Liana’s Paperdoll Boutique Formal Dresses, Part 1

Click for larger version; click for the doll.

I find myself, at the time of this writing, with a terrible headache and no drawings stored up in reserve… so instead of silence I thought I’d post some of my old Boutique dresses and one of the dolls.

When I was in high school and college, I ran a site called “Liana’s Paperdoll Boutique” for which I drew dresses and dolls. It got to be really rather sprawling, and was great fun, although my laziness, perfectionism and inability to really focus on more than one thing with  all my heart caught up to me and it slipped away at some point. These are from that old site.

I don’t remember which birthday it was when I got my set of 120 Prismacolors — though I bet my mom could — but in any case, these date somewhere to maybe sophomore or junior year of high school, 1997, 1998. (I’m very bad with dates…) I still remember details about some of them… the blue dress was a request from some paperdoll fan, and the gold dress was my first try at gold, and really my technique hasn’t changed too much. Also, I don’t do the outlines with black ink anymore, and I use the colorless blender instead of white… I don’t think my dolls look a lot better, though, and I post this one with some embarrassment, but hey, it’s history!


Archades NPC red dress from Final Fantasy XII

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This is just a red gown worn by a random Archades resident in Final Fantasy XII. I thought the original in the game was really pretty, but I don’t like how the drawing came out in the first place, though, and then my scanner ate it and playing around in Photoshop didn’t make it better. (Note to self: until new scanner arrives next week, white things scan better…)

It turns out that I don’t know how to color copper. So, once I figure it out, expect to see a mermaid with a copper tail soon, to compliment her gold-tailed sister…


Flora’s Red Gown from Professor Layton and the Curious Village

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

I’ve been into Professor Layton and the Curious Village lately, playing it every chance I got – using my 15 minute breaks during work to ferry those miserable wolves and chickens across the river, and so on. You come across this dress early in the game, and I thought it was lovely, even if Flora is rather younger than Sylvia. I’m rather fond of Layton’s outfit, actually… who knew brown and orange worked together so well, or that a top hat can be pulled off in any way, shape or form. If I didn’t have so many other outfits I want, I’d so do a female version…

Incidentally, Flora in the Japanese version is named アロマ, or, rather literally romanized, “Aroma.” I can see it as being “Alma” if one slurs quickly over the vowel of the ‘ro’… or maybe it’s just meant to be Aroma. Who knows…

I’d like to do an Oscar dress this year, but I’m not really feeling any of them. Possibly the scaly mermaid one…


Urban Dead zombie couture

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

I play a game called Urban Dead, a browser-based, text-based, player-versus-player zombie apocalypse game. If you play as a survivor, you spend your days hoarding ammo, freaking out about the barricades of your safehouse coming down and often getting killed in your sleep by another player anyways. Those of us who play zombies have much lower stress in our unlives: we have fun and dine on brains. (You can enjoy the benefits, too, if you already play as a survivor! Just stand outside and one of my zombie brethren will hook you up.)

I play one character and I think that before the outbreak, she was a leasing agent. (Having felt rather like a zombie at points during my time as a leasing agent, it’s funny to me.) She used to wear pastel suits and comfortable shoes, and her smile was as non-threatening as it could be. Now she’s overcome her problem of weak, splitting nails with a set of admirable claws, and she’s quite interested in high-density housing units and commercial properties. Her favorite green suit is, alas, a little worse for the wear.

I suppose that in real life, however one chooses to apply the term to a zombie apocalypse, the outfit would be more dirty and torn and less green. What can I say? My time drawing mermaids didn’t prepare me for this. Although… it was nice, for once, to not have to worry about accidentally smudging the red into another color.