Hi, all! I finished this piece months ago, but am only now allowed to post it here. I'ts the cover for the May 2006 issue of "Fantasy and Science Fiction" which just hit the stands. The picture is for the cover story by Matthew Hughes, "Herd of Opportunity."

To proactively answer the question that I always get asked: Yes, I get to read the story before I do the cover. In this case it's the story of a planet where the aliens act out plays from Terran mythology... and a bunch of other stuff happens too, but I won't include any spoilers! There are humans in the story also, but it was implicit that the aliens should be the focus... i.e. I wouldn't have been asked to do the cover if they just wanted the humans! :-)

Mostly pencil and Photoshop, with a little help from 3DSMax for the hovercar. F&SF likes their cover art to be an inch taller than the magazine size so that they can shift it up or down as the need fits, so that's why it's such a tall image. Some of the sides also got cropped on the final cover too.

-mike