An Interview with Sam Mameli (Skullboy)

He is a full-time professional illustrator and a regular member of the Between Two Cairns team!

Sam Mameli (Skullboy) is a full-time professional illustrator and a regular member of the Between Two Cairns team, alongside Yochai Gal and Brad Kerr. You can explore more of Sam’s work at https://betterlegends.com/

Mario | La Esquina del Rol: Sam Mameli, welcome to La Esquina del Rol. I’m thrilled to have you here. When I interviewed Mark Conway about a year ago, I discovered that you illustrated the cover for Meatheads, and that’s when I first learned about you and your art. Then, I started hearing you on B2C over and over again, hahaha, and it’s been fantastic to listen to you there.

Sam Mameli (Skullboy): Hello! And thanks for having me!

Mario: Last week, I visited your website and checked out your portfolio—I was absolutely blown away! It turns out some of my favorite covers for games and adventures were illustrated by you, and I didn’t even know it, hahaha.

Thank you for the opportunity to learn more about you and your work in the tabletop RPG scene. To get started, I’d like you to introduce yourself to the community, so they can get to know who Sam Mameli is and what you do in the world of RPGs?

Sam Mameli: My name is Sam Mameli, and I go by "Skullboy" on the internet, I've been drawing things for TTRPGS since around 2013 and I've been a professional full time illustrator since 2018. My work is spread out around the OSR and DIY rpg scenes and I've also done some work in boardgames, videogames and lots of show posters for bands.

I'm glad you like the work, and the experience of "oh wait he drew that?" Is one that is very familiar to me lol. I try to adapt my style to fit the projects I take on and I think it makes me a little stealthy sometimes.

Mario: Honestly, I'm a bit absent-minded myself and don't always look at the credits page. But when someone says to me, “This is Sam's work” and I look at the artwork, it all starts to click. That moment when I realize that this is REALLY Sam's work is truly remarkable. What strikes me most is your ability to maintain your unique style while giving each illustration the flexibility to be exactly what it needs to be. I really admire that stealthy quality, like you say, which highlights your versatility and incredible skill as an illustrator, allowing you to create such diverse and distinct works.

Sam, at what point did tabletop RPGs and your art intersect, and what inspired you to explore that combination?

Sam Mameli: Thank you! That's very kind of you to say. I think ultimately no matter how hard I try to emulate something else it's always going to be done through the same visual language that I'm always working with so it will still look like me a bit- when I was younger and getting started this drove me crazy! (I wanted to draw just like all my heroes! Moebius, Akira Toriyama, Mike Mignola, ) but I see it as more of a feature than a bug these days, and I tend to like the things I make more now than I used to.

I've been playing TTRPGs since my freshman year of college in 2008. I played in a game of 4e the week that the books came out and I've been hooked ever since. Sometime later in college I found the OSR and Google+ and the Blogosphere and all that after getting fed up with a game of 3.5 that I was playing in. I've always done drawings for games that I played in but it wasn't until after I graduated with my art degree that I actually started doing commission work for people. At that time I was active on Tumblr and I found Sword & Backpack, the print it yourself "dungeonpunk" RPG by Gabe Soria. It struck me as a really cool little system and I really loved the tone that he wrote it in, so I did some fanart and he reached out to me to make some stuff for the next adventure he was working on. We still work together on various projects now, but it was doing that work that sent me down the rabbit hole for doing things like custom character sheets for people- I always did home made sheets for my games when I played so it was a fun way to make some extra cash while I figured my post-collegiate life out. The art school I attended spent a lot of time on theory but not much on business so I found myself working a lot of coffee shop jobs. While I did that I played in games online with folks and evetually started doing more and more paid work for peoples games. It all just sort of spun out from there!

Mario: Yeah! the truth is that the community is amazing. I started translating Yochai's game and I haven't stopped since. Things have flowed and it's gratifying how among the same people I've met there's a great sense of community and taking part in projects. It's really great and I totally understand you.

So, Sam, how has working in the TTRPG scene shaped your artistic style and creative process over the years? Are there any specific collaborations or projects that have left a lasting impact on your work?

Sam Mameli: I think TTRPGs are just one of the places that my style makes the most sense? I've been drawing weird monsters and characters for as long as I can remember, and I think TTRPGs gave me the framework to do a lot of art and text work together, and in doing that led me to finally making comics as well. I've been reading comics my whole life, and while I think I'm a good illustrator, my ability to plot out a story has always been really shaky. TTRPGs gave structure to storytelling for me and that's how I've been able to do comic work now. In terms of projects I think there have been a bunch that have just made me level up my artmaking- some that come to mind are the characters I did for the OSE rogues gallery, that was a lot of drawings and by the end I felt like my style had improved. The wimmelbilderbuch piece I did for Barkeep on the Borderlands book is another one, I had never done a piece like that but I really loved reading Richard Scary stuff as a kid, I learned a TON from that piece. And in some cases the lesson is to go fast and not think too hard, by far my best known work is Adventure Game in Need of Translation and I did all the work for that over a weekend.

Mario: Many illustrators have a distinctive style that consistently shines through their work, no matter the circumstances. How would you define your style, and what are the influences that have shaped it into something unmistakably created by Skullboy, rather than anyone else?

Sam Mameli: I'm more of a cartoonist than antyhing else in terms of style. I studied art in school and I'm able to do realistic portraiture and things like that but ultimately I enjoy the act of simplifying things into cartoons. It's tough for me to define myself but I think my style is always trying to take a freeze frame of a chaotic or soon to be chaotic moment. I try to make my characters feel relatable, so that even though they're usually in fantastical situations they look kind of like regular people? I'm influenced a lot by looking at crowds of people and how they interact and what everyone is wearing and doing. I really love people watching, and I think that influences my work a lot.

Mario: This is always a tough question. What are the three pieces that have represented a milestone for you or that have simply been a before and after in your career as an illustrator? If you can tell us a little bit about why you chose them, that would be great

Sam Mameli: This one from Phantasmagoria #2 by Chance Phillips comes to mind. I think I did this in 2019 or so? It might have been earlier- It was a piece that I saw in my head as soon as the prompt was delivered and I think I did the whole thing in a weekend. I think this is the first one that I did that really went crazy with detail work and it set the tone for a lot of work after.

This is one I did for an issue of "Rolled and Told" and I think was a really good piece for me in terms of color palettes. I still really like the lighting in this.

This one was a milestone not just because it took ages and was fairly complicated- but it's my first Album cover and I always really wanted to have done an Album cover. It's also legit a great album I highly recommend it.

Mario: You won't believe it, but those images are the ones that first called me when I saw your portfolio. You've done wonderful things I can't say otherwise, but there's something about them that makes them great. I would like to know how you approach your creative process when creating your art? do you have some steps already defined or does inspiration just find you working?

Sam Mameli: Well it depends on what I'm creating for. I do a lot of contract work because I'm a professional illustrator, so I have a process for that and I also still make art that's just personal work that no one is paying me up front for. When it comes to client work it usually goes like this:

A client approaches me and says that they would like to work together. If I have time for the project I ask for more details and a budget that we're working within. When I have that information I usually do a couple of thumbnails and give the client a chance to give their input and then from there I proceed with the finished piece. It's a lot of back and forth and it tends to be more on the mechanical side. When I've been working with a client over a long time this process is far more fluid and intuitive. There are some folks I've been working with for many years now and it's much easier to know what they're looking for.

When it comes to my own work it's a really different process. Usually I'll be trying to read a book or watch a show and I'll get an idea that sort of interrupts my day and I have to work on it. It's almost annoying. Like a buzzing fly or a hungry cat. So when that happens I kind of just have to drop what I'm doing and draw. Usually this things take less time because the image is in my head already. When I do work for others I have to build the image in my head to meet what they're looking for. When it's for myself it's just committing the idea to reality.

Mario: Of everything you have illustrated, what topics would you like to explore or are excited to do but have not been commissioned to do so far?

Sam Mameli: I think right now most of my interest is in comics. I think it would be really cool to do some comic collaborations with game designers to showcase how their worlds and systems work. I think the portion of gamebooks that deal with "example play" are really useful and I think doing something like that as a comic could open it up to a bigger audience.

Mario: There is a very cool example of what you say at the beginning of the Echo Mofos book and I think it's a great idea. Hopefully what you said will reach more designers, I would love to see those comics explaining about the game.

Hey, and why the Skullboy alias? Where did that alias come from?

Sam Mameli: haha Skullboy came from when I was trying to be an art streamer, I don't remember why I chose it but it felt like it fit. I always liked when artists took cool pen names like Moebius though, so it's in that tradition.

Mario: hahaha that's the origin of the best aliases, La Esquina del Rol stands for RPG Corner and it was the first thing that came to my mind when I created my Twitter account hahaha.

Sam Mameli: It's important to leave the heavy lifting of names to the sleeping mind, first answer is almost always best!

Mario: And currently, which three role-playing game artists do you like the most about their work and why do you like what they are doing?

Sam Mameli: I think Amanda Lee Franck is doing some really incredible work. She has a a flexible yet distinct style and her art just has so much SOUL. It's mythic and horrifying and charming and her linework is superb.

Another favorite is Peter Mullen. His work excels at showcasing the scale of OSR play. The figures are always crawling around in these massive and beautiful spaces. He just really knows how to make something look perfectly gnarled and twisted.

Bruno Prosaiko is another one that just GETS it. Like, you look at the work and you can just see the type of game we're all striving for. It's a perfect blend of comedic and mythic tones and the way it flows is just amazing.

A few quick shoutouts to some of my other favs though- Goran Gligovic, Mun Kao, JP Coovert, Jason Thompson, Alex Damaceno, Marie Enger, Stephan Poag, Doug Kovacs, Skullfungus, Chaoclypse, Dave Hoskins, Shafter Brown, Stonedrunkwizard, Nate Treme, and I'm sure a bunch that I'm forgetting.

Mario: There are a lot of really amazing people out there, all my support and love for their work! What is "made by humans" is really unique and amazing!

Now I would like to talk about your participation in B2C. I don't remember when I first heard you there but I do remember the many times you have been there. How did you meet Yochai and Brad?

Sam Mameli: So Brad got in touch with me a while before I was on the pod to work on a piece for his book Wyvern Songs. I liked working with him and later I listened to the podcast. I was immediately charmed by the dynamic of the two of them and I sent them an email saying that I'd like to make a sticker for them if they were interested. They said yes and also invited me to be on an episode, It has since spun out of control entirely lol. I was originally only doing occasional guest spots to review old modules but I have since become a regular member- so I am now the 3rd guy on a 2 guy podcast.

Mario: I love listening to you on the podcast, you three seem to get along great and it's fun to listen to that two person podcast with three haha.

Now, I'd love to learn what you like to play when you have time?

Sam Mameli: We do have a lot of fun, and I'm really happy to be a part of it.

In terms of games I'm currently running a Swords and Wizardry game for my wife and inlaws. I also play a solo dungeon crawl game from time to time that I use to fuel the story of my comic Delvers. Other than that I've been embracing mostly lots of convention games because I really prefer playing with people IRL to online. I played in several really amazing games over the pandemic though that I wouldn't trade for anything. Other than that I like playing cribbage with my wife and occasional board games with friends. I'm in the process of trying to get into the rhythm of running a weekly open table game but so far this year is proving to be pretty busy so I haven't managed to lock that in yet.

Mario: Nice, what can you tell us about your work with comics and where can we get them?

Sam Mameli: I've only recently started making what I think of as traditional comics, but looking back at my work I think it's the best way to describe a lot of the books I've released- not all of it is panel structured but it's all pictures and words and much of it is only gameable if you decide to put in the legwork to do so. You can get the .pdfs of them on my itch.io page and you can get physical copies of some of them on my webstore. Delvers, my ongoing adventure comic is also now available in webcomic form here https://delvers.thecomicseries.com/

Mario | La Esquina del Rol: Thanks for sharing that with us. It's been great to learn more about you and get to know a little more of your work. You are really very kind and I have enjoyed talking with you. For those interested in commissioning art or other types of collaborations, where is the best place to reach you?

Sam Mameli (Skullboy): Thanks so much for having me! It's been great and I've enjoyed talking with you as well. You can get in touch with me by going to Betterlegends.com - all my info is there.

And that's all, my friends! I hope you enjoyed getting to know a bit about Sam. Big thanks to Yochai Gal for his support in making this interview possible.