(See more details about the World of Stark series here)
Technically, this armor doesn't count as part of the Iron Legion, but it did also make its debut in Iron Man 3 and was the armor that received the main focus. This armor has an upgraded version of the armor separation abilities seen in its predecessor, the Mark 41.
But I actually have a bit of a personal reason why I wanted to do this theme....
The year was 2014. I had recently made a pair of Incredible Hulk Jordan 3s and wanted to follow them up with an Iron Man theme and specifically chose the Mark 42 armor because the design really stuck out to me. Most traditional Iron Man armors have that balance of metallic red and gold or are mostly metallic red with sections of gold. The Mark 42 was different, as it flipped the idea and had the armor predominantly gold with smaller sections of red.
I had never done an Iron Man theme and wasn't quite sure at the time how to execute that metallic armor look. I forged ahead anyway and came up with this:
A few people liked it, but I was so unhappy with the outcome that I only took this one photo of them and didn't even bother to promote them. I actually put them up on eBay not long after this and sold them within a week of doing so. I told myself that one day, I would revisit this theme and redeem myself and do a much better job next time. I just didn't know that next time would be 12 years later.
Fast forward to 2026:
I've learned a ton of new techniques since then, and with me doing this Iron Man series, I knew it was a no-brainer to come back to this idea.
So here is the base shoe - the Jordan 6 "Red Oreo":
And again, here is the 2014 pair:
And here we have the 2026 pair:
On the original 2014 pair (which I think I used a different Jordan 6 base for), the colors were flatter and the patterns were hand drawn, whereas with the new ones, I used an airbrush technique for the armor patterns and a lot of metallics in the colors. I honestly didn't refer much to the originals when I came up with the new pairs, but I did remember a few details from the originals that I wanted on the new pairs but much more improved, such as the placement of the metallic gold. I also made the colors a lot more vibrant.
I'm really proud of how these came out and instantly got a feeling of redemption after seeing the finished work.
I do plan to add these to the store section sometime later this month (possibly in the next week or two), but if you are interested in a pair before then, feel free to send a message through the contact form or email at ecentrik@yahoo.com!
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