The banner

On Friday, March 29, @'s Pinkie Pie banner was approved and published on the MLP Forums. Pinkie Pie is her giggly, ecstatic self, having a great time. The chaotic, random mood in the background dances, and Pinkie Pie and Gummy celebrate in the foreground (and for Pinkie Pie, breaking the fourth wall).

Composition

This banner doesn't have anything plastered in the center, relaxing the eyes. The background has many tints, but they are faded enough so the two Pinkie Pies, Gummy, the logo, and navigation stand out and not blend in. If the background was brighter, then the banner would have been extremely busy, a major no-no in graphic designing.

Furthermore, because of the placement of the characters and background, Airbourne is trying to make the banner appear as happy as Pinkie herself, and he succeeded. As he's a big Pinkie Pie brony, he attempted to show as much respect for her as he can, and the banner is his successful way to prove it to his audience.

Navigation treatment

The navigation is in two colors.

1. When inactive, the buttons are the same color as Pinkie's foreground body.
   
2. The color of the navigation's stroke, button when the cursor is hovering over, and the button when activated are similar to the stroke color of Pinkie's hair.
   

Despite being the same color as Pinkie's body, because of the white inner glow, the light pink appears a little brighter, forcing me to occasionally look down at the navigation instead of Pinkie Pie herself.

Furthermore, the light color blends in too much with the light blue arrow in the "View New Content" box. The pink and blue arrow share similar tints, forcing the arrow to disappear in the background. If I only glance at it, unless you're someone with eagle eyes, you won't notice the arrow immediately.

Logo treatment

The logo is hovering slightly above-center to the right. Airbourne did a great job making it pop from the background with the thick red stroke. However, there are several issues with it:

1. The gradient is completely unnecessary. Airbourne is attempting to show three-dimensionality in it, similar to a party balloon. But for a logo treatment, it's unneeded. Logos work best when they are flat shapes. Treat the MLP Forums logo as if it's crossing multiple media. Logos with gradients are extremely difficult to duplicate perfectly on paper (and borderline impossible when embroidered) because there are so many ranges of color to blend. Instead of two colors, there are now hundreds, which means a waste of ink and strings.
   
2. Pinkie is laying down on top of the logo and breaking the fourth wall. Not only is it redundant, it also makes the appearance of the logo less powerful. The Pinkie on the left is sufficient enough, and use the appearance of the logo itself to tell your audience what the message is.
   
3. The logo is improperly scaled. "Forums" is bigger and wider than "MLP," but "MLP" is a little bit too small. Once more, refer to here to see the proper scale of the logo.
   

Other

Despite the pink and purple in the banner, Gummy's green colors don't clash. He, too, stands out and blends in simultaneously.

Ideas (for improvement)

• To copy-and-paste from my previous review, use the correct scale of the MLP Forums logo, which is found in my review here. The proportions are there for a reason and should be used as such.
   
  And for anyone who wishes, a vector format of the logo can be found under my Google Site: EPS, SVG, and PDF.
  
  • Treat the logo as if it's being transferred across multiple media, such as paper, embroidery, television, cards, transparencies, plastic, and so on. The Internet isn't the only media platform, and the best logos these days are when the they cross other platforms.
     
    This means no gradients. Use the flat shape of the logo instead. If you can, ditch the stroke, too.
     
    No need for a character to lay on top of the logo nor any piece of the character's anatomy. Use the strength of the logo alone to your advantage, for any extra details will dull its message.
    

  [*]Make the background pop out less by tinting it more. Pinkie is the main focus with the logo and Gummy secondary. Whitening the background and/or making it more transparent can make her appear closer and push the chaos further back, amplifying the illusion of distance. Also, the less obvious the background, the more you can play with the logo without the need to include redundant special effects or a stroke.

  [*]Use a more muted color for the inactive buttons to not only make both Pinkie and "View New Content" arrow pop out, but to also improve the banner's visual hierarchy. You can take the stroke color of Pinkie Pie and use that as the fill color for the inactive buttons of the navigation. The color for the navigation's stroke, hovering color, and active buttons can remain the same.

   

  As a bonus idea, you can maybe tie in Gummy to the navigation by adding in the green from his stroke or body or the deepest color purple from his eyes (possibly for the stroke of the navigation bars). However, this suggestion is a bit up in the air because pink (red that is tinted) and green are complementary colors, and adding in green anywhere could make the banner visually uncomfortable for the audience.

Conclusion

Gone ϟ Airbourne designed his Pinkie Pie banner to show his admiration and respect for the party Earth pony. It is creative, well-composed, and in character of her because she and the background appear energetic and happily chaotic. There are still some rough areas to clean up, but Gone ϟ Airbourne is well on his way to creating some marvelous banner designs for the MLP Forums.