Cass Face Sketches

Gah, I hate this scan.

This be the last hand drawn pictures I'll be submitting for a while...(unless I can get to my college computer lab and scan them there...)...Scanner's broken. I struggled on photoshop just to make it viewable. Doesn't help that my monitor is also dying on me so I can't really see how truly bad it is. From what I can see it looks pretty...blotchy? You can tell I did this with a ball ink pen, huh?

LOL, it's like the universe it plotting against me, foling every attempt I make at posting pictures online.

Anyhoo, just the first batch of sketches I drew at work of Cassandra Cain, aka the last Batgirl in DC comics.

I'm trying to attempt a more realistic style, and am practicing with Cass who's half-Asian, half-white. So if she looks different in each sketch, that's why. I'm still trying to make up my mind about how I want to draw her.

These sketches are actually kinda old now, I draw her a lot more Asian looking now, but this kinda works too. These are definitely not the best pics I've done in a while. But I liked them enough at the time to attempt to scan them.

Can I say I like drawing her hair? I'm not so sure if I've drawn hair like hers before...

In comics her hair was either very short or shoulder length or longer. The artists couldn't make up their mind about her. When she first showed up, she had that stereotypical asian bob cut. Never been a fan of it. Then once her book started her hair started getting longer or wilder. She'd be drawn with a sorta crazy layered shoulder-length haircut with gravity-defying bangs/strands. Kinda cute, I liked it. Most of the time she wore it in a short spiky ponytail with a scrunchie (ah...the 90's...). At one point she was drawn with a short pixie-hair cut. Cute, but weird considering every other issue, her hair would revert to shoulder length again.

Whatever the case is, I found it a nice detail how she was always this dark haired chick with "cool" hair. She was drawn to be slightly pretty or cool. Nothing too girly or purposely sexy. Be it gravity-defying bangs or spikey layers of hair, she just looked cute or badass. Never sexy or elegant, which is the look of tons of comic book female characters...Batgirl Cass was different from them all in many ways...

Last time we saw Cass in comics, her hair had grown very long and straight (I'm guessing to show that a year has passed in comics). Not sure I like it, I mean she looked very pretty and sexy...and maybe that's why...but yeah, it was too polished. She's not a very polished girl. Aside from being a disciplined ninja-type girl, she's also got a child-like side to her, and when not fighting baddies or in the presence of her coworkers, she's pretty rough around the edges. (she's sloppy...) So the messy layered/spiked look kinda fit her.

About each sketch...the top left-hand side one got too big for the sheet I was drawing on. Hence why she's sorta cut off. I do like the way she looks, if I were trying to make her more white or manga-ish. eh, but not Cass-ish enough.

The top right-hand side pic makes her look more ethnic I think. I don't normally draw her hair as poofy as this. But I like her mellow dignified face.

I got carried away with the center left-hand pic. Drew her looking sad. Ignore the anatomy and pose. It was just something to fill the sheet with, but it's not meant to be accurate. I think the artist Rick Leonardi did the BEST Cass faces ever. He made her look realistically Asian, beautiful and so very expressive. She has the prettiest faces under Rick's pencil. I tried going for a more expressive face here. Still, not sure she looks Asian enough.

I really don't like the center right-hand pic, but I wanted to draw her eyes half-closed as if in thought. I really don't like how her mouth came out. It just doesn't match the expression I was going for. Her hair is perfect though. this is how I'd like to always draw her hair. It just fits her.

The bottom left-hand corner pic is rather manga-ish, but I still like it. her eyebrows are very thick, which is actually accurate. Like I said, she's kinda rough around the edges, I don't think Cass ever worried about waxing her thick eyebrows. Though in later issues, we find out she learned to wear makeup (to cover up the bruises from her battles as Batgirl), and her eyebrows looked a little less wild. But it could just be the artist...

Bottom right-hand corner pic...couldn't resist. I know she's not polished AT ALL. But if she were ever to go undercover to some gala, she could look like this. No one would recognize her. (and the spiky hair in her bun would totally be reminiscent of her spiky ponytail).

This was inspired by some really beautiful tall Asian girls I saw going to a club in the casino I work at. They had their shiny black hair up in simple minimalistic hairstyles like this, with long dangling, modern looking type earrings, while wearing simple strapless black dresses. Their eye makeup was smoky with clean polished faces like Cass here. They looked flawless! I'm so jealous. >_<

(may imitate this look for her graduation dinner next week...)

*sighs* here's hoping Christmas brings me a shiny new scanner...or monitor...whichever comes first. I'd gladly take it! (JB's broke, otherwise she'd buy it herself)