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wdeleon — Diamond Hues And Shining Facets
#prpg #diamond_hues #shining_facets #fanart #originalcharacters #my_little_pony
Published: 2016-09-18 08:53:37 +0000 UTC; Views: 695; Favourites: 18; Downloads: 7
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Description
Diamond Hues (white unicorn on the right) and Shining Facets (dark unicorn on the left), the parents of Emerald, Topaz, and Sapphire Hues.Quick bios written up for the RPG they're characters in:
Diamond Hues:
Diamond Hues originates from the Hues Noble House, a family of minor nobility in Sparkle City.
Many members of the Hues family have historically had a distinct taste for adventure in their early adult lives, and Diamond Hues was no exception. She discovered this inclination while studying generalist magic and thaumo-archaeology at Radiance Magic College, venturing farther and farther into the field over the course of her under-graduate and graduate degree pursuits to explore and document pre-catastrophic sites and artifacts. Although an ethical grey area for an archaeologist, she sometimes took the opportunity her exotic destinations afforded her for personal "off-the-books" treasure hunting on the side, though she was careful and scrupulous to properly catalog and turn over any items that offered the possibility of restoring significant pieces of beneficial magical knowledge to ponykind.
During most of her college years, she was regarded as a very high achiever academically and magically, but distant and bookish (another long-standing Hues family tendency). After completing her studies, however, she made frequent long journeys to explore various destinations on the Isle of Yore. In the process, she fell in and out with various groups of traveling companions and made numerous friends, which helped to loosen her previously stiff attitude and broaden her social horizons and comfort level.
Near the end of one of these journeys, she parted ways with her companions in the Pony Republic. Although she intended to lodge in one of the towns until she could find safe passage toward Sparkle City with a caravan or other large group, she happened to meet an aristocratic family while passing through their lands who offered her hospitality in their manor as fellow minor nobility. One member of this family, a young and handsome unicorn stallion named Shining Facets, quickly became friends with her. She took notice of his fascination with her travels, his initiative and thirst to learn and satisfy his own curiosity despite most of his family's disdain for higher education, and his willingness to see the merits of her family's ideas about eugenic selection. Her interest was piqued, so acting on a sudden hunch, she took the opportunity to research his family, pedigree, and high magicality.
Realizing that an uncommonly ideal opportunity was in front of her, Diamond Hues decided to take the forward approach and ask for his help in becoming pregnant, saying she wanted to return home from this journey carrying the greatest treasure of all: a foal. Shining Facets agreed, and also decided to accompany her to Sparkle City to pursue a long-term romance, to which Diamond Hues readily assented. By the time they reached Sparkle City, Diamond Hues had her wish and was pregnant with the couple's first child, Emerald Hues. Shining Facets remained in Sparkle City permanently to help start their new family and be a part of his foal's life. Diamond Hues soon married him after a period of courtship just long enough to satisfy appearances among the nobility. They have remained happily married and had three foals together in total, all of them very strongly magical.
Shining Facets:
Shining Facets was born in the Pony Republic to a family of landed minor aristocrats of some wealth. His ancestry includes numerous highly magical unicorns, with some highly magical pegasi and a few very magical earth ponies. It was this high magical ability and the preservation of some precatastrophic knowledge which allowed them to accomplish heroic deeds that had earned them their landholdings and entitlements in the distant past. This strong magicality continued to manifest in later generations, Shining Facets being one of most notable examples. However, by the time of his parents' generation, they had mostly become complacent with their place near the top of the social strata, uninterested in higher pursuits or education and content to simply maintain their status quo of living in ease from agricultural profits.
Shining Facets found the prospect of this rural plantation-artistocrat life vaguely boring and not very satisfying, but had few other options in sight until his mid-twenties, when a beautiful unicorn mare passed through. The mare, Diamond Hues, was wandering the Isle of Yore at the end of a series of adventures and had recently parted ways with her previous companions, leaving her traveling alone back to Sparkle City. In the interests of fostering goodwill with other noble houses, Shining Facets' family offered her hospitality as a guest in their manor until she could arrange for safe passage home.
Diamond Hues and Shining Facets became good friends. He was fascinated by the stories she told of her travels, by her refined education, and by her intellectual wit and drive to explore and learn. She also told him about her family's long-running eugenic traditions. Being familiar as a farmer with the potential for selective breeding to create powerful advantages in emphasizing the most useful traits, he came to see these practices as interesting and sensible.
Nearing the end of her stay, Diamond Hues told Shining Facets quite forwardly that as the capstone to her adventures, she wanted to return home with a foal, and after getting to know him and researching the qualities of his family history and pedigree, she wanted it to be his. Shining Facets was willing to accommodate in helping her become pregnant, as well as wanting to pursue the prospect of a long-term romantic relationship. He also saw this as a convenient opportunity to get away from his current life and experience a city with a major center of learning, so he traveled with Diamond Hues for the ostensible purpose of escorting her home safely rather than letting her make the long journey alone.
By the time they arrived in Sparkle City, Diamond Hues was pregnant with the couple's first foal, Emerald Hues. Shining Facets never returned to the Pony Republic, remaining in Sparkle City permanently to start his new family. After a period of courtship just suitably long enough to satisfy appearances, he married Diamond Hues and became part of the Hues Noble House. They have been very happily married ever since and have had three foals in total, all of whom have been very highly magical unicorns.
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Comments: 2
First of all, I must preface this with the observation that, as someone who can't do a connect-the-dots with aid of a ruler I am singularly unqualified to critique art, so be sure to ask for change on these two cents.
As a whole, this piece does a great job depicting both the characters and the scene. Ponies are generally easy to represent visually but we also see how these two feel about each other, which takes more talent to convey. The facial expressions are well represented with just the right amount of detail, and Diamond Hues' feelings toward Shining Facets are especially evident both in expression and posture.
The style of the background is ideal. I especially like the lack of outlines, which allows the background to have detail but be discrete. One could observe that the transition from land to sky is a bit simple, but that is hardly relevant in a character-focused picture. The background is part of the scene but not the focus, and in that regard it's excellently done.
As for the characters themselves, they too are well presented. I'm even further out of my depth here, but the perspective and structure are well done. I could be reading too much into this, but Diamond Hues' slenderness and slightly longer legs do imply some noble lineage to me. I also love the way you've colored their manes and tails: detailed, yet soft and pleasing to the eye. I have only a few small criticisms, and again these should be taken with a pound of salt: the lighting is inconsistent between the two (Shining is lit from above right, while Diamond from above left); Shining's neck seems a little long and displaced slightly back on his torso to me, but consider my inability to draw a stick figure before lending that much credence; finally, and this is entirely a subjective thing, but the outlines fading away in places is marginally distracting to me; the varying thickness is used to good effect for shadows and contrast, but the lack of outline along only some parts of the legs feels a little off. However, those criticisms are quite minor (I honestly had to look at this picture for several minutes to think of them) and far outweighed by your fine technique and presentation.
As both a scene and a representation of these characters, all I've left to say is: well done!
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