Cowgirls

widescreen: 1900x1200 • 1680x1050 • 1440x900 • 1280x800
fullscreen: 1600x1200 • 1280x960 • 1152x864 • 1024x768

About this wallpaper
Roughly 90% Illustrator CS3 and 10% Photoshop CS3.

This is another Facts of Life wallpaper, but I did so poorly on making Blair look like Blair, and because the characters never dress in western wear, it really could be anyone. ;)

I came across some photos of Lisa Whelchel wearing a cowboy hat that made me go, 'ah, ha!' So this is a kind of what-if.

After I got my idea, I lightly sketched out the composition I wanted: Blair sitting on a fence or something and Jo standing behind her. My figure construction skills are seriously atrophied so I had a friend of mine pose for both figures, took photos of her, and used those as reference to get the perspective and everything right.

In Photoshop, I did the main sketch based on the photos I took, then had to do some head hunting for Jo and Blair's faces. Jo's was fine but it was hard finding an image of Blair with her head at the correct angle. The one I ended up using was of her feigning a pouty expression. No matter HOW hard I tried, I could NOT get my drawing to look like Blair without the pouty expression! I think Jo looks fine but... GRR. Now I know why comic artists who have to draw characters from live-action TV or film don't bother. ;)

Anyhoo - I took the sketch (which was nothing finished - literally just a quick 5 minute sketch) into Illustrator and dreweverything there, line work first. I was originally going to have something like forced-perspective telephone wires overhead but went with clouds instead.

I did this over the course of three days. The initial composition set-up took awhile, and tweaking the blonde's face probably took longer than anything else. While it still doesn't quite look like who I was going for, I am pleased with the overall results. :)