contemporary

Calla in Color: Mango and Strawberry Paper Doll

I will be at work late tonight, so I am writing this post early in the morning. I do evening reference shifts about twice a month and I enjoy it. Since I work down in the Special Collections, I tend to get specialized varieties of questions, but when I’m at the reference desk, I get all sorts of random questions. My favorite was an evening when I got asked about both Chinese acrobats and the economics of fisheries on the Gulf of Mexico.

Anyway, my point is that when writing blog entries early in the morning, you have to lower your standards for my coherence.

 

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color-swatch-mangoWhen I use these cheery fruity colors, I always find myself thinking of the tropics. I imagine Calla walking the streets of somewhere warm- Miami or Brazil- and drinking something iced out of a coconut. By the way, I totally think Kandi would steal the black skirt with the pink piping.

I seem to have some weird conviction that tropical colors means tropical places.

The only downside of writing posts in the morning is that it makes it so I end up posting two in the same day…. I shall have to think on that one was a problem. Oh well….

Calla in Colors… Avacado and Cream Paper Dolls

There’s something intensely 1970’s about this color scheme on Calla. Avacado is a color I’ll always associate with the 1970s. My highschool was decorated in avocado, burnt orange and sort of a muddy yellow color. Whenever anyone talks about how “classic” a color combination is, I think back to the rather horrid colored lockers and wonder if some design team thought that about them.

Of course, after I graduated, they did a remodel and now it’s a much more attractive grey, red and teal building.

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color-swatch-avacado (1)I have included the color swatch for this set, so you can see how the colors turned out when put on the actual paper doll. I usually collect colors on swatches if I am doing a large set (such as the Flock Modern Girl) and then keep them carefully saved as a file called something creative like “Color Palette”. I am particularly pleased with how nicely Calla’s warm mocha skin tone goes with the spicey orange red color and, in hindsight, I wish I’d used more of it in the set.

My love of Calla’s hair remains intense.

By the way, I just discovered a new paper doll blog. I am rather annoyed that I didn’t know it existed before this. I am so out of the loop sometimes… Yeesh. Paper Doll School is fairly new on the blog scene, only been around since June. I adore her tutorials and will probably be trying out some of her techniques myself, especially her advice on Photoshop, a tool I’m always trying to learn more about. Plus she has the cutest grinning bride paper doll on her blog. So, go visit her if you get a chance.

Calla in Colors… Black and White Paper Doll

So, Calla started out as a hip-hop infused paper doll project born out of my own ignorance of the genre. I don’t think that, in the end, she looks terribly hip-hop, but I did my best.

Calla began when one of my student workers and I got into a conversation about Chicago hip-hop style that ended with her giving me the names of several brands including Apple Bottoms, Rocawear and Baby Phat. Using their designs as a starting point, I carefully researched and then drew Calla’s face.

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For the next three days, I’ll be posting a different version of this paper doll in color each day.

Somewhere between the “head” being drawn and the clothing being drawn my own natural inclination for pin-tucks and pleats took over. So… I guess Calla is less of a hip-hop paper doll than she was meant to be. I still think she’s really really cute.
Each of these swatches is a little different. And each one was adapted and became one set of colors I used when coloring a version of Calla including the skin and hair colors, but not the eye or lip colors.

color-swatch-peaches (1) color-swatch-mango color-swatch-avacado (1)

I’m curious about which one people like the best, so I have a poll in the sidebar. It will be up for a few days. 🙂

Dead Roses: Gothic Paper Doll

I feel a little weird saying this is in color when the color is mostly black…

Not the most cheerful color scheme ever developed for a paper doll. I almost made it all black, but that seemed a bit much, even for Gothic Marisole. If you look closely, you’ll see one of my usual tricks for keeping things from looking totally “flat” is to use shades of the same color. So while everything is “black” there is still some definition between the various parts of the garments. I actually did this Marisole in four shades of very very dark grey which look black, but still allow the line work to be seen.

It’s all an illusion.

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So, Meredith asked: I think a ballerina paper doll would be cool or mabey a pool / summer themed doll also for some ting tiffrent you could do dolls theamed ot colors of the rainbow

how long have you been drawing paper dolls for?
could you do a cow girl paper doll that would be cool and diffrent

To answer the easiest question, I have been drawing paper dolls for as long as I can really remember. It began when my mother would draw me a doll as a bribe for cleaning my room or other activity and then I had to draw the clothing. Eventually, that evolved into drawing my own paper dolls, though I still prefer clothing to the dolls.

As for your requests, I have added them to my list of ideas. I usually keep a running list of ideas, but since most paper dolls are drawn weeks (sometimes months) before they eventually get posted, I can’t promise anything as far as doing any of those ideas. And I probably won’t to the ballerina, because tutu’s scare me.

To answer a related question, Tawny asked: What is your favorite sort of paper doll to draw? I mean… I think eeery thing you do is great, but what do you like to do the most?

I like drawing everything. I do find I tend to return to certain themes a lot. I like things that are a little alt-fashion inspired and a little fantasy inspired. I often draw from fashion magazines, because it makes deciding what to draw simpler. I always fear that I will fall into a rut and draw the same thing over and over again. I try to keep things interesting using reference images and other materials.

Got a question you want me to answer on the blog?Ask me here.

Dead Roses: Gothic Fashion Paper Doll

There are paper doll sets that go together all smooth and easy and I’m like, wow… this was so simple. And then… then there are sets like this one. It took me four tries to get everything to fit on one page and when it finally came together properly, I found myself thinking- “Why was this so easy? It as hard the last three times I tried it…”

Seriously… ugh…

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On the upside, I have here, in honor of Halloween and October and things, a traditional Gothic paper doll. When I was in high school, a longer time ago than I like to admit, the big trends were Gothic and Punk, now both seem to have given way to Steampunk and various forms of Gothic Lolita sort of styles.

And yes, I am using capitalization in the proceeding paragraph for emphasis, because I Like doing that.

Clearly spending a Sunday afternoon trying to get little paper pieces of clothing to fit on a page puts me in a grouchy feisty mood… so I shall go away now and work on the rest of this weeks posts.

I don’t think its too much of a spoiler to say that the color version will feature a lot of black. She is Gothic after all.

Striped Paper Doll Clothes

Clearly, I thought that the Dictionary Girl’s needed to get a little more rough and tumble…. so here they are… rough and tumbling (Is it just me or does that sound like a sexual innuendo?).

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I feel as though I need to say this, since I seem to get a lot of comments or questions that start with an apology- Please ask me question. Please make requests. Please feel free to inquire if I’ve ever done a style or a kind of paper doll. I will respond. I might take a few weeks days but I do try to get back to people.

Not promising that I’ll do a certain style of paper doll, but I try to reply as much as I can to comments and am grateful for everyone I receive.

I just thought I should state that somewhere.

On a fairly unrelated note, it is Speak Like a Pirate Day, so I went in search of a few pirate paper dolls. The pickings were not impressive. Final Fantasy Paper Dolls Made by Animama depict several of the Final Fantasy characters (none of whom I confess I know), but have some stylish pirate wear and fair number of other tongue in cheek outfits.

Lady Pirate Paper Doll depicts a beautiful black and white winged lady pirate. There are other printable paper dolls as well.

The Best Friends… A Bunch of Printable Paper Dolls

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{Click Here to Download for a PDF of all pages of this paper doll to Print}
So, this is going to be a Big Image, Small Post sorta day.

Here are the eight pages which make up the Best Friends paper doll set. (Yeah, I need better names for these things… I’m not good with names…)

My goal with this set of paper dolls was to experiment with slightly different body builds and poses while maintaining a similar enough over all style that the paper dolls would seem cohesive. I’ve never tried to draw this way before. I think I succeeded, but only because I drew them all at once. I can’t imagine trying to do this any other way.

Eventually, this set might get a sequel, but probably not for a little while.

I was going to wait until Monday to have my first paper doll post since I went on haitus, but I felt like people waited for two months and the least I could do was give some rapid paper doll gratification.

I hope everyone in the United States is having a fantastic Labor Day weekend. I have spent mine getting caught up with some work things, eating delightful barbecue and tomorrow I might do something radical and go see a movie. Mostly, I’m enjoying getting the time off work to get a little more settled here in Alabama.

Flock Modern Girl: Magnetic Paper Dolls

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So, I know I said these would be up last week (or maybe the week before that), but some things came up and I didn’t get around to it. The irony is that I drew this set last year and it’s been sitting on my desktop waiting to be finished for a while.

I tried to make sure each page of this set was a consistent color scheme, so that each page can be printed and played with alone, along with combining with the other pieces in the set. I walso wanted to play a little with the options of a magnetic set of paper dolls which are different than the options for a non-magnetic set of paper doll. I think magnetic paper dolls have interesting options, but are not the same as paper paper dolls for various reasons.

The Modern Girl Set PDF Downloads
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Dove PDF Download Oriole PDF DownloadPhoebe PDF Download
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Robin PDF DownloadStarling PDF DownloadWren PDF Download
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Clothing Set 1
PDF Download		Clothing Set 2 PDF DownloadClothing Set 3 PDF Download
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Clothing Set 4
PDF Download		Clothing Set 5 PDF DownloadClothing Set 6 PDF Download
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Clothing Set 7
PDF Download		Clothing Set 8 PDF Download

Tie-neck Blouses in Seventies colors for Paper Dolls

The thing I like about the Dictionary Girls is that they have very few outfits per post. And I enjoy getting to color retro inspired clothing, though I have plans to expand into some other styles in the future for them. Tie neck blouses are a fashion stable, even I own a few.

The truth is that I “rediscovered” this set of paper doll clothes under another pile of papers on my desk.

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I am not a terribly organized person. I try to be. I’m a librarian, so people always assume I’m organized, but the truth is that I live in a pretty much constant state of chaos. I love watching home decorating shows, because I admire people who are organized. The truth is that I am surrounded by piles of papers most of the time. I live, at the moment, in a tiny graduate student apartment and the result is that my desk (and often my couch) is covered in piles. I try to at least clean up the piles once in a while, sort of through them and look at what is stacked up.

On any given day, I might have old drafts of school work, half finished letters to family (which I write and then forget to send.. a bad habit) and then, of course, paper doll things. I collect around me things for ideas. I’m always low on them, so I need to have inspiration at hand. I buy fashion magazines and also those hair style magazines. I usually have a few rough drafts of doll poses and xeroxes of dolls in need of clothing. My world is full of fragments of this obsessive hobby of mine.

I’m moving soon, so I guess they’ll be the time to organize my paper doll supplies, other art supplies and school things. So much to do…

Oh, by the way, I’m having a drawing. Enter if you haven’t. 🙂

Meet Ethan… Boy Coloring Pages Paper Doll

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{PDF Download of all four pages for Ethan and his Wardrobe}

Confession time: I think men’s clothing is boring.

I know I shouldn’t, but I do.

Historically speaking, there’s some neat stuff for men, but right now it’s all trousers and shirts and jeans and shirts and suits and maybe some swim trunks and really… that gets old.

Still, my poll in January (and I, like apparently the candidates for president, take polling seriously) said that what people wanted to see was male paper dolls.

Originally, Ethan here had a girlfriend or just a friend… I shouldn’t make assumptions about my paper doll’s sexual orientation. However, I thought she looked like she’d just been hit with a brick or something, so I decided not to post her or draw her any clothing. She won’t be returning to the blog unless I decide I really feel like it and I doubt it.

Instead, I gave him a some clothing (including a styling Star Trek uniform) and have posted him.