Cover for Billboard magazine

Here's my latest cover for Billboard magazine. This was a lot of fun to do, but was a crazy deadline. The art director was very cool to work with and as I've mentioned before, that goes a long, long way. I was called last Monday night, and had my sketch to them before 9:00 a.m. Tuesday morning. For one reason or another, I didn't hear anything back until around 5:00 p.m. giving me only a day and a half to paint five people.

I love my job and I'm grateful every day to be able to do what I do for a living. If you want to be an illustrator, you need to realize that there will be times that this sort of thing happens. It's not the art directors fault, or the editors, it's the nature of the beast and you either love it or you don't. Yes, it can be stressful, and frustrating at times, but you've got to do what you've got to do, you gotta roll with it. And as I always tell myself, "I could be digging ditches", so I'd happily take this work that I do over anything else.





My quick mock sketch.



Originally Jon Bon Jovi was on the cover, but he was switched out for Taylor Swift, she's prettier.