Josh Langley
Illustration 2024
Whilst board game design seems like an odd direction for an illustrator, Josh had been cultivating a love for the medium during his time at The Northern School of Art. Alongside his studies, he was introduced to games such as Boss Monster and Dustbiters which changed his opinion on the genre and let him see them in a new light. From then on, his interest only grew until in January, during his second year at the university, he began putting together a concept for a board game of his own. He carried that idea until September of that year when he began development in earnest making it his Final Major Project. Naming the game Para-Social, this project ended up making use of all the creative skills that Josh had learnt during his practice. This includes the graphics and layout design required to make sure the information presented on the game pieces was clear and easy to read as well as illustrative work that went into creating the world and cast of characters within the game.
Josh began developing these skills starting in his foundation year at Exeter College where he originally went to study graphic design but ultimately decided to specialise in illustration instead. Whilst learning the fundamentals Josh was also working part time at print shop where he would create designs for various local companies which proved to be an extremely valuable experience. After studying illustration for a year, Josh decided to apply to the illustration course at The Northern School of Art where he was able to develop his practice further and try his hand at various disciplines within illustration across a range of different project before finally setting his own project brief in the third year of the course.
His style is inspired by the cartoons that got him into illustration in the first place with shows like Luke Pearson’s Hilda and Rebecca Sugar’s Steven Universe. He was obsessed with how these artists could take simple shapes and colours to create characters that were so full of life. This idea of focusing on shapes was at the forefront of his practice across all his projects even as his style changed and developed over the years. This rings especially true in Para-Social where he challenged himself to create 42 unique students each of which had to be distinct from each other whilst wearing almost the same outfits.
If you are interested in Para-Social and want to keep up with the project as well as any other future games developed by Josh, you can do so @nastyfreakgames on Instagram.