Hey guys! Lots of random, neat stuff going on at the Paigey labs. Thought I'd share it with you!
~I got my very own cosplayer!! Super awesome cosplay chica Jennifer Rose dressed up as my Rockabilly Rogue from my X-Men redesigns (that I still want to draw more of, but alas...) at this year's Dragon*Con! She NAILED IT! I'm already plotting to steal her sweater clips. Apparently she'll be at NYCC and I really hope to get a picture or two with her- cuz OMG! :D
~Also after returning from Baltimore Comic Con I decided to reinvest my profits into some fun new merch, this time around being my first sets of full color, all weather vinyl stickers (a la Stickermule.com). So far I've got my chibi Bride of Frankenstein made and I've got my Miss Mary Jane on a pipe and my Nurse on a pill coming super-super soon in sticker form. I'm super happy with Stickermule's stickers. They look great and have this nice rubbery matte texture that's unlike any stickers I've really seen around. The prices are also reasonable, there's low minimums so you don't have to buy a BAZILLION stickers with each order and the shipping was way fast. There's a wide variety of product as well. I highly suggest them for your sticker needs.
~I'm getting some of my original vellum inks of the art I did right before Baltimore Con together and have been finishing them in that weird technique I've been doing where I color them like animation cels. Here's some quick videos and process shots!
Also: haha, I'm a dork.
…so I totally ‘ship’ Wanda Woodward from Cry-Baby with Biff Tannen from Back to the Future. I mean they’re like MADE FOR EACH OTHER. They’re both SO HOT AND SO MEAN. Wanda could have moved to Cali after the events of Cry-Baby and met up with Hill Valley’s most loved degenerate somehow and.. and…. Hey! Where are you going???
So with Heroes over, my credit card is getting wrung out for all that it's worth. As a result, I did something I should have done BEFORE the show and offered single inked and greytoned marker character sketches (with no bg) for $75 a pop. That are on vellum, like the rather popular little Batgirl pic I did here.
That specific piece went for $200 on auction this Sat at Heroes. So yeah,not a bad deal. I only recently started selling my originals, as they are starting to take up too much room in my studio, so these are to be pretty rare, frameable pieces that whoever bought will have the one true, original copy of. To make toning easier with the markers, as they are done by hand- I also am coloring said commissions digitally in the more 'traditional' Paigey-style as I need to do a practice run to map out where my shadows are going to hit. So yay! The catch: For the time being, I only had 5 slots open for this offer, which was announced over my Facebook, Twitter and Tumblr accounts. Also, I was only doing fictional characters, not portraits. So no pics of people's wives, girlfriends, kids, etc. Sorry but too many egos get wrapped up in those kind of pieces and it infringes on my process. So revisions and progress shots ain't happening. You get what I'll give you, but if you're a fan of mine and pick a character that plays to my artistic strengths (boobs are aways a good start ~__^ ) I assure you you'll like what you get. Not saying I'll never do portraits of real people ever again, but that's not for this offer. I wanted to get these done quick and dirty. The experiment was a rousing success, with all five character slots being scooped up and payed for (the MOST important part!) in less than a week. I definitely want to do this again- it was A LOT of fun and I got a chance to put my own twist on some characters I wouldn't have otherwise thought to draw on my own. I'm steadily trying to build that trust/reputation with my artwork that if you give me something to draw, I will rock the shit out of it.
So anyways, onto all the awesome commissions everyone got!!
Big Barda "I'm not so bad. A little rough, maybe -- but once you get to know me -- I can be a real pussycat."
Lady Death "Queen of all that's dead or dying, baby..."
Columbia, from Rocky Horror Picture Show "It was great when it all began, I was a regular Frankie fan..."
Storm "The elements marshal their infinite might at my beckoning! Power seethes in the roiling clouds! Now, at my command -- STRIKE!"
A Baltimore Pinup Girl “I would never want to live anywhere but Baltimore. You can look far and wide, but you'll never discover a stranger city with such extreme style. It's as if every eccentric in the South decided to move north, ran out of gas in Baltimore, and decided to stay.” -John Waters
And an extra bonus piece!!
Baltimore icons Mister Boh of National Bohemian Beer and the UTZ Potato Chip Girl "Oh Boy!"
I've got a couple more Baltimore-centric ideas for pinups- my friends and fans in Baltimore (my hometown) are VERY kind to me and I always like to do a little extra for them. Think I may pump those out before Baltimore Comic Con in September and see if I can get some postcard sets made. Which I will certainly also post to etsy. We'll see what my schedule looks like, as I have A LOT on my plate for the next couple months.
Just finished up this wicked beast of a private commission for a fellow who loved my derby version of Dazzler so much he wanted to see more. (See her and the rest of my X-Men redesigns here!) This was definitely an instance of having a commission piece that if you give me an open timeframe and let me just do what I want you will get something awesome. It took me a little over a month and a half of off-and-on working with very little guidance from the guy who ordered it- he just wanted an action shot with Dazzler and I kinda took that ball and ran with it, adding in the Hellfire Club goons and various background elements. I'm trying to get away from portraits a bit as customers tend to get overly involved in the process which hinders the creativity of the piece and get more into character pieces where I can just cut loose without worrying about likenesses and waiting to hear back during the process. Once I got the idea for this piece in my head I was all "I'm really gonna hate myself in a month..." but I HAD to do it. There were just way too many things I love coming together. Plus me doing a piece with an actual background? Craziness! That was actually what took me the longest. Check out my progress shots below!
Sketching!
I tend to sketch out the elements separate and then lay them on top of each other digitally in Photoshop to make sure they line up and adjust any wonky anatomy issues. I'll then print it out on a low opacity setting to use as guidelines when I re-draw it and tighten up the linework.
Tight Pencils!
Drawing over top of my lightened roughs, I start cleaning up all those stray lines and start refining the figures.
Inking!
I recently revisited the old technique I learned at Kuberts of inking over vellum and forgot how much I prefer it to lightboxing my tight pencils onto a piece of bristol, as when I lightbox the original I tend to lose the organic feel of the piece and subtle linework tends to get lost in the reproduction.
More inking!!
I love drawing men's leg hair. It's a weird drawing fetish.
Colors!
I tend to work in with about 20 layers when I color, treating each major element like a big Dagwood-style sandwich- I start with my linework, then add the flat color underneath, then start working up from the flat color with each 'level' of shadows and highlights. I tend to color in flat chunks, almost like an animation cel.
You can also see that I changed the colors on Dazzler's pads halfway through to make her stand out more from the Hellfire Club.
Adding the background and special effects!
When I'm 90% done is my least favorite part of working on something. It just gets so grinding and you spend most of the time looking for all the little details you missed. XP
This was super fun to do, and I got to expand a little on my own make-believe rendition of the X-Men universe. What's funny is in my version of the X-Men, Dazzler is probably one of the tougher, more in-shape characters on the team, which in regular continuity is quite the opposite.
So I'm going a bit crazy with some sketching the last few nights, and figured I'd share some of what I've been working on!
I've simultaneously got both colors and the background sketch going on with my Derby Dazzler vs. Hellfire Club commission. (See earlier progress shots here!) The guy who got it has been super-cool with letting me do what I want at my own pace. Commissions for portraits, which I usually do, are fun and rewarding but they're usually for a specific deadline (birthday/wedding) and some people can get very touchy over likenesses. And revisions, revisions, revisions. Oye. But yeah, people seem to really dig my versions of comic characters, now if only *someone* would give me a job doing that.
::POINTED SIGH::
This is the kinda stuff I want to do more of. <3
MOAR X-Men Redesigns:
More X-Men redesigns. This is alt.model Psylocke in her British body,
I'll be drawing her Japanese body as well.
Another X-Redesign: DJ Nightcrawler.
I'm also in 10-week crunch time for my most favorite/important comic convention of the year: beloved Heroescon in Charlotte, NC! YAY!! Last year was my first time and I had an absolute BLAST! Now I'm coming back and I'll have Little Asian Sweatshop and Maria Danalakis in tow as we vend from our BIG AWESOME GIANT BOOTH! Woot!!
I'm hoping by the time Heroes rolls around the Sweatshop and I will have a prototype of the *DRESSES* we plan to start making together that will feature fabric designed by me! I'm figuring out how to make an omnidirectional fabric swatch to get printed now- and drawing little pinup girls and accompanying elements. My first fabric is going to be luchadora (Mexican wrestlers) themed. I know- random! But it's definitely fun to draw! Hopefully even more fun to wear! So excited about this!
A fierce little luchadora.
More luchadoras and some ideas for elements, like a bell.
On this day 5 years ago I moved to NYC to live with the man I love, carrying out one of the single best and scariest decisions of my life. It was scary because the risk was so high. If it all went well- I'd be living a dream come true. I'd be where I belong. But if it failed, I'd be chewed up and spit out and would have marked the second time in my life I had to crawl back to the primordial suburban ooze from whence I came. I had never lived on my own before. To go from the safety of my parent's basement, tucked away in a Maryland suburban cul-de-sac to the biggest, brightest, craziest city in the United States. The mythology of it makes my head spin. The city where songs have been written, movies have taken place, shows have been filmed, universes have been built upon. I have had a love affair with New York City since the first time I visited in high school for some art field trip. We only went to the Met and saw the Rockettes, but God, I wanted to stay. Thank God we didn't go anywhere near the Lower East Side. I'd have run away with the gutter punks. One of the times I went during Kubert School I kept one of the subway tokens I didn't end up using and strung it on a shitty shotbead chain around my neck. Almost like a promise to myself. Or some sort of totem. That was 1999. I rarely took it off. I thought I lost it while attending Dragon*Con 2004 and was so unbelievably upset. It showed up again though and it is one of my most precious pieces of jewelry. I still wear it everyday. Moving to NYC has allowed me to pursue my dreams of being a career artist in ways I would have never dreamed possible. This city has enabled me to make connections and friendships with amazing, creative, DRIVEN people who continue to inspire me. Had you told me 8 years ago that my life would be as it is now I'd have laughed in your face. I had thought the most I could hope for was getting full-time at Hot Topic and a studio apartment behind the local Target with my burnout boyfriend at the time who I had to MAKE get a job at Starbucks. My sole confidante was my supposed best friend, who sabotaged any attempt to better myself at every turn. It's a testament to my gumption that with all the setbacks I suffered at her hand that I still emerged as driven as I am. I was told on a daily basis that I was wasting my talents. Spinning my wheels in the mud. That there was more for me out there. Moving to New York was the new start I needed. One by one I severed connections to those that dragged me down and I am so much better for it. I now have real, true friends that support me along with career success that has been a long time coming in a city I love with the man of my dreams.
Haha, but yeah sorry I got all sentimental and TL;DR on you. You probably just wanna see some art, huh?
Cyclops! “Energy blasts, huh? Here’s one from a pro!” I think Cyclops gets a bad rep. I think people think just because you're a leader you gotta be square, which doesn't have to be true. There's plenty of cool leaders of teams (Hannibal of the A-Team for instance). And a guy can play it super straight and severe and still be cool. Cyclops is a very necessary member of the X-Men. Plus he's one of the more iconic members of the X-Men. I've always loved the visor. So with my version of Scott I wanted to really play up the old 'Slim' nickname, and what better way to accentuate how skinny a guy is than by putting him in a tailored Mod suit. I also modeled his looks a lot from old pictures of Michael Caine from stuff like Get Carter and The Italian Job. Just super cool, like you never ever see him sweat. Plus I wanted him and Jean to really LOOK like they're supposed to be together. Like they come as a set.
I'm also working on a private commission featuring an action shot of my Dazzler redesign. It was too fun not to pass up. Right now I'm just finishing up inks, but you can check out some progress shots I took of the piece so far. I'm having her skate against a team of Hellfire club Goons- much like her first appearance!
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).
Hey hey hey! So my insanely awesome year of the Paigey Roadshow is starting to gear up! Got lots of new merch cooked up and I'm excited to be vending at some all-new, all-different venues, including some roller derby bouts and concerts in my home state of Maryland alongside my BFF's store Little Asian Sweatshop. The first up in my adventures is in two weeks- Charm City Roller Girls Home Season Double Header on Saturday March 10 from 5:30-10:00 at Du Burns Arena in Baltimore. If you're in the area, I suggest you check it out! CCRG helped me get my first exposure in the art world when I did derby portraits and bout posters for them back when they first started up.
Speaking of all-new, all-different- I'm taking a little art time to myself for the next couple weeks and doing some redesigns of the characters that got me into comics in the first place, being the Uncanny X-Men. These versions of the characters have been running in my head for awhile so why not draw them? Trying to have a callback to the X-Men of the late 80's when everyone had different looks and everyone had their own unique presence in the team. And lots and lots of COLORS!
Rogue! “You look as nervous as a long-tailed cat in a room full of rocking chairs.” My version of Rogue still has the Carol Danvers/Ms Marvel powers (obviously) and since she's super strong and near invulnerable with the power of flight, she doesn't see the point in working out as crazily as some of her teammates, hence her being a little curvier. Plus she's from the south and eats fried everything. And she's voiced by the chick who did her voice in 90's X-Men, because that is my definitive Rogue voice.
Dazzler! “Call me Dazzler, darlin’. That’s my name — and that’s what I do. Dazzle people.” My version of Dazzler (one of my all time have comic characters) is a roller derby girl, obviously a lead jammer. And she probably sings in a band or something when she's not playing derby. I imagine her as one of those effortlessly cool girls who has a zillion awesome projects going on but can't hold a day job to save her life. So you always end up paying for her beer. One of my fave details I came up with was the mirrorball helmet, and the runs in her opaque blue tights were fun to figure out how to draw (esp the blown-out crotch, which is always the first to go with me at least).
I've got ideas for the rest of the core Blue/Gold team as well, which I'll put up as I finish. I'm actually working on a Gambit next. Which should be fun, cuz I DO NOT LIKE Gambit, so this will be my attempt at making a Gambit I like while still making him recognizable as Gambit.
KingCon Brooklyn was this past weekend, and also marks the end of my big convention year for 2010!
Me at my table on Saturday- rocking my new Louise Black corset!
Another 2 day con (thank goodness- 3 day cons kill me...) I worked at my table and sold all day Saturday. Sunday I sold the first half of the day then took part modeling in a special mini Dr Sketchy's session and afterwards spoke in my first panel ever! Excitement!
I also met legendary X-Men write Chris Claremont! He created Kitty Pryde!! He was impressed by my tattoo! I was also super duper nervous to talk to him.
I was also part of a video made by The Brooklyn Cowboy who asked around the con What makes Brooklyn awesome?
Go ahead and pretend my feathers ain't luxurious...
Sunday afternoon I got to model for Dr. Sketchy's Anti Art School, a bi-monthly cabaret life drawing session and worldwide phenomenon I usually attend as a guest artist with my friend Christy. I've been attending Dr. Sketchy's for about 2 years now and have become friends with Sketchy's founder Molly Crabapple, who I practically squealed with glee at via email when she asked me if I would like to wear the showgirl outfit I wore to NYCC to the KingCon Sketchy's session as a model. I was ALL ABOUT IT! I even made a little playlist just for the occasion!
NYC BFF Christy got some great shots from the session (which you can see above on the flickr slideshow) and I had a GREAT TIME modeling! I even got to be in the Dr. Sketchy BLOG!!! XD I hope to have more opportunities to model for life drawing sessions (of the non-nude variety) as I have a TON of crazy outfits and costumes I could utilize. Just sayin'. ;)
After the Sketchy's session, I got to take part in my first ever panel discussion for 'Hips, Lips and Pencil Tips: Sexualization of Women in Comics from a Feminist Viewpoint'. Thought it'd be funny to keep my showgirl costume on, as it was a main part of my talking points regarding my own experiences in the comics medium.
It was a really great panel, I almost wished it had been recorded. Everyone had really interesting perspectives and stories to share about how their sexuality has come into play as a comic book artist.
What I talked about:
~How when I was 12 I was looking for porn but found comics. My story of discovering my first comic while hunting for my dad's vintage Playboys/Penthouse Forums that my brother had gotten ahold of. While searching under my brother's bed I came across 2 comics: Uncanny X-Men #236 and #243, which started me on my lifetime obsession of comics, and Wolverine being naked.
Better than porn.
~Being my own 'booth babe'- Utilizing my past as a cosplay girl as well as my costume/dressup obsession as a tool to grab people's interest in my table/artwork at conventions with choice of dress (what I call my 'con drag'), using sales techniques from when I was a tv salesperson (yet another male-dominated industry I fell into) such as standing 90% of the time, eye contact with customers and starting up conversations with total strangers. Putting on the 'Paigey' persona at conventions which is basically just a friendlier, more outgoing and energetic version of myself than say, when I am at home in my sweatpants actually creating the artwork I hock at conventions.
~Alot of my pinup artwork has helped me embrace my own sexuality with more confidence, especially as I myself have become more 'womanly' in my proportions over the years. And since I've moved to NYC I've gained an exposure to and ultimately a fascination with burlesque and it's history, which has served as an amazing resource of inspiration not only for my artwork but to myself as well as that is a community which is accepting of women in so many shapes, sizes and colors.
I'm sure there was other stuff I went on about, as I tend to ramble when put on the spot, but I'm very excited to see what 2011 has in store for me convention-wise.
