sweaters

Playing with Pattern on Ms. Mannequin Paper Doll Clothes

logo-ms-mannequin-6Today is Friday the 13th which is apparently bad luck, though I have no idea where that came from. Does anyone know? Anyway, I figured a good way to get rid of bad luck was to post some paper doll fashions. 🙂

As a lot of my longtime readers know, I am often playing around with patterns for my printable paper doll clothes. I think pattern, while a pain in the behind, is important for the diversity of paper doll outfits. Solid colors are all well and good, but most of us have some patterned things in our closets and there’s not real good reasons why paper dolls shouldn’t be the same.

When thinking about pattern, I tend to fall into the same styles repeatedly. I suppose I can only be so creative on any given paper doll set. Still, I am always looking for new pattern inspirations- even if they don’t make their way onto the blog. I really admire the pattern work of Julie of Paper Doll School. Her patterns rock.

(She can also use Illustrator. I’m so jealous. I have the program, but I think that like a wild dog it can smell my fear.)

Anyway… Miss. Mannequin and friends are getting pretty girly today with their full patterned skirts and rose printed strapless dress.

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Before I forget, I wanted to mention that I recently stumbled across a Peal Chang paper doll. Soft Film is a blog devoted to Chinese film, as far as I can tell, and the author commissioned a fantastic paper doll of Pearl Chang, who was an actress. I confess to not being at all familair with Pearl Chang, but I knew the name Kwei-Lin Lum from her incredible paper doll work. Check it out, it’s a pretty neat paper doll.

Of course, now I have to go on Netflix and see if I can find any of these movies. Does anyone know anything about her?

Zippers & Ruffles: Paper Doll With Clothes to Color

logo-ruffles-zippers-marisole-bwSo… this is what you might call a paper doll that got to have an evolution. I originally planned on drawing a more typical cyberpunk set, but um…. I was bored at a thing and I started doodling and the outcome was a drawing of one of my Shadowrun character’s named Claudia.

As I’ve mentioned in the past, one of my hobbies is playing table top RPGs. I have several favorites, but one of them is Shadowrun, which just came out with a fifth edition rule set. Today’s paper doll is based on my last Shadowrun character, a technomancer named Claudia and her best-friend, an AI inside a teddy-bear named Douglas. (Technically, Douglas should have a suit and a carving knife, but um… that would be creepy.)

By the way, at this point, you might be wondering if its possible that I have any more socially awkward hobbies and the answer is no, I’m just your normal board-game playing, paper doll drawing special collections librarian who sometimes pretends to be an elf (except not really, because I pretty much dislike elves in general. Don’t ask).

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{Click Here for a PDF to Print} {Click Here for a PNG to Print} {Click Here for More Marisole Monday & Friends Printable Paper Dolls}
I did a few things differently with this paper doll. I redid the face to be a little more like I imagined Claudia looking. It’s not a Marisole face and it’s not a Margot face. I realize this is unusual which is why I have started a new category in Marisole Monday called Other Friends. I have no idea if I’ll do more “unusual” Marisole Monday & Friends paper dolls, but odder things have happened on this blog.

She’ll be up in color next week. 🙂

And Happy Sixth Night of Hanukkah everyone.

Look! Clothes for Ms Mannequinn Paper Dolls

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Ms Mannequin has some clothing, because without clothing a mannequin has no real purpose in life and the last thing you need are paper dolls having existential crises.

I’m not very comfortable sharing private stuff on the blog. I’ve never been much for public confessions and I have no desire to gain notoriety, but as Rosh Hashanah approaches, I always find myself getting introspective.

I’m a pretty secular Jew, but it’s the new year and I think it’s a good time to pause and think about things. Truth be told, as I sat down to write this post, I was expecting to say negative things, because lately I’ve been feeling a little overwhelmed by the blog, but in truth I have no real bad news to share.

Here we are on the eve of 5774, and really… there’s nothing to moan about. Now, don’t get me wrong, I can always find something to complain about, but the truth is the blog has been more regular this year than last year. I’ve managed to sell a few pieces to various museums and I’ve managed to pretty much do what I’ve wanted to get done.

I am, in fact, fairly happy and content with the blog. I wish I could post more, but I know that unrealistic. I wish I had more readers, but then I always wish that. I do need to get some sort of child paper doll up, since that was the winner of the poll at the usual New Year.

So, all in all… not a bad 5773. Bring on 5774, I say.

Kalisha: Paper Doll to Print in Color

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{Click Here for a PDF in Color} {Click Here for a 150 dpi PNG in Color} {Click Here for More Pixie & Puck Paper Dolls}

I try to be balanced in paper dolls. I want to have a variety of styles, a variety of skin tones, a variety of hair styles, a variety of genders (okay, maybe not the last one so much…), but I haven’t done a paper doll with glasses in a while.

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{Click Here for a PDF in Black and White} {Click Here for a 150 dpi PNG in Black and White} {Click Here for More Pixie & Puck Paper Dolls}

Recently, I have been watching a lot of Black Adder, particularly Black Adder Goes Forth, which I have never seen before. I’m really enjoying it, though I don’t know if that has anything to do with today’s paper doll creation, actually, I expect it doesn’t, but it has allowed me to draw some paper dolls.

Kalisha’s color scheme was inspired by flowers and sunsets- warm soft tones. I love pale grey trousers which perhaps explains why they show up so often in my paper dolls (also in my closet).

Happy 4th of July… Printable Paper Doll

Happy Independence Day!

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.

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{Click Here for a PDF to Print} {Click Here for a PNG to Print} {Click Here for the Rest of the Series}

 

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?

This is Greta: A New Black & White Printable Paper Doll

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.

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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.

Marisole Monday: Vintage Roses

After two set of Margot, I thought we’d pop back to Marisole for a while. This paper doll also has no pants. I just realized this.

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So, a while ago, I was asked about programs I use to work on my paper dolls. I don’t remember who asked me the question, but as I worked on this paper doll set, I tried to figure out the answer. Not exactly rocket science, but it took some thought.

I use Photoshop CS3 for all my paper dolling (a bit out of date, I know) and I like it, though the learning curve on it is steep. To color my paper dolls, I use a filter called the Bpelt filter, which is designed for flatting comics. Flatting is the process of coloring in shapes with no black line border. Traditionally, newspapers printed all of the color and then over printed the line work. I think comics, in the real world, may still be printed this way though I’m not sure… my printing history gets fuzzy once computers enter onto the scene.

I like Bpelt because it allows me to have my line-work on a separate layer which is useful for me.

Frankly, I don’t have much experience with other programs. I would like to learn Illustrator and Indesign, but I never have. I can’t really provide a helpful review except to say that I am certain I use Photoshop for about a tenth of what it is capable of.

New Full Color Printable Paper Doll Named Madison

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{A Full Set Printable PDF of the Three Page Madison Paper Doll}

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.

Spikes and Pleats… A Colorful Paper Doll to Print

I seriously feel like I should have saved this for Valentine’s Day, but I didn’t have anything else finished, so up it goes.

It’s not like I started with a plan for the obnoxious color scheme, but somehow the traditional black and red thing I do for punk clothing just wasn’t hitting the mark. So, pink, purple and black became the name of the game.

I sort of like it.

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I do wish the fuzzy sweater looked… well… fuzzier. By the way, the neckline of that sweater is low and it’s meant to go over one of the corsets or other tops, otherwise she shows off more of her swimsuit than perhaps is decent for polite society.

So, I think I’ve mentioned my wacky formula for calculating the number of outfit combos a paper doll set contains before which is the number of tops multiplied by the number of bottoms and then by the number of shoes and then by the number of “jackets” plus 1. Now often the formula doesn’t work, because the pieces aren’t really totally interchangeable, but this is a rare set where I think everything really can go with everything else. The result is a total of 146 outfit combinations (not taking into consideration accessories) which is pretty remarkable.

Jumpers! Paper Doll Dresses

Today, our printable pin-up Dictionary Girls get jumpers. Nothing terribly fancy, but I needed to do something simple and I wanted to get it done, so here they are. I’m fairly pleased with how they came out and very pleased that last week I managed to get a full week of paper doll posts up.

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{Click Here for a PDF to Print} {Click Here for a 150 dpi PNG to Print} {Click Here for The Rest of this Series} {Click Here for the Dolls to Dress}

Hopefully, I can do the same this week. I have everything ready, I just need to post it.

And now for a question answer…

Kate asked: I loved your Esther doll, some time back, and was wondering if you were up for doing any more biblical costume dolls.

At the moment I don’t have any more biblical costumed paper dolls planned. Ester was done for Purim, since it seemed fitting to do a paper doll for a holiday where children dress up, but I can’t really imagine doing a paper doll for another Jewish holiday. Not only because I can’t think of a tie in, but because I discovered that ancient costume is really hard to research.

However, I know Toria over at Paper Closet has discussed doing a Women of the Bible series and Toni on her blog has a Christmas and Hanukahh Paper Dolls including Mary, Joesph and a Jacob. They’re full color and have wonderful faces.

And on a totally unrelated note… Flat Doll is the website of the wonderful artist Kwei-Lin Lum whose work is surreal and beautiful and artistic and sometimes dark and sometimes playful and always interesting. And it’s just recently been updated after a long silence. Kwei-Lin Lum is one of the only paper doll artists who really seems to engage with the idea of what the medium “paper doll” or as she calls them “cut outs” can mean for transformation art. Seriously, her artist statement is inspiring and humbling.

She’s done three books for Dover- bi-lingual Day of the Dead, the rather dark Twisted Fairy Tales, and the slightly tongue-in-cheek Voodoo.

If you have a question for me and you want me to answer it? Ask it and enter my drawing.