Recolored Lavender Mermaid Tail with White Top

A bluish-lavender mermaid tail with lighter, warmer fins along the top, sides and base of the tail. The tail shimmers in shades of pink, purple, yellow and blue. The top is a one-shoulder Greek inspired white top that shows the midriff and is bordered with gold scroll patterns. At the shoulder is a golden starfish brooch with an opal in the middle, and there are strands of pearls looped over the shoulder and upper arm.You may remember this mermaid tail? I wasn’t satisfied with it at the time, and I wanted to practice a mermaid scale technique I saw used on official Ariel artwork and immediately coveted. So I reused this drawing so I could spend the time experimenting and trying to get the tail looking good. It certainly is an exuberant technique — maybe I went a bit overboard? Well, you know me, I like my glitter.

I’m still working on that mermaid story I mentioned in the previous post. I started actually writing it for NaNoWriMo but 40,000 words in I’m realizing I have to rework the entire second part and most of the first, and am currently having all sorts of fun planning to cut out several thousand of those words.

Next week, I probably will actually finish up that new doll. Until then, you can download combined color and black and white PDFs of all of my 2014 dolls and outfits for free! Also follow me on Facebook, Twitter or Pinterest for beautiful saris, sneak previews and paperdoll thoughts. If you enjoy my work, I'd also appreciate your support through Patreon.


Lavender-Tailed Mermaid with White and Gold Top and Starfish Brooch

A bluish-lavender mermaid tail with lighter, warmer fins along the top, sides and base of the tail. The top is a one-shoulder Greek inspired white top that shows the midriff and is bordered with gold scroll patterns. At the shoulder is a golden starfish brooch with an opal in the middle, and there are strands of pearls looped over the shoulder and upper arm.Here’s my first digitally colored mermaid tail! I’m not entirely satisfied with it, because without a little scale pattern I think it looks too flat, but I’m only just getting started with digital coloring so for today it will work.

I’ve had mermaids on the brain, because I read a book called Story: Style, Structure, Substance, and the Principles of Screenwriting by Robert McKee, which was all about how to construct a compelling, well-paced and satisfying story. It’s aimed at screenwriters, but it dealt with universal principles, so I got a lot out of it even though I’m not planning on writing a movie anytime soon. It’s a great book, but also pretty dense and something like 400 pages long, so I’ll also recommend Hilari Bell’s writing tips, which present much of the same information in a way that may be more understandable.

I always enjoyed writing my mini-stories about my mermaid world for this site, and I’ve often thought of making it into an actual story. I have a rather large amount of information already written about aspects of mermaid society, actually. Where I trip up is my lack of understanding about oceanography, general scientific principles and experience underwater, which has a direct bearing on a story set somewhere besides dry land. What does it feel like to hear things underwater, and what sounds are easiest to hear underwater? What might materials mermaids could possibly use to build cities look like after years spent in the sea? How far down can mermaids dive before they start to have problems with the pressure? Can they breathe underwater, like fish, or do they have to come up for air, like dolphins? If I want the geography to look a certain way, how did that come about? If you can’t store paper books underwater or too close to water, is there a good way of distributing and storing reading material?

For many of these questions, I don’t even know where to start looking because I have only a vague recollection of my science classes. I suppose if it’s my fantasy world I can answer all these things however I like, or simply not care, but to me it’s more fun if the world is plausible and the fantastic elements are placed elsewhere. I love worldbuilding, especially stuff like this geological history of A Game of Thrones where the setting is taken quite seriously. Still, it slows me down because I’m imagining a lot of things from scratch and learning a lot of things for the first time. If I actually want to write something, I’d probably do better with a setting that is easier to nail down, but I keep returning to my mermaids. And I do like it when I have the time to learn new things that I can apply to the world – I keep reading books about science or marine animals and coming up with mermaid world applications for little details.

In any case, it looks like an elf dress won my poll, with 51% of the vote, so I will sketch some out and be back next week with a black and white dress and a new contest, plus a 1930s outfit. Until then, follow me on Facebook, Twitter and Pinterest for site updates, previews and mermaid jewelry. If you enjoy my work, I’d also appreciate your support through Patreon.


Mermaid Monday 12: Black and White Mermaid for Coloring

Click for larger version; click for the list of dolls.

So now the black and white princess has a black and white mermaid friend to play with, or a mermaid secret identity perhaps. Either way, more coloring fun for you, less work for me, something that sounds good this evening! E-mail colored creations to me, or post a link in the comments. As far as the princess goes, I love how Freyja’s rich, warm version turned out, and yeah, I can’t not like anything my husband does.


Mermaid Monday #8: Black-Tailed Treasure Hunter Mermaid

Click for larger version; click for the list of dolls.

Now, tail color for a mermaid isn’t destiny any more than hair color is for humans, but there is something about black tails and treasure hunting that seem to go together, and it does make for more efficient camouflage than shiny gold generally does. Treasure hunters often end up being flashier than their gold-tailed friends when they’re not on the job, showing off their most recent finds and piercing their fins, but it’s hard to begrudge them any of their triumphs since they don’t tend to live out their natural lifespans.

This treasure hunter loves flashy clothes and heavy jewelry when she’s not exploring, but on the job she has a lot to carry and consider, so she dresses for speed (although she can’t quite let go of her lucky fin piercing) and comfort. She also has a small shovel in her backpack and carries a trident to help fend off sharks. She might look a little gloomy to those of us who associate black with death, but mermaids think of green as the color of death, since they fancy that the bubbles that mermaids turn into have an iridescent green tinge.

The Good Queen continues to triumph…