Attache's Nostalgia Thread of (Old) Commissioned Artwork

[Attache]

I am not an artist. However, I did briefly get into commissioning art from about 2007 to 2011. While I look back at it now and feel, yeah, I certainly could have used that money for other things I really have no regrets. The commissioning community back then was pretty awesome and I met a lot of cool people. 

I hooked up with most artists through Deviant Art so where those accounts are still active, I will link to them.

Thread Disclaimer: Again, I am not the artist of any of these works. In most instances (though not all) I merely created the characters in City of Heroes. Sometimes, I directed the artist with lots of notes and other times I let them do their thing. The late 00's were a different time and not all design choices then would be the same today.

Edited February 3, 2022 by Attache

[Attache]

My first commission came courtesy of Randy Kintz or rantz as he was known on Deviant Art. The character is Liberta, my Broadsword / Invulnerability Scrapper back in OG CoH. Today she is a Staff Fighting / Invulnerability Brute, hoping beyond hope that a proper Greco-Roman spear gets introduced into the set.

Liberta was never this busty but it was kind of Randy's style at the time. I recall I provided him a reference on a Roman Belt as the none of the belts in the game in 2007 worked very well. The bracers and arm bands were his interpretation. I'd love to have some neck jewelry like this in the game.

 

Thread Disclaimer: I am not the artist of any of these works. In most instances (though not all) I merely created the characters in City of Heroes. Sometimes, I directed the artist with lots of notes and other times I let them do their thing. The late 00's were a different time and not all design choices then would be the same today.

Edited February 3, 2022 by Attache

[Attache]

Part of what got me into commissioning art is that the SG I joined via Liberta (see above) had its own resident artist. I had already reached out to taghuso for a commission of my first alt in the group, the mysterious time-traveling Doctor Epoch - Grav / Kin Controller well before we had any of the Time powers. Originally, Doc had a gold cape with green lining (see right) but shortly after this commission was delivered, Tag had included Doctor Epoch on one of the SG's faux comic covers and had mistakenly colored it solid green. It looked much better so he was kind enough to do a quick re-coloring for me (see left), cementing his look until the end of the game.

 

Taghuso came back for a bit on Everlasting but didn't stick around. He still seems to be taking commissions pretty regularly and back in these days he was fast as lightning. I once commissioned a character from him and it was done in two hours. Ah, the benefits of being pals!

 

 

Thread Disclaimer: I am not the artist of any of these works. In most instances (though not all) I merely created the characters in City of Heroes. Sometimes, I directed the artist with lots of notes and other times I let them do their thing. The late 00's were a different time and not all design choices then would be the same today.
 

[Attache]

The next piece was also courtesy of taghuso and came with a little bit of backstory.

 

A few people in our SG - the All-Star Sentinels of America - had been talking about getting a commission from an artist named Douglas Shuler who was mostly known in the CoH community at the time for producing these digital pieces that bordered on the photoreal. He was kind of expensive and getting people to organized for a team commission was a little like herding cats so by the time I got everyone on the same page, Doug had stopped responding and it fell apart,

I felt kind of bad for the diehards who had committed early so I took what I would have spent on that commission and asked Tag to whip up this homage cover to the first appearance of the Justice League as a kind of thank you to the folks who has been in early and made things painless.. None of these characters are mine but they are, clockwise from the top, Astromarvel, Doctor Gorilla, Maiden Glory, Spirit Panther, and Lord Liberty.

 

Thread Disclaimer: I am not the artist of any of these works. In most instances (though not all) I merely created the characters in City of Heroes. Sometimes, I directed the artist with lots of notes and other times I let them do their thing. The late 00's were a different time and not all design choices then would be the same today.

 

Edited February 3, 2022 by Attache

[Attache]

A lot of my early commissions came from taghuso thanks to things like friend prices and outright freebies.  He did this one in a little more of a cartoon-style.

The Chrono King is Doctor Epoch's arch-nemesis. He also *is* Doctor Epoch from about 10 years in the future when personal tragedy turned him into a villain. When I re-rolled Doctor Epoch and the Chrono King after Time Manipulation was introduced to the game, I lost the ability to Level Pact them (they were on separate accounts) so getting them back to 50 was pretty tedious. 

 

 

Disclaimer: I am not the artist of any of these works. In most instances (though not all) I merely created the characters in City of Heroes. Sometimes, I directed the artist with lots of notes and other times I let them do their thing. The late 00's were a different time and not all design choices then would be the same today.

Edited February 4, 2022 by Attache

[Trike]

4 hours ago, Attache said:

The next piece was also courtesy of taghuso and came with a little bit of backstory.

 

A few people in our SG - the All-Star Sentinels of America - had been talking about getting a commission from an artist named Douglas Shuler who was mostly known in the CoH community at the time for producing these digital pieces that bordered on the photoreal. He was kind of expensive and getting people to organized for a team commission was a little like herding cats so by the time I got everyone on the same page, Doug had stopped responding and it fell apart,

I felt kind of bad for the diehards who had committed early so I took what I would have spent on that commission and asked Tag to whip up this homage cover to the first appearance of the Justice League as a kind of thank you to the folks who has been in early and made things painless.. None of these characters are mine but they are, clockwise from the top, Astromarvel, Doctor Gorilla, Maiden Glory, Spirit Panther, and Lord Liberty.

 

Thread Disclaimer: I am not the artist of any of these works. In most instances (though not all) I merely created the characters in City of Heroes. Sometimes, I directed the artist with lots of notes and other times I let them do their thing. The late 00's were a different time and not all design choices then would be the same today.

 

Nostalgia bell rung! I remember this, and I recall teaming with various members of the All Stars back in the day. 😃

[Midnyte]

I'm so glad to see you documenting this here. I have a beautiful piece commissioned by my then-husband, now-forever-friend, @TraumaTrain, as a birthday gift in 2007. It hangs proudly on my wall all these years later. 💖

https://www.deviantart.com/guildhelper/art/Mourning-Temptress-2-48026018

 

Edited February 4, 2022 by Midnyte

[Attache]

2 hours ago, Midnyte said:

I'm so glad to see you documenting this here. I have a beautiful piece commissioned by my then-husband, now-forever-friend, @TraumaTrain, as a birthday gift in 2007. It hangs proudly on my wall all these years later. 💖

https://www.deviantart.com/guildhelper/art/Mourning-Temptress-2-48026018

 

 

That is an awesome piece of work! Very cool!

[Fire Chief]

Here's one for you Attache...

Edited February 4, 2022 by Fire Chief

[Attache]

4 hours ago, Fire Chief said:

Here's one for you Attache...

 

I remember! Satin Doll and Neowolf! I was slowly working towards this one! 🙂

Good to see you here, man! 
 

[Attache]

Taghuso really liked Liberta so he gifted me this piece of her after I'd been in the All-Star Sentinels of America for a while. It was always an amazing surprise to get the gift of art.

 

Disclaimer: I am not the artist of any of these works. In most instances (though not all) I merely created the characters in City of Heroes. Sometimes, I directed the artist with lots of notes and other times I let them do their thing. The late 00's were a different time and not all design choices then would be the same today.

 

Edited February 4, 2022 by Attache

[Attache]

Oh, man! Bucky Sheldon from taghuso! This takes me back and also riddles me with regrets all at the same time. Explanation is in order. This is going to get weird.

 

As envisioned by Tag, the All-Star Sentinels of America were a Silver Age SG with a layered metafictional history. We tried to hardcore roleplay them all the time with few in-public OOC brackets but then there was this other element that they were all characters in the fictional Amazing Comics. We even had a fictional timeline of important events as our lore was decidedly different than the game lore.

As I recall, the fact that we could never get the forums for the ASA running in-character most of the time was kind of frustrating for Tag and myself. At the  same time, some of us were feeling that the ASA was kind of an odd duck within our coalitions, having our own detailed history that didn't match in-game and a very few other RPers seemed to like reference that fact. We talked about it extensively and decided to break our coalitions which we naively thought would be no big deal and ended up with months of drama.

Simultaneously, we decided to expand our metafictional universe by creating a lot of other SGs under the Amazing Comics banner and since all of us were now "speaking" for multiple characters on the forums, in an effort to avoid multiple sign-ins, we came up with another metafictional layer of forum identities that evoked the fictional employees of the fictional Amazing Comics. It was getting a bit nutty. James Sheldon was editor Sal's assistant, nicknamed Bucky because he stuck close to him like a sidekick.

We never 100% recovered from this and I think only like three of us were into it anyway. The All-Star Sentinels were in until the very end of the game but the Amazing Comics experiment led to so many bad feelings in an otherwise excellent community, it was a huge mistake. But, hey, I still have Bucky to remember it all by!

Looking back, it probably would have been less effort just to try to make some real comics. 

Disclaimer: I am not the artist of any of these works. In most instances (though not all) I merely created the characters in City of Heroes. Sometimes, I directed the artist with lots of notes and other times I let them do their thing. The late 00's were a different time and not all design choices then would be the same today.

 

Edited February 4, 2022 by Attache

[Attache]

The third Torch Titan, also courtesy of taghuso but with an extra special connection.

 

As I dug deeper and deeper into the fictional lore of the All-Star Sentinels, I found that quite a number of the characters from this history were free and available. The first two Torch Titans had been Tag's characters and both were kind of unapologetically modelled on Alan Scott. This was all back in the days before you could buy extra server slots so at some point, Tag had deleted TT to make room for another character so I grabbed it, asking if I could do a Silver Age version. I even said "Think Hal Jordan to your Alan Scott." He was sold.

I can't recall if I commissioned this or if he did it as a kindness but either way, it has been one of my favorites.

Disclaimer: I am not the artist of any of these works. In most instances (though not all) I merely created the characters in City of Heroes. Sometimes, I directed the artist with lots of notes and other times I let them do their thing. The late 00's were a different time and not all design choices then would be the same today.

 

[Attache]

She's known simply as Mime now on Everlasting but back on Virtue with taghuso drew her, she was known as Maniac Mime. I also did a Who's Who page I did on her in the style of DC's Who's Who in the 80's.



Fun fact: The Factoid section references the Amazing Comics Group, editor Sal Rothstein, and Tag's artist alter ego of Terrance Anderson within the ACG! It was layers upon layers!

Disclaimer: I am not the artist of any of these works. In most instances (though not all) I merely created the characters in City of Heroes. Sometimes, I directed the artist with lots of notes and other times I let them do their thing. The late 00's were a different time and not all design choices then would be the same today.
 

[Attache]

Juggertha was an artist / art collector back in the OG days of the game and he did this one for me after I'd ran a contest in the All-Star Sentinels to try to drum up some interest in red side and the ASA's rogue's gallery. I don't really recall now many people took part but Condor King was the winner! This character is not mine but actually belongs to my old friend @ApeChild. 



Disclaimer: I am not the artist of any of these works. In most instances (though not all) I merely created the characters in City of Heroes. Sometimes, I directed the artist with lots of notes and other times I let them do their thing. The late 00's were a different time and not all design choices then would be the same today.

[Attache]

One of my more popular characters on Virtue was Janet Planet and Big Chris brought her to life for the first time. Janet comes from a possible future where humanity has split into 3 sub-species: The intelligent Lectors, the beautiful but simple-minded Idio, and the gruesome but mechanically inclined Trogs. I'll give you three guesses where Janet falls in that lineage.

 

 

Most people people think I got the name Janet Planet from either Rocky Horror, Schoolhouse Rock, or Alan Moore's run on Supreme. The name may have been lurking in the back of my brain because of those influences but I didn't consciously pick it because of any of them. I was just looking for an alliterative name and it popped into my head. I didn't recreate her on Everlasting because the fact that there is another Janet Planet is comics bugs me even if you are hard pressed to find an actual image of her.

 

Disclaimer: I am not the artist of any of these works. In most instances (though not all) I merely created the characters in City of Heroes. Sometimes, I directed the artist with lots of notes and other times I let them do their thing. The late 00's were a different time and not all design choices then would be the same today.

 

[Attache]

Ah, Satin Doll from Jocachi! I love the character name and this piece of art. But, still, there are a lot of things of changes I will someday make to her in the game.

 

First, the overall look. My initial take on this character's look  isn't too far off this - she is supposed to be a femme fatale with somewhat impractical costume. I always saw her with a cape/poncho kind of get-up - something like a vintage nurse's cape. With none of the capes in game really looking like that and with the Hard Candy hairstyle cape clipping issues, I went with the jacket and she just ended up looking like a Black Canary homage.

Second, the appropriation. When her origin was created, Satin Doll was the second to take up the mantle - the first being her grandmother in the Golden Age. After an adventure in India, the original Satin Doll acquired the Eye and Khaṭvāṅga of Kali and returned to the United States with them. Even while making the character in like 2007, I was aware that this was totally the Mighty Whitey trope and well-worn in comics. but I didn't bother to change it or parody it, I just acknowledged it in RP from time to time and that just isn't good enough.

I recreated Satin Doll on Everlasting and was able to get the costume a little closer to what I first envisioned. When I get around to re-working her bio, I'll probably drop the Eye and Khaṭvāṅga of Kali and pull from the in-game mythos. I never could represent the Khaṭvāṅga in-game anyway so there isn't really a need to cling to it.

 

Disclaimer: I am not the artist of any of these works. In most instances (though not all) I merely created the characters in City of Heroes. Sometimes, I directed the artist with lots of notes and other times I let them do their thing. The late 00's were a different time and not all design choices then would be the same today.

 

Edited February 7, 2022 by Attache

[Redletter]

On 2/7/2022 at 2:21 AM, Attache said:

Ah, Satin Doll from Jocachi! I love the character name and this piece of art. But, still, there are a lot of things of changes I will someday make to her in the game.

 

First, the overall look. My initial take on this character's look  isn't too far off this - she is supposed to be a femme fatale with somewhat impractical costume. I always saw her with a cape/poncho kind of get-up - something like a vintage nurse's cape. With none of the capes in game really looking like that and with the Hard Candy hairstyle cape clipping issues, I went with the jacket and she just ended up looking like a Black Canary homage.

Not a bad outcome, especially since Black Canary's design (both modern and classic) is somewhat ubiquitous. I'd say it's nearly as common as the even MORE impratical combat mini-skirt.

On 2/7/2022 at 2:21 AM, Attache said:

When I get around to re-working her bio, I'll probably drop the Eye and Khaṭvāṅga of Kali and pull from the in-game mythos. I never could represent the Khaṭvāṅga in-game anyway so there isn't really a need to cling to it.

To be fair, the in-game mythos this item could (and probably does) exist, though it may be in the hands of an indian hero, since the whole "CoXverse" has heroes all over the globe, not just here in sunny Paragon. My off the cuff reccomendation for a change would be to connect it to the shards that Oroboros uses? Theyre fairly ambiguous of origin, and have connections to time, which I personally feel is the strongest RP aspect of the domains Kali commands that we can directly emulate in game (time is wonderful on just about every class that has access to it)