Derby Uni Anime Society Badge

My sincerest apologies to anyone from the Anime Society in question who happens to stumble upon this as it took an absolute age to get finished. Basically the kind people at Derby Uni's Anime Society (including the likes of Alex and Laura) decided to hire me to create a members badge after seeing my J Culture Con poster and having read my comics. No problem I thought, I need the work, they seem to like my stuff - we're sorted.

That was late August/early September. Not knowing what they were letting themselves in for I proceeded to take 5 months to get the whole thing roughed, pencilled, inked and coloured. The moral of the story is never take on a commission in the middle of a house move and a job hunt. Doing right by them I ultimately lowered my initial fee considerably as a gesture of goodwill and apologised profusely.

It did'nt help that I re-drew the final piece about 8 times and ended up completely changing the composition and the girls pose in the process. To make up for that I tried to cram it with detail and really work hard on the anatomy. Actually that hilariously back fired when I realised the women in my anatomy book were fairly well toned in the muscular department so it'd appear more pronounced and easier to follow on paper - resulting in a slightly bulky schoolgirl. In the pencils the poor girl had an overly detailed face and solid jaw looking like an old man too, I've tried to correct that in my final piece but...

That said I'm pretty chuffed with the skirt even though that motion and flow is a virtual impossibility. The Derby Uni colour scheme of mint greens and white actually lent itself rather well to the school uniform and it was cool putting in little touchs like the uni logo on her boots and giving the monster thing Ram horns in a nod to Derby's representative animal.

If there's ever a next time I'll really have to up the ante (or suggest a faster, more appropriate artist!)