So, this isn’t a very big update, but I did get some more clothes for the Magnetic Marisole series formatted and resized for the magnetic dolls. All contemporary stuff. I brought some magnetic paper dolls to one of my hosts over my travels and she remarked that she really thought her magnetic paper dolls needed more clothing. Needless to say, I am working on that. 🙂
So, in celebration of the 4th of July, here in the United States, I offer a paper doll, as usual. I mean, I don’t know how else I was going to celebrate. I’ve done some 4th of July paper dolls in the past… like these Marisole Monday rocking some 18th century attire which I had a lot of fun drawing.
At home, in Alaska, they have fireworks at midnight on the 3rd of July, because it doesn’t get dark until about 10 pm. In Alabama, where I live currently, I have no idea what they do, but I can hear the fireworks from my apartment. I had a quiet 4th which, after two weeks of constant travel and stress, was just what I wanted.
This is a new member of the Mini-Maiden Family. I am thinking of naming her something that begins with H, but I am having trouble coming up with an idea. There aren’t a lot of good H names out there… So, at the moment I am divided between Helen or Hannah… neither of which I’m too smitten with. Suggestions from the audience?
I have named the paper doll Emily for reader who requested her. Emily comes complete with a graphing calculator, space suit, lab coat, safety goggles and a rocket t-shirt. Who doesn’t need that? Emily has short hair so that her space helmet fits properly. I realized after I drew it that the boots should probably not be separate, but it was already colored by the time this occurred to me. I didn’t put a flag on her space suit, because I know I have a lot of international readers, but feel free to add your own.
Personally, I rather like the flag of Yap an island in the Federated States of Micronesia. Now, I’ve never been to Yap, but it’s fun to say and they speak a language called Yapese, which sounds pretty cool to me. (Okay, most of them speak English, but Yapese sounds a lot cooler than English…)
Happy Slightly Belated Birthday, Emily and Enjoy the paper dolls!
Now, I just need to do the cowgirl set people keep asking for… I wish I knew how to draw a cowboy hat… or that I didn’t find horses kinda creepy…
Thoughts? Questions? Ideas about Space? Drop me a comment.
This is one of those sets where the yellow looks a lot more yellow than I had planned for it to look. Oh well…
I spent most of this weekend trying to come up with something witty and funny to do for April Fools day, but… honestly… I got nothing. Therefore, we’re just going to keep puttering along here in paper doll land. Sorry guys, I’m just not that good at that sort of thing.
I hope everyone had a wonderful Easter or is still having a wonderful Passover, depending. I had a quiet day spent working on blog stuff and cleaning my apartment. I rather enjoyed myself, I confess.
I’m also not totally pleased with his face. I don’t think he looks as African-American as I had planned him to look, but I am trying my best. I think he’s okay, but I’m not totally pleased.
The most commonly requested thing for the blog, outside of sometimes asking for more things in black and white, is for a boy for Marisole Monday. I know this has taken a long time to happen and I don’t regret that. I drew about seven versions of this pose before I finally had one that I felt didn’t look like he was HUGE next to Marisole and her friends or looked like he was creepily androgynous (not in metro-sexual way, but rather in a… disturbing alien sort of genderless way).
So, today we have the first of the males of Marisol Monday. Since the girls are Marisole, Mia and Margot, it seems only fitting to give the first of the boys an M name as well. After some thought, I have settled on Marcus. Though I have been often asked for a boyfriend for Marisole, I am not defining Marcus’ role. He could be a friend, a brother, or a lover. There’s no reason to be hetronormative with Marisole Monday. I should also add that since the Marisole Monday family is growing, I’ve renamed the sets “Marisole Monday & Friends” and will probably be redesigning their logo in the future.
I am going to confess right now that I don’t know how many Marcus’ dolls I will do. I have two other sets in the works, but as I have mentioned before, I find men’s clothing really dull for the last two hundred years or so. I work on a college campus and so I get a fairly good look at what young men wear these days and well… I just can’t imagine drawing hoodies and jeans for the rest of my life. I’m not say there won’t be other boys in the Marisole Monday world, but they probably won’t be too common.
Okay, so news: After some deliberation I settled on Natalie’s suggestion for a name “Mini Maidens”, though I have to mention that DotRot’s suggestion of “Faye and the Holidaze” was probably the one that made me laugh the hardest. I have a soft spot in my heart for alliteration. I want to thank everyone for entering, since I hate naming things.
Greta is the new Mini Maiden and she shares a face with the Valentine’s day doll. I’ve made a new category for the Mini-Maidens with separate subcategories for Faye and Greta, since those are the two members at the moment. Passover in on the horizon, but I don’t think I’ll be doing a Passover paper doll. Though a mini-bowl of matzo ball soup might be worth it…
Anyway, I hope everyone likes the Mini Maidens and their new place among the serial dolls on the site. They aren’t on the Index page yet. With one thing and another last night, I forgot to make them an icon, but they’ll be added soon.
Some of you probably remember my Chinese New Year and Valentine’s Day Paper Dolls which I did last month. After I did them, I found myself drawing a lot more for this pose. So, I decided to actually name the first of the dolls. I have named her Faye, after a Chinese foreign exchange student I knew in graduate school. Her wardrobe, like that of my grad school friend, is girly and a hint of boho. I haven’t updated the Printable Paper Doll Index with her yet, but I will be soon. Probably this weekend.
By the way, the new series needs a name. So, I am asking for recommendations for a good name for these little paper dolls. I’ll select my favorite from the comments in a week (Friday the 22nd) and the winner will get a custom paper doll set of their choice.
It’s been a while since I did a contest and so the rules are as follows:
1. You can enter up to three names.
2. You can only win one contest a year.
3. I will announce the winner on the blog on the day the contest ends. I will also email the winner at their email address attached to the comment. If I do not hear back from the winner within a week, I will use a random number generator to select the next
winner
.
4. The winner will receive a one page custom paper doll based on one of my paper doll series within a month of the end of the contest. Sometimes life gets in the way of this goal, but I will email the winner if that is the case and we can make other arrangements.
So, enter your paper doll series names and we’ll see what we’re going to call this new set of paper dolls.
So, this was supposed to go up last Monday, but clearly that didn’t happen. Never the less, here she is on this Monday looking as dashing as ever.
Sunday was Purim, as some people probably know. Purim is one of my favorite holidays, mostly because of fond memories from when I was a child an the joy of making and eating hamentashen. As usual, I made far more of them than I could eat and so I’ll be giving them to various people today. Several years ago, I drew an Esther paper doll, though you’ll have to scroll down a little to see her in the post.
Anyway, in other news, I know I’ve neglected the blog over the last few weeks. I’ve been really busy, but I’m hoping to get back onto the ball with it. A few things are going to be changing, so keep your eyes open for a new about section and a few other new things- nothing radical, mostly housekeeping chores that I put off for a long time and finally am getting around to.
Today’s paper doll was inspired by a lot of different things, but mostly by my realization that I haven’t drawn very many coats for my paper dolls (with the exception of my Snow Day set, years ago) and my new found favorite research tool- hair style magazines, particularly black hair style magazines which I can draw hairstyles out of.
I do feel a little self-conscious buying the magazines at the local drug store, since the woman behind the counter usually gives me an odd look, but they’ve proven invaluable for getting hairstyles right. This braided bun is something I’ve wanted to draw for a while, but since asking random passer-bys to stand still for art practice isn’t really reasonable, my hairstyle magazines saved the day.
What sorts of hairstyles would you like to see for Marisole in the future?
Happy New Year! Apparently, this year is the year of the Snake. My limited understanding of the Chinese Zodiac informs me that it’s both the year of the Snake and the year of Water. I really don’t know much about the Chinese Zodiac.
Anyway, I have been on a Chinese traditional dress kick since last year. I decided to draw a qípáo or cheongsam which is the figure hugging high collared dress of kung fu movie fame. The dress isn’t that old, but evolved around the 1920s in Shanghai. The original qipao was wide and loose and long and trimmed with bands of embroidered fabric.
The tunic on the left has “horse hoof” sleeves which were a standard part of Manchu dress during the Qing Dynasty in China. I shortened it to make it a little more modern. There’s also a pair of jeans, a pair of trousers and a modern qipao with a matching skirt, which is apparently not an uncommon way to wear one.
Speaking of all things Chinese, I was heavily inspired by the Kurhn dolls like this one which I guess are sort of Chinese Barbie dolls. Anyway, I hope everyone has a lovely New Years Day, I plan on eating dumplings in celebration. (Also, because I have them in my freezer.)
I am currently debating if I should give today’s paper doll some friends, because I really liked the pose and I had fun drawing her (though I’m not totally pleased with the hair).
I don’t have very many Asian paper dolls, partly because it took a long time before I was comfortable drawing epicanthic folds, which are a characteristic of many East and Central Asian people, though are by no means exclusive to those groups. There is a huge variety the shape of the epicanthic fold and I never felt like it looked right until I got to grad school and ended up sitting across from a Chinese student for an entire semester. I don’t know what she did to stay awake, but what I did was use her as a model for my first Asian Pixie paper doll, named Zoe. Of course, she didn’t have blue hair or such a huge head, but I digress.
So, the Poll is over, since January is done and a child paper doll won to my own astonishment. So, I’ll get on that. In the mean time, enjoy Madison.
I’ve mentioned before my “skintones make shoes a pain” thing, and so I wanted to give this Marisole a skintone that was shared by another doll so that she could share shoes. I chose Candy Coated Couture, but I don’t think the skintones are actually the same. In fact, a quick check with photoshop’s eyedrop tool tells me they aren’t. This has something to do, I think, with how Photoshop saves things for the web.
So, I did a little internet research and found a lovely article
I am going to try a few other methods and see if they help. It’s a strange problem indeed.
Since it’s Christmas Eve, I wanted to wish a everyone a lovely Christmas. Be safe and be merry. I am back in Alaska with my family celebrating.
I don’t think I’m that great of an artist. This isn’t a plea to be reassured or an attempt to fish for compliments, I’m just being honest. And I say this because what I draw rarely looks like I wanted it to look in my head. I’m often satisfied with my work, but I rarely look at it and think, “Yeah, that came out just like I wanted it too.”
Marisole’s hair today is a rare case where I can say that it came out just like I wanted it too. It looks natural, bouncy and cute. I am quite pleased.
There were originally a few more pieces on this set, but than there was a tragic run in with a glass of egg nog and well… now there are a few fewer pieces on this set.
Opps.
Oh well… I hope everyone is having a lovely holiday season.
By the way, this is the 100th Marisole paper doll post… though not the 100th Marisole design, since she has been posting in both black and white lately… still, not a bad achievement.
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