The first element of the sketch that I shared with some friends was the skull. I had blocked out super rough ‘masses’ in the image as circles, but this was the first part that I narrowed my focus to. The skeleton is of a black dragon and so I wanted the skull to reflect that. The skull, more than any other single element of a dragon shows what species it it. So the high nostril holes, and the archetypal horns were some of the first focal points.

Next I moved on to the shape of the skeleton’s pose. I thought about what position the dragon would have been in for its last moments. If we assume that no adventurer got the better of it, and that it was in its den, it would likely be covering its hoard. So I wanted the pose to reflect the simple concept of “M I N E” and that meant clutching, encircling, and possessiveness.

I’m trying to work on my storytelling and building of ‘scenes’ rather than singular characters / creatures, so I pulled back by scaling the dragon down. Get it? Scaling down. Dragon.

Ahem.

As I populated the scene with other elements, I made sure to draw viewers’ eyes to the focal point of the image – the dragon’s head – through the use of line.

Let’s start the monthly roundup off right. With a werewolf! I mean, I could do far worse for inspirational than a werewolf for Halloween, right?

I think the artist (Frost Llamazon on X) did an amazing job of creating the feral, powerful nature of a lycanthrope here. So here’s what I love about the image – bullet (non-silver) point style:

• The pose – The hunched back and predatory posture is perfect.
• The background – This may seem silly since it’s such a simple style, and I think they even used it for all of their ‘weretober’ images, but I think it’s super effective here, and highlights the character. Colors work perfectly with the fur tones, too!
• Fur tones – Speaking of the fur tones – they’re spot on.

The creature is a bit more beefy than I tend to make them when I do werewolf stuff, but if you’re going for ‘power’ over ‘hungry’, Frost nails it.

Next up, I absolutely love “Pumpkin Carver” by Danijela Antunović over on artstation. This is what I consider a ‘knock it out of the park’ illustration.

• The Story – I get the sense that there’s a big story behind this painting, and I want to know ALL of it.
• The Colors – Masterful use of color (de)saturation here to draw the eye and make everything ‘loom’ in the background.
• The Character – This little gnome feels like a creature I could sit and have tea with, and I very much want to do just that!
• The Hands – Have you noticed his gnarly little hands? Those are working man’s hands.
• The Designs – The ones he has pinned up, and the one on his little… foot stool? I want to dive into that book and see what else the lil guy has come up with.

In other words, this painting draws me in with every part of it. I want to immerse myself in it, and I can think of no better praise for an individual piece.

This troll, created by @IgorGrouper@mastodon.art seems like a great example of their style, and it has the kind of personality and style that drew me into art when I was a kid.

Some of the things I love about this image include:

• The Linework – Specifically, the crunchiness of the linework. Igor creates such great texture with simple line, that it makes me envious.
• The Pose – So many folks draw trolls as uber tall humanoids. This troll could be tall, but it’s definitely massive, and that deep crouch gives it such a feral mood.
• The Composition – I’m a fan of triangles.
• The Old School – There’s a bit of an old school rpg revival happening, and I feel like Igor’s style taps into that in a really choice way.

This post is part of a feature series I’m working on here at dragonbones.net to give credit and support to artists I think are doing exceptional work in fantasy themed art and illustration.

I’m open to suggestions if you think there’s something that I should see. Feel free to use the contact me form here on the site, and put “Inspirational Art Post” in the subject line so I don’t miss it!

If you believe I’ve attributed something incorrectly, or would like your work removed, please let me know by using the contact form here on the site, and put “Correction Request” in the subject so I don’t miss it!

The Concept

In short, I would like to do a series of books about drawing. Specifically, I would like to create the go-to series for folks who play TTRPGs and would like to draw their own characters, or the creatures that their characters face off against.

But that’s kinda a big ask.

So I’m eating this particular elephant one bite at a time, and I’m starting with the humans. It’s the logical starting point for a number of reasons, but here are some of the big ones:

• I’m going to give it away for free. Yup. A quality book, which takes time and effort, and I’m not going to ask anything for it. I want people to get it into their hands and get the benefit of the things I’ve learned. So… free.
• There are a lot of ‘how to draw people’ books. They run the gamut from Amazing to Wouldn’t Use it for Kitty Litter. I want to try to shift that curve. I want to make something that people can relate to instantly while being extremely useful.
• It’s a testing ground. I want feedback. I want to know what works for people and what doesn’t. So using a topic that is more universal seems sensible.

Balancing Thorough with Efficient

This is a tricky one for me. At times I want to put ALL THE THINGS into this. Go through everything from anatomy to architecture to diet into the book. All from a visual perspective, of course. But that’s too much and honestly, would make it into the sort of project that would never see the light of day.

So I have to pull back and keep the content to things that people will be able to use. Preferably what they can use right now, today.

And of course, I find myself thinking of that old adage from Mark Twain: “I didn’t have time to write a short letter, so I wrote a long one instead.”

Quality – not quantity.

Support

Want to help me keep the ball rolling? Well here are the things that will most definitely do that!

• Ask me about it! (Comment below – ask whatever you would like to know!) This might be the very best way. It shows me that there’s interest in it, and keeps me motivated.
• Share this post! This helps for much the same reasons, and it potentially gets others involved.
• Check out my Patreon! You don’t have to pay anything for this either. You can ‘follow’ me and keep up to date (though I’ll also post here on dragonbones when I can.) Like with the others, it shows folks are interested, and while I’ll take suggestions anywhere, patron suggestions will weigh a little more.

Detailed Updates

I’ll post both at my Patreon page and here as things progress.

So far, I’ve been bouncing back and forth from the writing and editing to the drawing side of things. It’s a process that works for me and my ADHD brain.

Depending on which version you’re looking at, I’m currently at about 15-20 pages of almost entirely text, and I have a number of pages of illustrations. Those two will get cut up and commingled, but I think we’re looking at 20-25 pages so far, and it’s likely to get significantly larger before I edit it down.

Point is, that it’s coming along nicely so far, and grows as I have time.

This post is part of a series on my forthcoming book titled How to Draw Fantastic Humans. I will create a ‘main page’ to gather info on the topic soon, but for now, this is it.

Even this ‘quick and dirty’ version of the layout process takes a little bit to get through, so I’m adding a short Table of Contents here in the event you’re looking for something specific.

• Crediting the OG
• Formatting
  • Headers
  • Text Columns
  • Tables
  • Filler Images
  • Watermark (the Background)
• Wrap Up

Credit Where Due

Before I start into all of this, I wanted to thank the user /u/YaAlex on reddit. They’ve created a number of Docs templates that you can copy then edit to fit your content any way you would like. It was looking at those templates and figuring out what was involved that lead me down a long and winding road that lead me here.

So if you want the real quick and dirty version – go check out their stuff, copy them, and edit them to your heart’s content!

Still here? Awesome. Read on, my friend.

First Things First: The Content

It may seem kind of obvious, but I would feel remiss if I didn’t point out that you have to start with quality content.

If you’ve started your process here, instead of writing up some really great ideas for your ttrpg, I would suggest that you stop now and go do that. Making things look pretty will only get you so far, while quality content could be scribbled on the back of a napkin and people will still care.

Write up your idea anywhere. Longhand in a notebook, in your phone’s note app of choice (Google Keep will even copy your Keep Note into a Google Doc when you’re ready) or yes, even in Google Docs. It doesn’t matter.

What matters is writing the idea down. Then reviewing it and editing it. Get it right and then move it into a layout document. Not before.

In addition to causing you to focus on the wrong thing, it will also cause you to do double work for layout. Usually more than once. And that, my friend, is just annoying.

Formatting

Formatting your document in a way that looks and feels like the classic ttrpg books is why your here in the first place, so let’s get to it!

Headers – They Do So Much

It amazes me how many folks still don’t realize this yet, but headers do a lot of work in most modern software packages.

What’s more, they’re a super easy way to keep things organized in your own head.

Use the headers in your Google Doc like the levels of an Outline. H1 is the first level, H2 is when you’ve moved in one tab, H3 is another tab in, etc. Use a header for each section you’re working on and then copy (or write if you ignored my very first suggestion in this post) and then move on to the next element.

Move In / Use a Higher Number Header for Subsections

I’m doing it in this blog post as an example (and the image to the left is from one of my documents). The Title of the blog post is H1. The section “Headers – They Do So Much” is H2. And (I’m sure you guessed this) “Move In / Use a Higher…” is H3.

Keep going until you’re done with a section and you’re ready to move back up to the previous layer of Header. Wash, rinse, and repeat.

Columns – for that Classic Look

Breaking your text into columns adds some relief for the eyes in the ’empty space’ of the gutters between the text. I’m assuming that’s why traditional ttrpg books have made them the default for layouts.

No Mobile for You!

Just kidding – for a long time, working on these documents in Google Docs and on a phone or (as I do) on an iPad was… problematic. Fortunately, there’s good news on that front: Safari on the iPad now functions like a more fully featured browser would on a laptop or desktop. That, in turn, allows for far more precise work on these documents when on mobile.

Trust me when I say it’s a huge relief. If you’re working on your iPad like me, delete the Google Drive and Google Docs apps from your iPad and just do it all in Safari. You can thank me later.

Tables – the Stuff of RPGs!

Let’s face it – tables are a huge part of ttrpgs going all the way back to the beginning. Conceptually, they simplify prep for the DM / GM and build inspiration all in just a fistful of lines.

Format

The standard these days seems to be simple enough – a collection of columns and rows with alternating darkness for the background of the rows.

Table Title (D20 Table)

In the template I’ve modified YaAlex’s original, I’m using Header 5. That means that the Title will show up and be linkable in a table of contents when I’m ready for that.

I wouldn’t go any lower than that (meaning – I wouldn’t make any other parts of the table a ‘header’ because we don’t want our TOC to be 894390 items long.

Labels (d20 / Entry)

Simply create a table with at least one more row than what you strictly need for the content. That first row will be your labels for the columns.

For the text, I like to make them ‘normal text’ (ie – not a header) but I make them bold and I set the font size to a bit smaller than normal.

For the cell backgrounds, I make a point of NOT giving it a color so that the page background / art shows through.

Individual Rows

And finally – the results for your table. In the first column, your die roll numbers, and in your second, the results.

Sometimes Iike to alternate color / white for each row. Sometimes I’ll group them into something like 3 color / 3 white. I generally don’t go more than 3 rows of the same color though as it starts to get hard to track across with your eye.

Prep Work Saves Time

I think that YaAlex has the right idea. Build yourself out a bunch of different options for these tables and keep them in a document so you can copy and paste them into future projects. It will save you a lot of headaches.

Filler Images

So you have some great art to inspire your readers and bring your content to life visually? Excellent. Let’s get it into your document and looking its best!

Format. I recommend using the PNG format with transparent backgrounds. I usually create them at roughly 2x the size you actually need. You can compress images down, but trying to scale them up will cause them to become pixelated. And worse? You may not see it on a screen, so you won’t know until you go to print it out!

Placement. If you’ve split your content into columns on the page as described above, just position your cursor where you want the art, then Insert > Image > Upload from Computer. It’s going to make things look janky – don’t panic. With the image still selected, you can adjust its size by click / dragging the squares in the corners. Note: NOT the blue ‘water droplets’ in the corners. That’s for modifying your selection.

Flowing Text. The icons in the lower left corner of the screen shot are for ‘flow’ of text in relation to the image. I tend to use the second option so the text flows around the image. If you scale your image to the width of the column it’s in, and kept enough clear space around it in your graphics app (in the PNG) it should read really well.

The Background – Making it Pop

The background is where we really give these documents a classically ‘professional’ appearance, and it’s surprisingly easy to do.

The Image

The entire background needs to be a single image. This is a bit of a downside to working this way, but it’s doable in most any graphics manipulation app. I use Procreate on my iPad.

Proportions of the image are important. If you’re working at 8.5”x11” in your document, that’s your image size. But – keep in mind whether you’re planning to print physical copies of your document or keep it purely digital as a PDF. Digital only, and you’ll be fine with ~100 px/inch. Printing physical copies? You’ll want to set the resolution to 300 px/inch.

Keep in Mind that you don’t want your background to make the text hard to read or be distracting from the content. To this end I tend to keep the image light in color with the exception of some decorative elements at the top.

I like to use cloud brushes and various filters and layering in Procreate to play around with things until I have what I’m looking for.

Samples for your use. Feel free to take these sample backgrounds and use them for whatever you like, as long as you credit me and link to this website. If you’re interested in a tutorial on how I make the background images for ttrpg layout in Google Docs, let me know in the comments below.

Placing the Image

Placing the image is simple enough – just select the Insert menu and choose the Watermark option.

As you can see from the image to the left, I like to make the scale slightly larger than 100%. That pushes the image outside the page borders so that there’s no white border at the edge.

You can make the image semi transparent. This can get a little tricky, but it’s possible to make the page color something different, and the image slightly transparent if you want to ‘tint’ the image. Honestly though, I would personally just tint your image in your graphics app before you place it if that’s what you’re looking for.

Wrap Up

And that does it for the basics. We can go deeper, and if there’s an interest, I happily will! But for now, I just wanted to put down the basic elements of formatting ttrpg content in Google Docs.

If you follow the steps above to format your document, you can then just use File > Download > PDF and you’ve got your TTRPG ebook ready to go!

I’m going to do some things to help more folks see what I do.

Public Posts on Patreon

First thing I’m going to do is to open more of my posts on Patreon so that they are publicly viewable.

There’s a nice feature to help with this. It will allow my patrons to see it ‘exclusively’ first, but eventually, the post will go public. I’ll use that for more posts. I won’t do it with everything (I think my patrons should get something exclusive for supporting me) but I’ll do it with more.

So even if you’re not able or interested in supporting what I’m doing financially, consider following me over there to see more stuff popping up!

A New Tier – Postcards

I’ve been thinking for a while about adding one or more new tiers to my profile, and I think I’ve finally decided on one that folks might actually be interested in. Postcards.

It’s annoying to have to go somewhere and check a website or read emails to see what someone’s been up to. But snail mail? Something that just shows up to your house? That might be kinda fun!

I’m working on figuring out what I would charge for such a thing, and if I want to put a cap on the number of folks who could join at that level.

Something Else?

I’m open to suggestions for other things I could do to make my page of more interest to folks who might use it. So if you have an idea, I would love to hear it!

Comment here, or ping me on ‘the socials’, or whatever.

Our social media focused world has taught us that a quick click of a like / heart / whozawhatsits is sufficient thanks to artists for their hard work. I’m calling malarkey on that.

I also thought I would like to put more of my focus into the images that really stand out to me and study the why of my experiences with them.

So I’m starting a new ‘feature’ here at dragonbones. My plan is to post at least once a month, and here are my self imposed ‘rules’ for these posts:

1. They have to credit and link back to the artist who I believe created them. (If you have a conflict with who I attribute a piece to, please contact me – I’ll happily look into it and do my best to correct any errors.)
2. Explain what about the image drew me into it, and why it made the list for that month. This could be a style, a medium, or… just about anything.
3. There is no three.

Just to start the ball rolling, here’s a piece I came across this morning by one of my all time favorites – Richard Whitters (@WhittersRichard on X).

I really love the image for several reasons:

• It pays homage to Gary Gygax. You don’t do what I do without Gary Gygax doing what he did.
• It’s fun and friendly while telling a great story about monsters.
• The details are on point. Look at that adorable displaced kitten. The youthfulness and naivety of the troll is just *chef’s kiss*.

My sincere kudos (and thanks) to Mr. Whitters for sharing so much of his work over the years and (knowingly or not) teaching me a great deal about fantasy art.

This post is part of a feature series I’m working on here at dragonbones.net to give credit and support to artists I think are doing exceptional work in fantasy themed art and illustration.

I’m open to suggestions if you think there’s something that I should see. Feel free to use the contact me form here on the site, and put “Inspirational Art Post” in the subject line so I don’t miss it!

If you believe I’ve attributed something incorrectly, or would like your work removed, please let me know by using the contact form here on the site, and put “Correction Request” in the subject so I don’t miss it!