ART OF JOHN SHROADES

I grew up in central California and as soon as I could hold a crayon I knew art was my calling.  All through school art was my favorite pastime and always my goal to be better.  Upon reaching Fresno State University I took fine art, advertising graphics, illustration and art history.  With little money and big ambitions I packed up and moved to Pasadena to attend Art Center College of Design as an Illustration major. While at Art Center I won a portfolio competition for an illustration scholarship from the school and graduated with distinction. While in college I did many varieties of freelance illustration including game box covers and t-shirt art and the inevitable logo designs.

After college I was recruited from school into the computer game industry by Sierra On-Line. While in games I have applied my talent to a wide variety of artistic pursuits including background painting, character design, environment design, animation, 3D modeling, UI design, outsource direction, art direction and marketing illustration/design.  I’ve worked in games since 1991 contributing art to over 17 published games and many more prototypes. The titles I worked from start to finish on include games in the series’ of King’s Quest, Gabriel Knight and Space Quest.  I also worked with Alexey Pajitnov (designer of Tetris) on Microsoft’s Pandora’s Box and with Marvel on Super Hero Squad Online. More recently I have contributed concept and game art for mobile titles such as Nicki Minaj: The Empire and Kitty City.

Since 2004 have also enjoyed taking on freelance work focusing on children’s books into reality. Joining the talent force at Shannon and Associates I have worked on 4 picture books, many young adult novel covers, dozens of Highlights projects and many card game illustrations for clients including Upper Deck, Wizkids and Bella Sara.

I continue to explore the latest styles and push my creative and technical abilities to take on new artistic challenges.