swords

Yellow & Blue Medieval Fantasy Gowns

A Fantasy printable dress-up doll with two dresses and a yellow and blue themed color scheme. The doll has brown hair in braids and tan skin. The two dresses are both mevieval inspired with long skirts and sleeves. She also has books and a sword as accessories.
A Fantasy printable dress-up doll color pages with a pair od dresses and braids. There are accessories for the doll like two swords and a pair of boots.

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Today’s fantasy printable dress-up doll has a pair of medieval inspired gowns with girdles, swords and books, of course. Because all paper dolls are happier with books.

When I’m in the mood for some “basic fantasy,” I tend to go back to medieval stuff. Not the actual medieval period, but rather what the Victorians thought the medieval period was. It’s all big castles, princesses in fancy dresses, dragons, and noble knights. In a nod to actual medieval gowns which were worn over kirtles or underdresses, I like to add the layers. You can see more of this sort of thing on my fantasy medieval Pinterest board if you’re curious.

I confess though that these aren’t the most unusual or inspired pieces for me, but I feel like I am stretching myself enough with the digital art thing without trying something totally new.

I chose the colors for these dresses from classic Norwegian design and old-fashioned children’s book illustrations. I used yellows, blues, and soft ocher shades to make them feel cozy and cheerful, like a sunny day or a calm, clear sky. These colors remind me of curling up by a fire with a big picture book.

And since I was thinking of books, I drew some books to be accessories along with swords. I like drawing books. It’s the librarian in me.

This is the first sort of fantasy set for the Ensemble Eclectica series. My hope is always that this fantasy printable dress-up doll will inspire imaginative play and storytelling. That’s the best part of playing with paper dolls, isn’t it? While I’ll admit that I have been on more of a modern clothing kick as of late, don’t worry. Eventually, I’ll come back to fantasy, sci-fi and other elements. I always do.

A Stylish Paper Doll July: Fantasy Adventuring Armors

A printable paper doll coloring page of fantasy armor with a padded gambeson, leggings and boots.
A printable paper doll coloring page of fantasy armor with a sword.

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And now I am pleased to say we are all caught up with this paper doll project! Woo!

I wanted to do something that really let me play with fantasy stuff like armor since I hadn’t done much of that. I had ideas for chainmail, but never could get it to look right without manually drawing every link. I almost bought a brush for it, but then I have have mixed experiences paying for brushes. Some are amazing and some are kind meh. It’s tough, because you can’t really test it before you pay for it.

Anyway, I’m really happy with how both of these came out even if I didn’t end up sorting out my chainmail challenges. Rather then chainmail, I went with a padded gambeson (which I think is the right name… for the quilted padded jackets people wore as armor back in the day or sometimes under plate armor) for one and the other I did a bit more of a fantasy breastplate thing. All five pieces can mix and match, so there really quite a few options.

One thing that this digital process does that my physical process doesn’t do is that it is MUCH faster. The speed at which I can go from sketch to inking to posting is massively increased. Mostly, this is a good thing, but there is one major downside.

One of those downsides is that the human eye tends to miss things. We see as much what we “think” we are seeing as we see what is actually there.

So, I do find when I look at some of these posts I notice little things I don’t think are quite right- like I am not sure about the gauntlets on both the sets. The angles seem… maybe not quite right.

In the long term, this probably means building in a “rest” period and learning some tricks for looking at my digital art more critically. Learning things like that was sort of the point of this whole project.

Lapis the Swashbuckler and Adventurer Paper Doll

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Okay, so here’s a wild thing I learned when looking up where the term Swashbuckler came from. The term originates back in the 1550s and meant something like “blustering, swaggering fighting man.” I find that so fascinating, because I’ve always associated the term with Errol Flynn and other sort of pirate films of the 1950s. So, I assumed it was a more modern term. Who knew?

Anyway, Wikipedia describes it as adventure literature that focuses on a heroic protagonist stock character who is skilled in swordplay, acrobatics, guile and possesses chivalrous ideals. Sounds about right. I do love me a good fun adventure movie with sword fights.

Yes, I watched too much Highlander in the 1990s.

Anyway, I really wanted to diverge from my usual fantasy gown looks into something a little more adventurer, though let’s be clear- it isn’t any more practical. Practical fantasy clothing sort of seems to defeat the whole point, I think.

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