Scott Johnson is an American Illustrator who began his career in 1994 doing black & white ink drawings for tabletop roleplaying games such as Dungeons & Dragons (TSR), Mage: The Ascension (White Wolf Game Studio), and Rifts (Palladium Books). He soon became a regular contributor to the Palladium Books Megaverse, including the Palladium Fantasy RPG, Heroes Unlimited, Nightbane, RECON: Modern Combat, Systems Failure, and The Rifter.

By the end of the 1990s, Scott recognized how new digital pen tablets would soon impact the illustration market. He became an early adopter of this emerging technology, and began teaching himself digital illustration techniques using Adobe Photoshop. In 2000, his first digital color illustration was published by Palladium Books on the cover of The Rifter #11. Kevin Siembieda, the owner of Palladium Books, gave Scott opportunities to develop his new color style on the Rifts CCG and also the cover of the After the Bomb RPG. Over the next 5 years he created many covers for Palladium Books, but his most famous book cover from that time is undoubtedly the Rifts Ultimate Edition Main Rulebook, which has now been in print for more than 20 years.

In 2003 Games Workshop hired Scott to create Warhammer 40k covers for the novel Lord of the Night, the anthology paperback What Price Victory (also printed in the 2005 Warhammer Calendar), and the graphic novel Kal Jericho: Underhive Bounty Hunter. His most notable 40k cover, however, was originally for the comic book Warhammer Monthly #81 featuring Ephrael Stern, Sister of Battle. This art was later reprinted as the cover for the critically acclaimed The Daemonifuge: Heretic Saint paperback graphic novel, and reprinted yet again as the cover of the Daemonifuge large hardcover edition. Finally, it was included in The Art of Warhammer 40k hardcover book.

Also in 2003, Scott submitted his art to Marvel Comics hoping to create covers featuring the superheroes that influenced his childhood. American comic publishers were not yet publishing variant covers as a regular practice, but Marvel’s Creative Department was looking specifically for a digital illustrator to create art for licensed merchandise. Thus began a long relationship with Marvel, contributing to their vast library of digital art made available to licensees producing Marvel branded products.

In 2005, Marvel signed Scott to an exclusive contract, employing him full-time to be their primary merchandise artist. He worked directly with Tom Marvelli, the VP of Marvel Creative Services, to help guide the distinctive and memorable look of Marvel’s massive worldwide licensing campaign. Marvel secured prime shelf space at global retail chains like Walmart, Target, Toys R Us and others. The result was impactful; a new generation of young Marvel fans slept in Spider-Man decorated bedrooms, wore Hulk t-shirts, ate from X-Men lunchboxes, and did their homework with Avengers school supplies. Scott recruited, collaborated, and maintained quality control for the many other artists contributing to the project. All artwork for licensed merchandise at this time funneled through Scott for corrections and revisions, in order to maintain a consistent “house style” that was recognizably Marvel.   

By 2007, Marvel was taking control of their characters on the big screen by producing their own films. Scott’s focus shifted to licensing and promotional artwork for the debut Iron Man movie from Marvel Studios. The huge success of the film led to more MCU movies and a deluge of MCU licensed merchandise, including posters, clothing, toys, games and even Burger King Value meals. Over the following 12 years, he contributed licensing art for Iron Man 2, The Incredible Hulk, Captain America: The First Avenger, Thor, Iron Man 3, The Avengers, and every other subsequent MCU and Spider-Man film all the way through Avengers: Endgame.

By 2016 Scott’s artwork had already been appearing on Hasbro toy packaging for almost a decade, but due to changes in Marvel’s licensing operation (and also no longer being Exclusive to Marvel) he now began freelancing with Hasbro directly. Hasbro hired Scott to create art for Spider-Man toys, Ultimate Spider-Man action figures, Marvel Titan Hero Series, and Marvel Legends Series action figures.  

In 2017 Scott was given the opportunity to work on Transformers, lending his talents to help create promotional artwork for the animated Netflix trilogy and toy line War for Cybertron. He worked primarily as a colorist, layout, and finishing artist on posters and toy package art for the first two installments of the trilogy, Siege and Earthrise, which did not air until 2020. Later, Scott also did similar work for a proposed Transformers: Legacy animated series, but Netflix declined the proposal from Hasbro. Legacy did see life as a toy line, however, commemorating the 40th anniversary of the Transformers brand.

In 2018 Hasbro acquired the Power Rangers franchise from Saban Properties. Scott was hired to create promotional and licensing art for the new Power Rangers: Beast Morphers series on Netflix. His illustrations were used for advertising, convention booth displays, toy packaging, merchandise and even the Netflix menu screens for the series. Following Beast Morphers launch, Scott shifted his attention to G.I. Joe. But he would return to the Power Rangers franchise in 2021 to do promotional, licensing and toy package illustrations for the Power Rangers: Dino Fury TV series. Following Dino Fury, he briefly created merchandise and toy art for Power Rangers: Cosmic Fury before turning his attention to G.I. Joe full time.

Scott began doing artwork for the G.I. Joe franchise in 2019, beginning with marketing artwork that would be used for a variety of purposes including advertising, website graphics, and licensed merchandise other than the toys and action figures that Hasbro produced themselves. In many ways, this series of multi-use character illustrations was similar to the Marvel licensing art that he was doing 15 years earlier.

During this time he also created licensing artwork for the movie G.I. Joe Origins: Snake Eyes. These illustrations appeared on movie merchandise, posters, and the back panel of the movie action figure boxes that were part of Hasbro’s new G.I. Joe: Classified Series action figures.

Starting in 2023, Scott became one of Hasbro’s primary package artists for the G.I. Joe: Classified Series, creating the individual character illustrations adorning the front and side panels of the packaging. Since then Scott has created artwork for more than 65 action figures, making him the most prolific character artist of the G.I. Joe: Classified Series toy line.