Marceline the Vampire Queen

Recently I've become a pretty big fan of  "Adventure Time" on Cartoon Network. And of course my favorite character is the vampire queen, Marceline. Since I've been slightly obsessed with these Hanna-Barbera redesigns (I have so many more coming that are now in the sketch/thumbnail stage), I thought I'd try my hand at the Adventure Time crew, starting with Marceline. This time I did some inking for a change. Not in Illustrator, and not anything fancy, just with micron pens. I've been swamped in freelance work and can't afford to spend the time on really good quality inks. But I thought I'd post something a little more finished than the usual pencil roughs. I will however share my thumbnail sketch, which was pretty much just done from memory.

Then I looked online for a more accurate representation of her, and surprisngly found tons & tons of actual model sheets from the show. Pretty handy!

Then I did a cleaner drawing and added my personal flair to her while still trying to maintain a nod to the original design, which I love. Then I inked it up with microns and colored it in photoshop. Since my son Griff is a pretty huge fan of the show (and my toughest critic), and I want this design to be appealing to Adventure Time fans, I had him over my shoulder as my art consultant. It's still a bit grainy, but much more finished looking than my usual roughs. All in all, I'm pretty happy with her and can't wait to start on Jake & Finn. Hope you guys like it!

Here's the black micron outline:

And the finished color design: