Bright Ink

SOOO, since I've been here long enough apparently, I've got access to the blog. So of course I'm going to use it! I'll mostly write about pony things here, as, well, it's a pony site, and I have other places to vent if I really need to. ANYWAY. Them's Fightin' Herds has been fully backed, PLUS they've reached all of their stretch goals! I'm SUPER excited for the game, I can't wait to play when it's done! It looks really good, and the dynamic music system is pretty cool! Also: have some fanart 'cause I didn't think it belonged in the 'pony' art thread

Welcome to my Character Feedback/Help Thread! My name is Ziel (Zieli on DA), and I am a visual artist in many forms. One of my favorite things to do, however, is create new characters! Character Design, be it starting with a design and building off of it, or starting with a personality and creating a design to fit it, is something I rather enjoy doing. But, I would like to think I have a pretty good handle on what makes a good character story-wise, too! So if you're not sure about your OC, or don't know where to start, feel free to ask and I'll do my best to lend a helping hoof! Rules + General tips for feedback requests: Please let me know what specifically you're seeking help with. If there is anything you DON'T want me to comment on, please also state what that is! (EG: "I need help with my OC's backstory, but I DON'T want any critique on their design.") Please do NOT ask me to design your OC for you! I can give suggestions for the design, or potentially tweak an existing design, but in order to learn, YOU will have to do most of the work! A good place to start is either with the Pony Creator (easiest), or with a Free Base (requires some artistic skill - double check the rules in the submission to make sure you're allowed to use it!). For cutie marks, you can use the Cutie Marker or Cutie Mark Creator (this one doesn't seem to work for me but it might work for you). If you'd like me to transfer your Pony Creator design + Cutie Mark onto a Free Base, I can do that for you - please provide the Creator design, Cutie Mark, and Base you want it on! Please let me know whether or not you're trying to make your OC more "realistic". By this, I mean "Do you want them to fit into the MLP Universe (good for canon RP), or are they just for fun (no serious restrictions)?" In general I will lean towards "more realistic" unless told otherwise, since many people appreciate "realistic" OCs over "unrealistic" OCs! You can also specify whether you want them to lean towards realistic, but it doesn't really matter to you if they're still a little out-of-the-ordinary. Please do NOT get upset at me for my feedback. My feedback is only meant to help - I want you to improve! If I don't like something and think you should change it, that's my opinion - meaning that you don't have to agree with me if you don't want to, and you don't have to change it if you don't want to! But please don't waste both of our time by trying to justify/explain your choices to me - just take it with a grain of salt, and move on.

Thank you all for the complements! I'm glad you like my work, and I myself am happy with where it's headed! This is the ref for my new ponysona: He's a donkey/unicorn hybrid, but obviously more unicorn. Dakota Maple wasn't his birth name - I haven't decided on that yet, but it's not very important. I might use the base for other characters / adoptables or something. I'm not sure if I'll write Dakota a proper profile, though. I'm not sure how I'd go about writing a profile based on myself, haha,,

Ahh, okay, yeah probably a good idea haha. It was still pretty high in the subforum, so I didn't bother looking at the date. >w>;

Hnn yes thanks for the comment on the art! Haven't made a ref in a while. Probably gonna hoard this one away for myself. >w>

I agree with the mention that his current cutie mark doesn't symbolize what you wanted it to - there is nothing romantic about a skull with two disembodied pony wings! Since I'm not one particularly for writing, I'll poke at the visual aspect. I'm personally not a fan of it. Red and green are complimentary colors, but you'd generally want to avoid them together (with white, no less!) as they're considered Christmas colors. Depending on which color you consider the most important, I'd either change his coat to a dark grey/blue, lighten it up, or change his mane to an even darker green (or again, dark grey). You can always fiddle around with the palette and try something new all together! I also saw you mentioned you wanted him to be a pirate so he could show that not all pirates are bad - but you also have him killing his own father and plundering in his backstory. I could see him being a flawed character - thinking what he's doing is "good" but it's really not. Or, instead, I'd say have him dump his father off to the Royal Guard instead - because he's better than his father, he's not going to stoop to the level of killing. And if he's still going to steal, have him be a sort of "Robin Hood" - steal from the rich (and tyrannical) and give to the poor.

Do you have an example of a traditionally drawn image? I tend to find traditionally drawn artwork is either less saturated, or more tinted - especially with pencil crayons, where they won't be as dark. In the following image I lightened her overall colors, then re-saturated her eyes and mane. Personally I feel this "softens" the contrast between her palette - specifically the mane and coat, which feels like the thing that stands out the most to me.

EDIT: Since most people like the regular tail more, I'm going to go with that! Thanks for the feedback! Alternate Title: "Decisions are hard." I need help deciding on the tail for my Ponysona. I'm not sure whether I like the plain horse-like tail, or whether I should change it to the traditional unicorn tail. I have an avatar of him on SecondLife which will have to use the horse-like tail, but that doesn't mean I have to draw him that way! (He's a donkey/unicorn hybrid, if you were wondering, hence the markings and large ears.) My boyfriend thinks the traditional unicorn tail makes him look pretentious/snooty and thinks people will perceive ME that way if I change it, but I've always liked traditional unicorns, and, well, it's much like a longer donkey tail. TL;DR - Let me know which tail you think looks best!

@Venomous Thanks! I've gotten better over the years. Saying thanks again 'cause I'm not sure how to tag you properly. ;w; See above post.

AUGH SUCH AWESOME ART PS: The link in your profile for your DA account doesn't work! Please fix ASAP, I MUST follow you! >:0

Your artwork is really cute! Keep it up! ^^

Hello all! My name is Ziel (or Dakota Maple, as is my current Ponysona's name) and, well, I'm an artist! In this thread I'm going to basically dump all of my pony art on you, whenever I make it. Large images will be added as links to my DA! EDIT: Since I've noticed at least one "redraw" thread that doesn't directly require the artist's permission to do a redraw, I'd like to let it be known that I do NOT want to see any of my work "redrawn". You may use my work as reference, but you may NOT heavily reference it (don't use the same pose/same head/etc.). If you'd like some tips on how to improve your work, or use references the right way, feel free to ask me about it! I am not opposed to helping others out, I'd just appreciate if you don't "monkey see, monkey draw", if you catch my drift! Here's the pony pieces I've done so far (EDIT: added more older ones I forgot about!) First appearance of my old Ponysona, Freckle. Considering he was basically my fursona in pony form and I remade said fursona/lost love for his "old" design, unfortunately this ponysona went with it. http://leizycat.tumblr.com/post/72565275347(WARNING - MUSIC) http://zieli.deviantart.com/art/Pony-Glider-488530384 http://zieli.deviantart.com/art/Nightmare-Defiance-505948422 Defiance was a "Nightmare" version of Freckle, but I still hold his design dear, as it came to me in a dream I had. He is now his own character - a perfectly villainous stallion! The last three are bookmarks! I hope to print them out and sell them at various cons I attend in the future. ^^

It's been fully funded as of today, so I don't think it's going to flop like you said it would! I'm actually rather excited for it myself. ^^ While yes I was into it because I found out it was Mane6 and the "rebrand" of Fighting is Magic, there's also these points to make the game all it's own: Lauren Faust came up with new character designs, as well as the lore/story for the game! While the characters share some design aspects with MLP, all of them have their own unique look. The game will have an entirely unique soundtrack, which is ALSO dynamic, meaning that it'll change with every match. Each playable character has their own variation of the same track, and their version will play if they're dominating the match. They also have their own intros and outros (of course). Back to the lore. The new story for the game is pretty interesting, and each character is getting their own little backstory explaining why they became the chosen ones for the main quest of the game. All of them have likable qualities, but they're by no means perfect, and they're also not copies of the MLP main cast. The game will also have a visual lobby for online play. It's nothing fancy but it's definitely impressive how they also immerse the fighting into the lobby itself. I think it'll fly as a stand-alone game. Sure maybe a lot of people who aren't into cutesy ungulates will turn their nose up, but from those that have given it a go, even not being bronies, the gameplay seems likable enough to earn players simply for that aspect.

My favorite thing to work on... probably is character design. I've been delving more into multi-character pieces, but I find there's nothing quite like creating a new character! That's also my favorite part of my costume making - being done and having the character FINALLY brought to life! I'm going to... try to be a little more talkative here. I don't have a lot of trouble when it comes to sharing my opinion (or advice at times!) but I guess I just have trouble giving my input on everything, and focusing on multiple things at once - I'm often drawing or sewing so people who have IM'd me often find I won't reply for quite a while - I simply forget! =w=; But this is all completely new to me, and I would certainly hope this community is more approachable than the ones I'm use to. :3

The episode was so... painful. It was empty, bland. Sure the songs were good and made you have feelings... but it was still a huge disappointment. It felt forced right from the beginning. One thing I briefly considered was "maybe Diamond Tiara's mother gave in to her because she never thought Diamond Tiara would stand up to her, and she's only bullying Diamond Tiara because she herself is pushed around" but for the love of GOD, I should NOT be thinking so deeply about her mother when the episode is suppose to be focused on HER! And to add to that, Diamond Tiara just turns around and goes "it's my CUTIE MARK that allows me to make people do what I want" - and then that whole spinoff spiel in my head is made null anyway. Good for Diamond Tiara for turning around and "being the pony she wants to be", I guess... but it just feels so fake, as in, I wouldn't be surprised if the next episode is how all of that was just a dream one of the crusaders had because they wanted their bully to turn good.

HYPE HYPE HYYYYPE!

My Favourite Mane 6 Pony: Rainbow Dash How did you find MLP Forums?: Google. >w> How you became a fan of My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic: I saw it blow up on the interwebz, and heard that the story and animation was good. And it was! I have no regrets being a fan. Hey all! My name is Ziel (or for now, Dakota Maple) and I am a Digital Artist / Model-Maker, Costume Maker, Furry, and (obviously) a Brony! I also play video games every so often. I'm a quiet person, as the title says - I have very few close friends or people I talk to a lot, but even so, I still enjoy meeting new people, and consider many people I meet (online or offline) to be my friends, even if we don't talk constantly. ^^; (I guess I DO talk a lot sometimes, and I tend to speak my mind, but as far as one-on-one convos go I have trouble talking to people all the time. I'm very introverted in the majority of situations!) After a lot of lurking on the outskirts of the actual pony community, I've decided to get it over with already and stick my nose in. See what's going on in this part of the internet. If you would like to know more about me, talk to me, ask me about my art/costumes, etc. feel free to ask whatever you'd like!