Monday, April 22, 2013

By Any Other Name

Hi, everypeoples.  It is I, rocketdave, the contributor to this blog with the least girly moniker, making my inaugural post in order to share a look at one of my most recent drawings.


Also, here's another drawing that Bea commissioned me to do for a book published through Lulu a while back, though it and the other illustrations I did were left out of said book for the simple reason that nobody involved, including myself, knew how to insert images into the text.  The drawing was intended to go along with Bea's story "The Sissification of Martin."


In case you're wondering why I signed the older drawing with my actual initials while the newer pic is signed "rX," that is in reference to the deviantART account I set up specifically for art of this nature, which is registered under the user name rocketXpert.  I also have a much older deviantART account as rocketdave - that account was intended to be a general-purpose depository for any artwork I happened to do.  However, as soon as I posted my first feminization drawing, that type of thing became pretty much all anyone wanted to see.  I can't say I was surprised- it's been my observation that art that appeals to people's prurient interests is what garners the most attention.  While I initially appreciated my burgeoning popularity, I'm afraid I also felt an increasing resentment of how my online identity had become subverted.  Consequently, to put some distance between myself and the more fetishistic artwork, I registered for the second deviantART account last year.

Had I known I was destined to become so closely associated with crossdressing art and the like, I might have worked harder to carve out a separate identity for myself from the get-go.  Of course, some of that decision was taken out of my hands, such as when Bea started posting my work and crediting me by my full name... without consulting me on what I preferred, I might add.  Perhaps when Bea tried out a girl's name on me during our earliest correspondence, I shouldn't have objected.  While I wasn't bothered by it, in my experience, being called by a name other than my own is kind of a strange feeling and can get wearisome after a while, so I expressed some reservations about essentially pretending to be someone I'm not.  Bea's response: "What a fuss about a bloody name!"

As if two different user names on deviantART were't enough, further confusing matters, I use the nom de plume Debbie when I illustrate books for Sandy Thomas Advertising.   Talk about diluting your brand.  I guess whatever people want to call me is fine... just so long as none of my family members discover what sort of art I'm best known for.

Lastly, rounding out this rambling introduction, here are a couple caricatures of yours truly:

In case you can't tell, I'm a fan of a certain science fiction franchise.

4 comments:

Anonymous said...

Brilliant illustrations - some of these would go very well along with Carrie's next episodes on Rose and Jackie, all very erotic

rocketdave said...

Thank you, Anonymous. It's worth pointing out, though, that Jack's story is not Carrie's alone and that other people have contributed. Since I can't seem to come up with any original ideas of my own, I've considered that my contribution could be to provide a few illustrations for that project, but I haven't found the time for that so far.

Carrie P said...

A great first post Dave, I’ve always been a fan of your art and this piece is wonderful. It portrays a scenario I’m sure a lot of us would love to be in, a feminised male maid receiving his punishment and as if his humiliating status needed underling -she’s wearing the trousers. Brilliant.
I think you may be overthinking a lot of this stuff Dave, your work is excellent and you are certainly not diluting your brand. You have a lot of fans in ALL aspects of your art. The way I see it is that this particular genre is just one small facet of your talent and it speaks to a very specific audience much in the same way as the others pieces you have posted show a different side of your artistic prowess. I also have an interest in said franchise, perhaps you could combine both interests - Voyager’s Seven of Nine is a Domme just dripping with possibilities. I love the look on the girl’s( your?) face in the ST piece.
Regarding a female name, I too found it strange calling myself by a girl’s name at first but now it’s something I rarely think about. We all have different dimensions to our personalities and the way I look at it is my femme side is only one of them. Do you want to tell us what Bea came up with??
Great contribution, please keep it up.
Carrie

rocketdave said...

Thanks, Carrie. I can't really take credit for the idea behind the piece with the "maid" being caned. I did that as part of an art trade- the other guy just told me what to draw.

I'd like to believe people aren't just interested in my art for one reason, but it's tough when I'll post something like the aforementioned maid pic to deviantART and it gets over a thousand pageviews in a single day, and then I'll post something that's not so salacious and I'm lucky if it gets fifty views. But perhaps I do tend to sell myself short; I've often been accused of focusing too much on the negative.

I'm pretty sure the name Bea randomly assigned me in that first email was Dee. One of the reasons I nipped that in the bud was because I have an aunt by that name. In hindsight, I suppose I could have used it as an homage to her, but I'm not sure what she'd have to say about that. Anyway, I prefer the name I thought up, Debbie, because it sounds sort of like my initials, D.B., spoken quickly together; I think that's a little more creative.

Funny that you should suggest combining forced femnization and Star Trek; I've actually had a notion to just that for a while now, in comic form. Again, it's partly a matter of finding enough time to concentrate on a project like that... as well as coming up with a clever title, of course.