TerminalObsession

Thank you! I now have another picture, this one being me shamelessly tracing my own art. This is him in full, glorious grayscale:

Dust Devil nodded, setting her menu on the table decisively. Sort of. Sure of what she would order, she hailed one of the waiters with a hoof just as tan as her namesake. Ironblade let her head drop onto one hoof, staring, bored, as Dust placed her order. She was quick to follow, the waiter giving her a funny look, but writing it down anyway.

So, this is my little garbage character. He's unoriginal, but I love him anyway. And sorry for the charcoal-ish quality, this image is quite small. I don't have much information on him besides his name and some random trivia.

@@Hazard Time, Dust Devil shrugged while Iron fanned out the menu in her hooves. It didn't take the gray mare long to make her selection, a small smirk decorating her face. "I'll take the chicken salad," she said, relishing the looks she received. "What? When you're living with griffons, you get used to it or starve." She shrugged lightly, tossing the menu back onto the table with a puff of red magic. Dust deliberately pulled up a different copy, as though worried that Iron was contagious. Iron herself did nothing but roll her eye at that.

The ability to shapeshift, but only after slowly licking the thing you want to transform into. The same is required if you want to turn back.

Yeah... I'm trying to curb the urge to make everything into a hybrid giraffe. Not much progress so far, sadly.

Yes, they are truly perfection! All hail scanner! Also, I may have screwed up on actually using the scanner, but whatever, past is past.

@@cwhip9, Mercury peeked around the stone creature warily, wondering why they had stopped. Her first presumption was that something had gone horribly wrong; Nothing good could come from stopping in a place like this, she felt. Nothing at all. Upon seeing the stone golem's stuck foot, she frowned. Personally, she did not care to try to pull it out. Her magic was too weak, and she was tired. String could try, but Mercury, oh so slowly, started to move on, forward, farther into the maze.

@@Hazard Time, Iron and Dust looked at each other and shrugged. Neither of them moved from the crystal siblings' path; Dust stayed from sheer boredom, Iron for the elusive promise of profit that was still more than anything else in the city. Though Dust Devil walked nearly side-by-side with the siblings, Iron stayed behind them, quiet save for the steady beat of her hooves on stone.

Thanks! Oh, by the way, here's your picture. It's derpy Sunshine with a bug on her nose. The splotches are drops of water; I'll rescan the picture once they've dried out. I can still color it if you want, or I can leave it black and white. Your choice.

I might actually finish this tomorrow, simply because I don't want to draw Sunshine's mane. If you have any clearer reference pics, that would be great, because I draw manes as solid things so I can't just kinda scribble something down. Procrastinating for life.

@@iceestarz, Hey, being the procrastinator I am, I'm starting on your thing. It'll hopefully be done sometime today.

So, things happened, and now I have a working scanner! To celebrate this amazing event, I will be posting some of my slightly not sucky drawings from this school year. Don't be fooled; This gallery is kinda like a lesson in all the ways I can screw things up fatally. So I drew my OC, Ironblade. As it turns out, coloring with a graphite pencil and then lugging around a drawing in your backpack for months is a great way to make it blotchy as all hell. I mean, look. At least Iron has a fairly blotchy coat anyway, so it's no big loss, and I used colored pencils for all the others. As it turns out, my scanner is still a crappy one and can't see colors very well. This is Donut Steel, whose coat was originally a peachy cream color before my scanner decided it was going to be blind. At least you can kinda see it in her left hooves, which are darker. Her eyes are supposed to be bright cherry read, with the streak in her mane being much pinker than shown. The black spots are oil stains. This one actually turned out okay, with no obvious horrible flaws other than me accidentally cropping out my signature a little bit. The blue-to-white gradients in her wings turned out really well, in my opinion! I also just really like this OC in general. I don't quite like the accessories on this one, but, being the first time I tried that at all, she turned out mostly alright! Her wings could have been better, but I still don't quite have a style for them. And the scanner dulled out the shading and her colors, but whatever, she still looks nice! These two are technically the same pony, so I decided to try a mirror image-type thing, which absolutely did not backfire horribly on me. This is my most recent color drawing. I kinda screwed up Vermilion's shading, and Mercury's coat looks kind of blotched (not nearly as bad as the first drawing, though.) But that's minor nitpicking; I'm still proud of this one. I'll also post some pencil sketch things, which I drew in a different style. This is Rainbow Dash, with mechanical wings that I kind of messed up terribly and never went back to fix. I didn't quite understand what I was doing wrong with the way her wings are attached to her body, and they don't look that good, which is kind of bad. They were supposed to be the focal point; Mechanical stuff is not my thing, apparently. On the bright side, I really like how her face came out. Sorry about the darkness; It was the only way I could find to actually make the lines visible, because they're not drilling-holes-through-the-paper dark. Even so, some of them aren't the most clear, but at least you should be able to see it. God, my scanner is bad, but it's better than the alternatives. But other than that, I actually really like it. It's not complete; This drawing was supposed to be a cover for a fanfiction I really like, but I'm almost afraid to color it, lest I screw it up. So yeah, look at my arts and give me virtual internet points! Those are nice.

@@Hazard Time, Dust subtly put distance between herself and Ametrine, something Ironblade did not fail to notice. However, she didn't comment on it. Intelligence is nothing to be ashamed of, she reasoned. Besides, Iron liked the mare. She had spunk. And Iron was slowing down a few paces herself, putting distance between herself and the furious crystal mare, if only to have a little more reaction time should worse come to worst. "No," Dust said once Ametrine had cooled down a little, "I don't really know the places. Never had time for them, y'know?" She turned her head around. "What about you?" "Also a no," Iron answered. "I don't care for it. I'd make a terrible tour guide; Not nearly enough stabbing in it for me." Dust Devil bit her bottom lip, chewing on it for a few seconds. "Whatever. We can always search, exploring is fun," she said. "There's gotta be something in Bangcolt somewhere."

Nale (the Order of the Stick)

@@Hazard Time, "Well, she was definitely going towards the train station," Dust said. "As for why, I'm a weather worker, not a mind reader. You oughta know better than I do. I'm just your guide now." Ironblade quietly began to follow the procession, staying just within earshot, keeping her notched ear pointed to the conversation.

@@Hazard Time, Dust leaned back, though she didn't lift a hoof. "Woah, take it easy!" she exclaimed. "One question at a time!" Somewhere behind her, Iron snorted in amusement even as she faked disinterest. Dust, after a fairly intense staring contest, finally admitted defeat, taking several steps backwards to clear up some space. Lifting her muzzle to the sky, she trotted in place, spinning in a complete circle before coming to a stop and locking eyes with Ametrine. "I can take you to where she was," she said. "She was going... eh... That way, I think" she continued, vaguely waving her right hoof, her hoof facing away from the wall of the arena. "Let's go." With a shake of her head, Dust started forward, humming faintly. "I think she had... Oh, ten guards or so. And she wasn't missing any legs or anything." Dust snorted. "I would have noticed if she was."

Umahara (The Iron Horse) (It's a fanfiction)

@@cwhip9, Mercury flinched slightly at String's touch before giving in. As they continued, her stone-faced determination started to come back. Small silver hooves click-clacked against tile as she pressed forward, her hooves clicking at a noticeably faster pace than String. "Because he's scary?" she suggested, her voice still rather small and shaky.

@@Hazard Time, "Well, I did see a crystal pony a while back," Dust said thoughtfully, ignoring Ametrine's plight entirely. "I think she was red… But then again, some ponies are, like, 90% mane, so I dunno." Another thought occurred to her. "Say, is she rich? Like, fancy guards in shiny armor kind of rich?" Dust looked at the sky, then back at Ametrine, running a hoof under her chin. Ironblade had gone right back to leaning against the wall, though she kept one notched ear pointed towards the conversation.

@@Hazard Time, (Dust appears to be an earth pony. Thought you might like to know that.) "Dust Devil," the tan mare replied, trotting over to Ametrine. She cast a critical eye over Ametrine's crystalline coat, reaching a hoof in an attempt to tap her cheek, apparently seeing whether Ametrine was really made of crystal. "Crystal ponies are even sparklier up close," she remarked. Dust opened her mouth to say something when she was stopped by one of Iron's scarred hooves in front of her mouth. "Which brings us rather neatly to what I was going to say," Iron said, her voice sharp, distinct, commanding. "I believe this lovely mare here might have a lead." "Hey!" Dust snapped from behind Iron's hoof. "You didn't tell me about this!" "So I'm a liar; sue me," Iron replied. "You can fly and we can't, you can leave any time." Dust Devil very plainly lacked wings, beyond the simple outlines carved into the metal plates on her shoulders. Even so, she nodded in agreement. "Plus," Iron continued, "there's probably going to be flank-kicking aplenty, and I'll be fighting." Dust sighed theatrically, laying a hoof across her forehead. "Now I have to watch. Damn it, stop being so convincing." Iron shot her a pointed look. Dust shrugged. "What? I'm coming, I'm coming. I'll guide ya to that building you've mentioned, I've seen the whole city." Another glare. "And I'll tell you what you want to know," Dust said with a roll of her eyes. "Can we stop acting like interrogators and get to the point already?" "Sure," Iron said agreeably. "These two lovely ponies are looking for someone, and we're going to work together to help them find her. Sound like a plan?" "Pretty much," Dust said. A smirk spread across her face and she adjusted her goggles as she turned her green eyes to Ametrine. "So," she continued, "Hit me with your best shot. Who you looking for?"

@@cwhip9, Mercury peeked out from under her hooves before shakily stumbling onto them. "I thought we were going to die there," she confessed weakly, her voice still small and trembling. "I'm still not sure we won't…" Even so, she found potentially being crushed by the stone monster to be better than being stranded alone in the tunnels, and she followed String quietly, slowly regaining her composure.

Well, I am Idea Chicken. I give ideas sometimes, when I'm not doing other pointless stuff. And your ponies do need ears. Just make them small and derpy-looking, and you're set.

@@cwhip9, Mercury only pulled back, drawing her mane over her face and curling up into a small, silvery ball. "No," she whimpered, her voice sounding very small and weak. "I don't have any ideas." She didn't see the change in the stone beast. It probably wouldn't have reassured her even if she had.