Wolverine: Look Sharp Inspiration Board

So it's Project Rooftop time again. This time the challenge is Wolverine. Yeah no sweat. Design a costume for a character who has several iconic costumes and looks best when wearing plain clothes. The mind boggles.

My first step in these redesign contests is to hit Google search and see where my mind wanders. As new ideas develop more and more images are gathered through design and coincidence. After I've cast my net wide I refine the images down to a tight group of images and they are put in there own folder. This becomes the "Inspiration Folder" for the design and from there I get to drawing. I love this research process. I liken it to dipping your brush in an inkwell. Without absorbing the ink you cant begin drawing.

This Inspiration Board below is my collection of images for this project:

Annotations from Top Left to Bottom Right

1. Alex Ross' unused redesign is close to perfect. Why it's never been used is beyond me. It's X motif use is key.

2. Hugh Jackman's jacket is iconic enough to get it's own scene in that shitty shitty movie. (Pa Kent gave it to Logan, apparently). The Great Majority think "leather jacket" when they think "Wolverine", so it would be silly to ignore that fact in any subsequent design.

3. See Grant and Frank understand.

4. The Hooded Man. Logan from the far future. The Hood is a fantastic way to integrate head-gear without the mask shaped like his fucking hair, and it would allow the character to make steps toward his "future self". 

5. Brown and Yellow-Orange. His best colorway. See: leather jacket.  Also: Wolverine's classic silhouette is a sleeveless unitard. Every comic book costume he's had has been this way. So how do I make his costume sleeveless and feature the leather jacket. Hmmm. . .

6. . . Voila! This is Mountain Research's Jacket with removable hood and sleeves. Now we have an innovation that the costume can be hung around: A multitude of styles out of a single garment.

7. Stirrups on the pants look tough and keep your pant leg straight.

8. Russell Crowe as Robin Hood. Check out that removable hood and the cool silhouette it creates. Badass.

9. Sam Elliot = Biker Sexiness.

10. A hooded leather vest with attachable sleeves by S2VS. Check out how cool it looks open with the gloves.

11. Ordinary clothes works best. So this design has to look like ordinary clothing assembled into a uniform.

12. The genuine articles. Key to the look: jeans and denim vest with patches of leather. But blue jeans are too informal for a superhero costume. And it doesn't fit the chosen color palette.

13. But heavy duty Duxback Cotton does. That Carhartt Yellow Orange implies working class, lumberjack, hard work, durability. It's perfect, and the reinforced panels will be done in the chosen brown leather. 

14. THE SOURCE: Let's get drawing!