Roller Girls and X-Men

Last weekend Fenny of Little Asian Sweatshop and I officially started our 2012 Season of selling with our first vending event of the year: The Charm City Roller Girls Double Header Bout in my hometown of Baltimore! It was a rousing success and it was great to see some of my Maryland friends at the show! This was also another show where we were able to accept credit cards via our Square readers- it makes a HUGE difference in sales. People are more likely to buy higher ticketed/multiple items if they don't have to part with their cash. Especially at stuff like this where there's other businesses like food stands that prefer cash.

Speaking of which- I also hadn't been to a CCRG bout in about 3 years- and as someone who went to their inaugural bout back in 2005(?) I'm super proud to see how far they've come! No more roller rink bouts! It was at night in an arena! And there were FOOD stands! With PIT BEEF AND BRATS!! :d YUM! And beer! And a guy selling gourmet marshmallows! Crazy! So I'm super proud of my home league of roller girls! And what an awesome bout to watch as well!

Fenny and our table (with sparkle table cloth upgrade)!
Right in the main foyer as you walked in-
we could even watch the whole bout from our seats!

Me! Yay!

The spread! I forgot my display fixtures so I
couldn't put out as many necklaces as I would have liked.
We still had a great-looking table regardless.

We also did specially-designed Little Asian Sweatshop flowers for the four CCRG teams: 

Night Terrors flower! Royal blue & black!

Mobtown Mod's target flower!

Speed Regime camo!

Junkyard Dolls hot pink zebra print!

Also! I dunno if you saw my last entry (see below), but I've started drawing for myself a little bit to allow some no-pressure 'practice time' between commissions ands major assignments so my skills stay sharp. So I've been drawing these X-Men redesigns of basically what the team members would look like if I was handed the title and told to go to town and remake the comic with my own little spin on the characters. Which if we TRULY want to indulge in the fantasy of for a second- I would co-write with one of my favorite comic writers ever, the awesome, awesome Adam Warren. ::wistful sigh:: GOD THAT WOULD BE AWESOME.

I already drew Rogue and Dazzler, who had one of my favorite rivalries in the 80's over who would end up 'dating' Longshot. (The Wolvie/Cyclops over Jean drama is pretty damn played, IMHO.) But anyways! Here's the designs for both Jean Grey and Gambit.

Jean Grey!
“You and I are quits now, X-men. Our paths will cross no more. My destiny lies in the stars.”
For Jean I wanted her to be what I envision to be like the hottest redheaded sexpot ever (seriously, like who DOESN'T want to do her in the X-Universe?), which I concocted as a combination of Dolly Read in Beyond The Valley of the Dolls, Daphne from Scooby Doo and a pinch of Marsha Brady. I also loved all her 60's outfits and I've been interested in the Mod style for a bit. I even worked in a subtle 'X' pattern on the dress.A lot of folks say she could easily be Mary Jane from Spider-Man, which while true- I'd actually make MJ taller, skinnier and her hair darker/flatter. More high fashion model-y. 

Gambit!
“Everyone can relax! Gambit has returned...”
I have a confession: I cannot STAND Gambit. He's just a gimmicky douchebag who's supposed to come off as this slick ladies man but it really just comes off as sleazy. Like you'd contract VD standing within 3 feet of him. I *tried* making Gambit cool and psychobilly, which I think would lend itself to the card suit theme I tried working into his look. It's hard to see but I have card suits on one set of knuckles and  'NOLA' on the other. If I had cared more I would have had a jacket/shirtless version that shows all his tattoos, cuz I imagine him covered with lots of old school tats having themes like playing cards, NOLA, being a thief/criminal, etc. Gambit's basically that skuzzily attractive guy who never bothered working on a personality because he got away with being so gosh darn handsome all the time. But if you stand within 3 feet of him you run the risk of contracting some form of VD. So yeah. 

I'm going to open up a gallery on the top menu of the blog here soon for all of these redesigns so you can see them together. I've been getting some nice little bits of exposure for these on Tumblr and the like thanks to blogs like Fashion Tips From Comic Strips, which focuses on the fashion found in the comic world. One of my faves, always cool stuff on there! Highly suggest it!

Next up I'm gonna try and draw up Cyclops, whom I have a pretty fun idea for (think 60s Michael Caine).