I Made a T-Shirt

Hey, you all* remember Ainsley McNeaney from a few posts ago? Well, she asked me to design a t-shirt for her to sell at an upcoming gig.  The concept was "Woman with an Octopus Hat." So I drew this:

 More after the jump:

Groovy right? The next step was to clean it up and de-wonkafy the face a bit:

 Next began the process of prettyfying it. I "colored" it in grayscale, added some shading and put in some Art Nouveau circles. I thought that it might look nice on a cranberry colored shirt, so here it is on red background:

Ainsley wasn't sure about the ring around the head, so I dialed it back a little. The hair was bothering me some so I went in and "re-inked" it in photoshop, first to make it more graphic, but also to smooth the lines out. I decided that the octopus did not need smooth lines, as they have kinda bumpy skin and the diference in the line quality created a nice contrast. At this time it was decided that the t-shirts would be black:

 

 Here is what the final shirts should look like:

 Not too bad, but as I sit here looking at it, I'm noticing every mistake I made and everything I could have done to improve it and it's driving me nuts. I will learn from these and do better next time, Gadget, next time.

*Usage of the term "you all" is not intended to suggest that I actually believe that anyone reads this.