Amy Reeder Hadley (Tentopet)
http://www.tentopet.com/
I first saw Amy, or 'Tentopet' over at the Manga Academy website back when I was a fledgling comic book artist in early high school. I had thought her work was pretty awesome but my admiration for her really grew when right before I started college. I picked up a copy of "Fools Gold", her OEL Manga. (OEL means Original English Language, a term used for western artists who do manga). I really admired her style as it was a mix of realism with a playful twist. She put a lot of detail into her work and made things like freckles and sewing machines seem interesting. Right now she has just finished work on Madame Xanadu issue #1 with Vertigo. I was a bit skeptical about her switch from Tokyopop to Vertigo but I think she has certainly grown as a artist. The detail and hard work she puts into her comics makes me proud of her, and I aspire to be at her level one day. Even with all this work to do she still has time to give back to the art community by doing YouTube video tutorials. I personally find these very informative and inspiring. Her website also has earlier tutorials that are equally useful.
Marty Le Grow
http://sadwonderland.deviantart.com/
I first read about the work of Marty in an issue of Anime Insider in 8th or 9th grade. I remember sitting in the waterford crystal shop where my mom worked one afternoon and seeing this tiny article about a book called Bizengahst. The article described this girl who pitched an idea so awesome that Tokyopop scooped her up for a big book deal. I was in awe as she was living my (then) dream. I found her Deviantart page and followed her work on the book. I bought the first volume as soon as it came out and I loved it. It greatly appealed to my then heavily gothic sensibilities and I found the story fascinating. (The series is now on book five, coming out on the 15th of July.)
Marty was everything I wanted to be. She went to and graduated from the school of my dreams (Savannah College of Art and Design), did comics for a living with a hugely popular company, she wore and made elaborate costumes and got to go to conventions to show them and her work off. I still greatly admire her to this day, and I'm very excited to see how Bizenghast will end and what series she will do next. Her snaky humor also never fails to amuse :)
Bettina M. Kurkoski
http://www.dreamworldstudio.net/main_v7.html
The first thing that attracted me to the work of Bettina was her amazing coloring skills. She uses copic markers, which happen to be a personal favorite tool of mine. At Nekocon 2006 I had the opertunity to meet her. We talked about markers (as she had just bought a ton of ink refils) and she cheered when she found out I used them and prefered traditional media. She even looked over my portfolio and gave me tips when she didn't have to. I'll never forget how nice and friendly she was. She even gave me a hug X3
Here I am (in the black lolita dress, lol) standing next to her. She was there promoting her manga "My Cat Loki"
As fun as this post has been, it's getting really long now ^^; I'll do another Heros post in the future, it was fun sharing my heros and why I admire them so much.
I hope you all find some inspiration from these fantastic female artists!
Stay Steamy!
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