feathers folded along her back. Margo has a cartoony, overly grumpy expression. Her black beak is set in a deep frown. The inner yellow skin of her mouth is slightly revealed as she croaks the word "CRIMES" ominously. It's implied that you're supposed to take Margo very seriously, but who would? [/id]

#warlockd #graphic novel #original character #indie comics #barn swallow #bird #birb #birblr #art #artists on tumblr #cartoon #character #my art

[hannahmcgill]

My latest caterpillar stage illustration...if you can find the little critter anyway (I have so much leaf I need to eat, it's absurd 🤢)

[img id] Digital art of an arrangement of milkweed leaves, rendered in soft teal colors. It's a stack of leaves on a stem with one big leaf thrust into the foreground via foreshortening. All the veins can be seen in this one big oval leaf with a pointy end. Eating its tiny way through this leaf is a tiny caterpillar, near the tip. It has a lot of leaf to get through if it wants to become a proper butterfly. [/id]

#cocoon year #digital art #illustration #art #artists on tumblr #leaf #plants #garden #my art #caterpillar #insect

[hannahmcgill]

This one makes me happy because it's the last time I have to draw that annoyingly detailed eggshell :)

[img id] Digital art of a teeny tiny baby monarch butterfly caterpillar chowing down on its own eggshell. The caterpillar stands on microscopic milkweed fibers and lifts the eggshell overhead, chomping away. The caterpillar is light peach in color, with a black head, black legs, and black spikes running down its body in rows. Its butt is facing the viewer. The eggshell and the milkweed leaf are seafoam green. A watermark in the corner reads: http://hmcgill.art [/id]

#art #artists on tumblr #caterpillar #cocoon year #my art #illustration #sciart #entomology #insects #bugs #cw bugs

[hannahmcgill]

The caterpillar

It destroyed its egg

Yes

YES

The caterpillar is out

[img id] Digital art of a newly-hatched monarch butterfly caterpillar crawling out of its shell for the first time. The shell is translucent, covered with dimples and ridges, with a slight sheen on top. It has a huge ripped hole in one side where the caterpillar exited. The caterpillar is a pale peach color with lines of black spines running down its body. Its legs and face are black as well. It crawls over an extrem closeup view of leaf fuzz, from a milkweed leaf. Where is our little friend headed? Text in the corner is a watermark: http://hmcgill.art [/id]

#with credit to Nael who wrote the poem 'The Tiger' from 'They're Singing a Song in Their Rocket' #digital art #art #artists on tumblr #caterpillar #entomology #bug #insect #egg #sciart #science #biology #my art

[hannahmcgill]

Cocoon Year Weeks 7 & 8 Graphic

A little late posting this one (These do a lot better on Bluesky and Mastodon for some reason!) but I haven't forgotten my dear insect-averse tumblr crowd.

There will be an additional wrinkly baby caterpillar soon! Nom nom nom!

[img id] Digital art of a caterpillar munching its way out of a translucent eggshell. The caterpillar is chunky with a shiny black head, and little black grippy legs. Just the head of the caterpillar pokes out, while the rest of its body curls around inside of the shell. The egg rests on a nest of fine, curly milkweed hairs. [/id]

#illustration #digital art #artists on tumblr #insect #tw: insects #caterpillar #entomology #science illustration #sciart #biology

[hannahmcgill]

Cocoon Year Weeks 5 & 6 Graphic

Here I studied the caterpillar forming out of the goo within the butterfly egg, and the shell being semitransparent.

[img id] Digital spot art of a round butterfly egg. It is gelatinous and the seafoam-green shell is semitransparent. The egg nestles on the hairs of a milkweed leaf. Inside the egg, a caterpillar with a lumpy orange body and a black head is clearly developing. Text on the bottom left reads: http://hmcgill.art [/id]

#art #digital art #artists on tumblr #egg #sciart #science #entomology #insect #tw: insects #butterfly #my art #photoshop

[hannahmcgill]

Cocoon Year Weeks 3 & 4 Graphic

A study of a butterfly egg, and milkweed hairs, done for my Cocoon Year blogging project. Deliberately weird. If you hate visual textures, do not interact.

[img id] Digital artwork of an extreme closeup of a butterfly's pale green egg. The egg is ribbed down the sides with ridges and lines of indentations, softly shiny. The egg is nestled in the fine hairs of a milkweed leaf. A black arrow points to the egg. Text over the arrow reads: "It's an egg! I swear!" A watermark for http://hmcgill.art is present at the bottom of the piece. [/id]

#digital art #art #visual texture #artists on tumblr #egg #butterfly #macro photography mimicry #texture #monarch butterfly #sciart

[hannahmcgill]

I drew this for my first 'Cocoon Year' blog, where I document the struggles of making a longform comic.

Originally it was going to be about developing a webcomic, but pitching to agents has wormed its way in yet again.

[img id] Digital artwork of a monarch butterfly perched upside-down on a decorative seafoam-green leaf. The butterfly has bright orange wings with stark black outlines. White spots line the edges of the wings. The butterfly's body is covered with black fur that also has white spots. It has laid approximately one little pale green egg. The leaves form stylized curlicues.

Text on image reads as follows: 'Me' over a black arrow pointing directly at the egg, referring to me being 'born' or getting laid, perhaps? Not in the naughty sense, I'm literally being laid in this picture, inside of an egg. 'My Creative Impulses' is over a black arrow pointing at the butterfly, implying that I am a creation of my own desire to make graphic novels. 'http://hmcgill.art' is on the bottom of the image as a watermark to go to my website. [/img]

#art #illustration #butterfly #orange #monarch butterfly #lepidoptera #digital art #photoshop

[hannahmcgill]

Messing with watercolor/pencil brushes in Adobe Fresco and thought people might want to see it, even though it’s not a comic and it’s not in my normal style. Byronosaurus!

[img id] Digital watercolor and pencil piece of a Byronosaurus in an abstract marshy environment. It is set during the evening when sunlight just crests the dinosaur’s feathers and causes its wings to glow. Its face is in sharp, bright relief of the sun, while the rest of its body is in shadow. The Byronosaurus is velociraptor-like in stature, with pronated wrists, wing claws, and upright toes on its feet. However, the Byronosaurus has a longer, beakier face, and is probably the nerd to the velociraptor’s jock. [/id]

#my art #dinosaur #reblog #fresco experiments

[hannahmcgill]

My indie graphic novel, Amphiox, and stickers arrived. Now they're ready to sell. I have many copies available for sale. Each comes with three stickers.

I'll reblog this with a direct link later. For now bask in the merchandise!

[img id] Three photos depicting Amphiox in print and with bonus stickers.

Photo 1: Photograph of a box full of 'Amphiox' graphic novels. The graphic novel has a giant fishtail with a glowing fin on the front. The graphic novels are stacked and wrapped in shrinkwrap inside of the box.

Photo 2: Product photo of three different vinyl sticker designs, still in their StickerApp bags. One sticker is a smaller version of the Amphiox cover with rounded corners. Another sticker is the golden bee-infused 'H' logo that I use to represent my brand. The third sticker is an egg with a baby amphiox inside.

Photo 3: Two photos of the amphiox egg sticker stitched together. One shows the egg in daylight. The second photo shows the amphiox egg after it has been charged in sunlight and allowed to glow. The glowing effect shines through the amphiox hatchling itself, making the creature appear luminous in its shell. [/id]

#amphiox #art #comics #indie comics #webcomic #fantasy #fantasy comic #science fiction #my art #small press

[hannahmcgill]

To anyone who was wondering about Warlock'd:

I've completed writing it a few times, in fact I have completed it to the stage where I had it all laid out twice, too. In each case, I haven't felt confident enough to go forward with the art.

It's a special sort of production hell where the only person working on the project (...me) started out with no idea what they were doing. So I hope that people don't mind updates. They are markers of my general ability to actually make a whole graphic novel. This is just something I have to try and fail a few times to get right. I'm happy enough to share my progress so long as it doesn't feel like false promises.

Currently I'm doing another outline and then I'm going to use some layout/art production techniques I picked up from the Amphiox project. Hopefully this is the last writing do-over. I want it to result in a story where people like reading about the characters and feel like they are friends. I want the sequence of events in the story to make sense and to have interesting consequences.

Anyway, I drew this portrait of Pierre (or Cleric Stone) on my iPad with Fresco down in the nice cool basement. August is horrible for drawing anyway. Better to whole up and fix writing problems.

[img id] Digital art done with a Fresco brush meant to mimic pencil or charcoal. It's a bust portrait of a 12th century cleric named Pierre...or maybe Cleric Stone. He's Black. He wears his hair in mini-braids under a red hat. The hat has one crenellation on the brim to indicate that Stone has a few royal indulgences. Three hoopoe wing feathers stick out of the cap. Stone is otherwise dressed like most clerics of 12th century Paris, with a luxurious black cape held shut with a daisy wheel clasp. He wears fitted black gloves and is about to throw a poorly-drawn firework into a crowd. [/id]

#warlock'd #warlockd #writing #writeblr #art #sketch #pierre #cleric stone #adobe fresco #digital illustration #medieval #fantasy #my art

[hannahmcgill]

Look at the little stickers I'm sneaking into print preorders of my webcomic, Amphiox! Provided everything goes well, each sticker will have a special effect.

Print order goes in on August 1st. Grab a copy, help me out!

[img id] Array of three stickers. One is a gold-leaf logo with a bee on it. The other is a glow-in-the-dark, egg-shaped sticker with an amphiox hatchling printed on it. The third is the cover but as a vinyl sticker.

Text reads: *Digital mockups. Final designs subject to production changes. [/id]

Today's update marks the halfway point of my webcomic, Amphiox.

If you want to avoid the upcoming cliffhanger, you may be interested in preordering a physical copy:

It includes a PDF download of the full story. Read it early, in one go!

International, or just don't like paper? There is also a way to purchase the PDF by itself here: https://hmcgill.art/product/amphiox-pdf-digital-only-edition/

[img id] Photograph of the Amphiox mini-graphic novel, artfully posed within some overgrown ivy. The cover is black and has a fish tail on it with the title 'AMPHIOX' running vertically down the middle. Serpentlike coils writhe in the background of the cover. The artist/author label reads 'H. McGill http://hmcgill.art'. [/id]

#amphiox #small press #printing #zine #webcomic #self-publishing #self publishing #comic #comics #indie #indie comics #stickers #my art

[hannahmcgill]

Whoops! Yesterday's page of Amphiox (http://amphiox.hmcgill.art) was an older one not meant to go out. I've put a new, more properly dramatic page up. Left is the old one, right is the new one. The right one will be present in the print edition, which is available for preorder.

[img id]

First image: Digital webcomic page. Page Description This page has four panels with lots of art elements overlapping and crashing about the page. The margin is taken up by yesterday's highway in the upper left corner. Panel 1 SFX (Drawn in a wavy style, in light blue) RUMBLE The island where the amphiox lives shudders. The waters around it ripple. Panel 2 SFX (Drawn in capital block white letters, set along an arc that matches the amphiox's curved spine) KA-CRSSHHHH!!!! The amphiox splits the island in half as it breaks free of its underground grotto. Panel 3 The amphiox churns the island into bits while the ocean ravages from below. Panel 4 The amphiox reveals itself in full, discombobulated glory, as a manipulator of the ocean and lord of impending disaster. Chunks of its former island home fall to the ocean around its massive, writhing form. Black coils stir the deeps. A tsunami wave is in the amphiox's grip! The wave must be several hundred feet tall!

Second image: This page is the same layout as the previous image. The amphiox's pose has been changed in the fourth panel. It is now closer to the viewer, more chaotic, and rearing into the sky. It has more fins that clutter up the composition. Rubble rains down from the sky and into the ocean before it. [/id]

#amphiox #webcomic #webcomics #indie comics #comic #webcomic update #my art #digital art #monster #kaijuu #fantasy #science fiction #indie

[hannahmcgill]

Still really happy with how this spread in Amphiox turned out. Unfortunately I couldn't display it in full in page-a-day webcomic format, but here is how it's meant to be viewed.

[img] Full-bleed, two-page spread depicting an airship village over which manta rays are flying through the air. There's a hodgepodge of somewhat airworthy vehicles and gadgets, tended by villages. The village has a silly little farm and enough food for everyone to eat. There are cars, helicopters, a giant airship, and hot air balloons for navigating the land, air, and sea...provided people can get the things working in the first place.

For a more complete description of both pages, with dialogue included, please visit http://amphiox.hmcgill.art. It is a webcomic and each page has a full transcript. [/id]

#amphiox #webcomics #webcomic update #comic #comics #indie comics #indie #my art #digital art #airship #fantasy #science fiction #manta ray

[hannahmcgill]

Forgot to add: I colored these as well.

[img id] Three recolors of the same axolotl lineart as above. All three are digital art that tiles. Each image depicts a pair of Axolotls frolicking around aquarium plants on an abstract, aquarium-inspired background. There is an orb hidden in the foliage, as well as a secret third axolotl's face.

Image 1 depicts melanoid axolotls on a background of soft pastel pinks, blues, greens, and purples, with a white orb.

Image 2 depicts albino axolotls on a graphic background of flat black fills, greens, and blues. The orb is yellow.

Image 3 depicts wild axolotls on a graphic background of lime green and teal hues. The orb is turquoise. [/id]

Guess who discovered the 'preview pattern' function of photoshop...

img id: Digital artwork of axolotls swimming through aquatic plants. There is also an orb and a disembodied axolotl face for flavor. The artwork is uncolored and lines only at the moment.

#axolotl #art #artists on tumblr #tiling #pattern #nature #digital art #my art

[hannahmcgill]

Today's update marks the halfway point of my webcomic, Amphiox.

If you want to avoid the upcoming cliffhanger, you may be interested in preordering a physical copy:

It includes a PDF download of the full story. Read it early, in one go!

International, or just don't like paper? There is also a way to purchase the PDF by itself here: https://hmcgill.art/product/amphiox-pdf-digital-only-edition/

[img id] Photograph of the Amphiox mini-graphic novel, artfully posed within some overgrown ivy. The cover is black and has a fish tail on it with the title 'AMPHIOX' running vertically down the middle. Serpentlike coils writhe in the background of the cover. The artist/author label reads 'H. McGill http://hmcgill.art'. [/id]

#amphiox #webcomics #webcomic #webcomic update #preorder #newrelease #indie #art #digital art #zine #risking the url this time #please preorder