FanPost

Something awesome is coming to my mailbox soon.

I'm sure you've all visited thePensBlog at sometime or another. I know some of you here are even frequent commenters over there. It's an awesome website; easily one of my favorites.

Well, a little over a month ago, I was browsing the new PensBlog site layout and saw the "Stephen S." tab. I clicked and came across this post. For someone who's always looked for unique Pens items, but didn't want to pay $1200 for a signed Sidney Crosby jersey, this was totally awesome.

So I emailed Stephen and a little over a month later, this piece of awesomeness came out of it:

V66ret_medium

via oi53.tinypic.com

UPDATE: Stephen just finished the logo as well:

64fh8h_medium

via oi56.tinypic.com


 

After the jump, I'll talk about my experience in depth.

As I said, I emailed Stephen about the drawings. I had a bunch of questions like if I could only choose one of the portraits already up or if I could pick out a picture of a player. I was told this:

Thanks for checking out my stuff... If you have a particular pic you'd like to have used as reference, I can do that but it will cost a little extra to account for the sketching time to work the photo into a solid illustration. How much extra really depends on the photo source...

If you're still interested, let me know so we can get started.

I explained that I'm going to college in California, but I live in Texas, so he'd have to send it there. I then sent him a few photos that I would have possibly been interested in him doing. One of them was this one:

2h4j4nq_medium

via i36.tinypic.com

Knowing that that pic wouldn't exactly fit in a portrait, I asked what could be done about it. Stephen suggested something like this:

6jn8g9_medium

via oi52.tinypic.com

I thought it was totally awesome. However, I was only days away from moving back to college and I'm not a person who makes a purchase on something she saw five minutes ago. So, I told him about my situation and he said he had no problem waiting. About 10 days later, I decided I was ready to order the 3 portrait Sid picture. I also ended up ordering a Pens logo as well:

2141tmv_medium

 

via oi53.tinypic.com

A week later, Stephen sent me this guide illustration to update me on his progress:

122nhic_medium

via oi56.tinypic.com

Here it is before the gold background was put in:

K6lr_medium

via a.yfrog.com


A little less than a month later, I got an email with awesomeness attached to it. Stephen called it "the sickest thing I've ever done," and I have to agree:

V66ret_medium

via oi53.tinypic.com

I'm sure Stephen would've been quicker, but he seems like he's been swamped with customers lately. Even so, a month for something this sick is great time in my book.

Unfortunately, I won't be able to see it until I come home on Thanksgiving (American Thanksgivng, Leafer =P). Being in college, I wanted to make sure these sick portraits have a more permanent home. Right now my parents' house is the only place that's permanent for me. I can't wait to see it in person!

Doing business with Stephen was great. He was so accommodating and made really easy for me. If you're reading, Stephen: Thanks so much for doing all this for me!

If any of you are interested in purchasing something from Stephen, just email him at stephen.slesinski@gmail.com . You can also check out his site over at thePensBlog or his Twitter. He's a really cool dude and posts some awesome stuff!

The content expressed in fanposts does not necessarily reflect the opinions of the staff here at Pensburgh.com. FanPosts are opinions expressed by fans of various teams throughout the league but may be more Pittsburgh-centric for obvious reasons.