The Man, The Artist, The Inspiration... and other news.

I'm really not trying to be one of those guys who talks about himself constantly. Yeah, it's my blog and all that, but who cares about what I ate for lunch? I'm not writing this for me though, trust me... that part comes after the break. Today, I want to talk about an artist who goes by the name of Bluemeganium, who graciously provided me my new artwork for A Gentleman's Price. To do this, I will unfortunately have to talk about myself a little bit.

Before I had any ideas about writing, I used to spend off-nights from work hunting down pony images on Derpibooru. Even before I'd read Fallout Equestria — my first fanfiction and the source of my brand of MLP Stockholm Syndrome — I was waaaaaay into MLP fanart. One guy that really stood out to me was Blue. What I really love about the guy is how innocent and heartwarming his style is. It's very MLP, even when it's explicitly sexual. I've referenced his works of art directly in my stories. In the chapter "Do The Right Thing Part 1" Dizzy Twister is a maid, directly referencing one of his favorite background ponies as she's portrayed in his art. Blossomforth is referred to in The Scent of Prey as knowing so much about sex positions she could write a book about it, a reference to another of his pieces.

You could make a solid case that my writing reflects his style, at least in my eyes. He's has a major impact on me through his creations.

When I commented on one of his images... sadly it's explicit so no link... that I would love to see him draw Roseluck sometime, a couple days later he created the one you see above. He even told me it was cool to use it as cover art for AGP, when I asked about it. That is a really nice thing to do for a stranger. He didn't have to do that for me; he has people commissioning art from him! So if I can ask anything from the people reading this, please visit his DA page and tell him what a great guy he is for doing that. That is one solid brony, and the least I can do is send some new views his way.

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Okay, back to talking about me. Bleh... I'm stuck on Movie Night. I really don't know where to go next. Grand_Moff_Pony provided his input and the story has been edited to reflect suggestions he contributed. I'd be lying if I didn't say I was very discouraged by the aftermath. Movie Night had a lot if issues that he caught! For some reason, I referred to Terra Foliata as "The Terra" which I really can't explain. A case of temporary Russian?

Thank you, Mother Russia for that...

I also switched from showing to telling a few times. I blame that on my switch from First-person to Third-person. You can bend the rules a bit with First, but in third (or second) you have to be really careful your narrator doesn't start telling people what to think. I'm seriously considering just moving ahead with the TSoP upgrade first and then seeing what to do later. We'll see.

Cheers.

Edit: Fertile Ground got another big edit! I changed the first half of the Rose/Lily sex sequence substantially, completely changing the feel for the entire scene from a 'clueless mare about to get her comeuppance', to more of a 'oh dear god, I'm being ripped out of the closet' sort of thing. I rather like the latter better!