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Description
Jean Grey has always been a favorite character of mine, so while I was somewhat pessimistic about her return to life in the comics (I mean, let her rest, you know? We already had the younger, time-displaced version of her running around), I was kind of excited to see her leading the X-Men: Red team.

Unfortunately, I think Marvel missed out on a grand opportunity to really make the team name have some oomph, so... here is my idea of where they should have gone with the X-Men: Red team.

See? I make jokes. And then I take three weeks to draw the visuals, because unless you know they're all redheads, it's a pretty terrible joke. But anyway, here we have, from left to right, the original Jean Grey, her daughter Rachel Summers (aka Prestige), Angelica Jones (aka Firestar), Hope Summers, the Irish superhero Molly Fitzgerald (aka Shamrock), and the previously mentioned young, time-displaced Jean Grey. Technically, Molly isn't a mutant -- she's more of a mystical hero, but I've just always been a fan/amused by her existence (seriously, her superpower is that she's lucky. She's one drinking problem away from hitting "The Quiet Man" levels of Irish stereotyping), so she's on the team. Given she last saw action in the '90s, I tweaked her terrible costume a bit. Her hoodie actually has a Shamrock on it, too, but Young Jean wound up blocking it.

I started out trying to emulate the simple shading/highlighting style of Audrey Mok, but, as I moved on, my usual approach to things seems to have taken over, until we wind up with Young Jean being pretty much all me. If nothing else, I think this piece taught me to just do my own thing, and stop trying to emulate others. Learn from them, sure, but be true to me, too. (In all honesty, I keep trying styles that I hope will let me work quicker... but that's never been the case so far.)

So, that's all there is to it. I wish I could have done something more dynamic, but... this really was supposed to be a quick-hit type of thing. I did not expect to start it in January and finish it this late in February. But let me know what you think -- as always, comments, critiques, and advice are more than appreciated!

(Molly's Marvel info page, for those who might be curious: marvel.com/universe/Shamrock )

___________________

Disclaimer: I’m red-green colorblind. Because of this, it’s difficult for me to tell similar shades/hues of different colors apart, and, therefore, I need to work with very limited palettes when I color pieces. For shading and highlights, I’ll generally adjust the ‘value’ portion of the HSV setting to make the base color lighter or darker; I’m unable to ‘cool’ shadows by adding blue or anything like that. I’ve often been told to be bolder in my highlighting and shading, and I’m trying to be so, but… sometimes it still seems pretty tame. I’m just saying this in case you mentioned I need to do that on a previous piece – I’m not ignoring you, and I appreciate the input. It’s just not very easy for me to implement confidently.

(Also, all featured characters belong to Marvel)

Description
Jean Grey has always been a favorite character of mine, so while I was somewhat pessimistic about her return to life in the comics (I mean, let her rest, you know? We already had the younger, time-displaced version of her running around), I was kind of excited to see her leading the X-Men: Red team.

Unfortunately, I think Marvel missed out on a grand opportunity to really make the team name have some oomph, so... here is my idea of where they should have gone with the X-Men: Red team.

See? I make jokes. And then I take three weeks to draw the visuals, because unless you know they're all redheads, it's a pretty terrible joke. But anyway, here we have, from left to right, the original Jean Grey, her daughter Rachel Summers (aka Prestige), Angelica Jones (aka Firestar), Hope Summers, the Irish superhero Molly Fitzgerald (aka Shamrock), and the previously mentioned young, time-displaced Jean Grey. Technically, Molly isn't a mutant -- she's more of a mystical hero, but I've just always been a fan/amused by her existence (seriously, her superpower is that she's lucky. She's one drinking problem away from hitting "The Quiet Man" levels of Irish stereotyping), so she's on the team. Given she last saw action in the '90s, I tweaked her terrible costume a bit. Her hoodie actually has a Shamrock on it, too, but Young Jean wound up blocking it.

I started out trying to emulate the simple shading/highlighting style of Audrey Mok, but, as I moved on, my usual approach to things seems to have taken over, until we wind up with Young Jean being pretty much all me. If nothing else, I think this piece taught me to just do my own thing, and stop trying to emulate others. Learn from them, sure, but be true to me, too. (In all honesty, I keep trying styles that I hope will let me work quicker... but that's never been the case so far.)

So, that's all there is to it. I wish I could have done something more dynamic, but... this really was supposed to be a quick-hit type of thing. I did not expect to start it in January and finish it this late in February. But let me know what you think -- as always, comments, critiques, and advice are more than appreciated!

(Molly's Marvel info page, for those who might be curious: marvel.com/universe/Shamrock )

___________________

Disclaimer: I’m red-green colorblind. Because of this, it’s difficult for me to tell similar shades/hues of different colors apart, and, therefore, I need to work with very limited palettes when I color pieces. For shading and highlights, I’ll generally adjust the ‘value’ portion of the HSV setting to make the base color lighter or darker; I’m unable to ‘cool’ shadows by adding blue or anything like that. I’ve often been told to be bolder in my highlighting and shading, and I’m trying to be so, but… sometimes it still seems pretty tame. I’m just saying this in case you mentioned I need to do that on a previous piece – I’m not ignoring you, and I appreciate the input. It’s just not very easy for me to implement confidently.

(Also, all featured characters belong to Marvel)