Cool things for your eyeballs · 5:20am Sep 10th, 2016
I rarely* commission cover art for my stories. It's not for lack of interest in supporting talented artists; in part, it's that most stories don't strike me as needing that kind of fanfare. Also, there's the cost. Writing fanfiction for fun is fun. Sinking money into cover art for fanfiction seems more likely to make it less fun.
And yet, some stories call for more than what I can cobble together in Inkscape or find lurking out on the 'net. Take, for example, a Power Ponies story that I started in the most recent Writeoff:
This isn't the finished product, but IMO if you've got a DeviantArt account you should stop what you're doing and go follow the ridonculously talented artist right now. When you come back, have a look at what I submitted for the Writeoff, which is basically the first ~15% of the story:
A brief flash lit the night above a city full of skyscrapers, and Starlight Glimmer tumbled out into the sky, screaming and flailing her limbs as she instinctively sought purchase on a floor that was no longer underhoof.
A curious observation intruded through her terror, and she slowed her movements--though not her descent--as she eyed the crimson military-style coat and pants that she unexpectedly found herself wearing. She blinked, and looked closer, studying their yellow piping and polished, star-shaped buttons. She also felt an unusual sensation on her face, and pressed her hooves up into what felt very much like a beard.
“Zdravstvuyte, comrade,” the beard said.
Starlight shrieked.
“Nyet,” the beard said. “Such fear does not befit the greatest hero of the East! Is bad enough to let these Power Ponies joke about you as ‘The Red Menace.’”
“Where am I?! Why do I have a talking beard?!” Starlight paused, digested the latter piece of information, and scowled. “Seriously, ‘Red Menace?’ It was one collectivist economic system, in one village, one time!”
The beard sighed. “You know it is super hero name, and this is Maretropolis, and I am inoplanetnyy simbiont from Horsehead Nebula… now, shall we stop you splatting like nasekomoye on pavement?”
Starlight focused on the ground with rising panic. “Y… yes, please!”
Her head jerked forward as the beard formed long prehensile limbs that lashed out toward the nearest pair of buildings. The beard also snaked down around her neck and wrapped it in a strong brace. Moments later, the limbs gripped the buildings and snapped taut. Starlight’s teeth clenched, and her body juddered, but she soon came to a halt, suspended hundreds of cart-lengths above the bustling streets below.
As Starlight’s adrenaline receded, her mind began working to make sense of her situation. “Spike’s comics,” she said aloud. “He showed me one he said I shouldn’t touch…”
“Comrade,” the beard said, angling Starlight’s head toward an alley far below. She watched a pair of adult ponies with a foal backing slowly into the light cast by a streetlamp. A figure advanced on them, its features indistinct but menacing.
“Vy gotovy?” the beard asked. Starlight felt growing concern for the ponies, and the beard pulled her forward and down. She cried out with surprise at the sudden motion, but soon was overwhelmed by exhilaration as the beard swung her through the forest of skyscrapers at speed, forming new limbs and absorbing old ones as it went.
The beard dropped her down to street-level as they came around the final building separating them from the family. Starlight hit the pavement at a full run, flaring her horn with magic and charging toward the bulky silhouette. “The Red Menace… er, strikes again!” she shouted, closing in on it.
It turned on her, and the light of her horn revealed a predominantly aqua-colored creature whose pony-sized torso and head looked grotesque above its spindly forelegs and long tail. It had no hind legs, but somehow moved by floating just above the ground. It sported a large crest upon its back, as well as an orange mask with bright outlines of yellow that was pulled tight across its head.
“Save us!” the family shouted, retreating further.
The figure threw itself to the ground in front of Starlight. “No, save me! My sisters and I were just trying to get out of the world we were stuck in… next thing I knew, I was back in my original body, but I don’t know where I am and I can’t get this mask off!” The figure wrung its forehooves. “It talks to me… makes me attack things… doesn’t let me sleep!”
“Another world? Sisters?” Starlight’s eyes went wide. “Wait, you’re… Sirens! You were banished from Equestria a thousand years ago!”
The figure wrung its forehooves. “Yes, but I’m alone… I’m lost… please, I need help!”
“Spike told me,” Starlight said, mostly to herself. “They defeated the villain, and… the comic let them go.” She looked up at the figure. “I don’t know if I can get myself out unless… I arrest you, too. But… I don’t know if it’ll bring you out with me if I do that…”
“Please! Get me out, before the mask takes control again!”
“Arrest this prestupnik,” the beard urged.
Starlight swallowed, wondering what Twilight would do. She also wondered just how much influence the beard might have over her.
And that, more than anything, made her uncertain what to choose, or whether she should choose at all…
Let me know what you think!
He's hardly ever sick at sea!
Huh. I'd imagined the Red Menace's beard to be of Marxist proportions, even when at rest. This is that weird kind of letdown you get when the movie version of the book doesn't sync with how you pictured it. It's still cool to see the story realized in another medium—indeed, every other aspect of the picture is awesome—but it's still a little disappointing at the same time.
4202479 I'm actively trying to resist going and watching the whole play now. Thus far I've stopped at finding a properly satisfying version of Modern Major General.
4202593 I imagined it being much bigger too, and I've asked the artist to tweak it before they get to colors and finishing work. Still, once I looked past that one detail, I thought it was too cool not to show people.
4202593
The beard IS different in a "The Shining" kind of way...
Maybe they were going for the Lenin?
i1.wp.com/fabrickated.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/03/vladmir-lenin.jpg
I know he was influenced heavily by Marx, but I do think Lenin is the one that was singled out as the true "Red Terror" during the red scare.
It would have to utter the phrase "must crush capitalism" for me to get fully on board though.
But with all of the symbiote stuff that beard was doing...
media.salon.com/2014/04/karl_marx.jpg
Now there's a beard that can grapple buildings!
4202725
I simultaneously love and hate anything Gilbert and Sullivan.
Their works are absolute genius, but at the same time they cause me serious cringe factor. I think it's because of the sheer blatant nature of their work. It is wonderful satire, but at the same time, it's taken to the absurd on a level that just surpasses my comfort zone on occasion...
Which I know is silly considering how lacking in subtlety my own work is.
I think that your story is going to be a winner. I know my story is... um... well it's longer... I'll give it that! Lord knows where it's gonna go though. Also... Gilbert and Sullivan? Huh. Well... they never wrote anything like this:
4205797 That song... that is just...
Thanks for the vote of confidence!
4202818 I am shocked to learn that your capacity for ridiculousness has limits.
4210780
I don't think it's actually the absurdity that gets me, because I love things like Airplane, or Leslie Nealson.
I think it's the silliness factor...
Like... I like straight man humor:
"Surely, you can't be serious!"
"I am serious... And stop calling me Shirley."
Like... the characters almost never acknowledge that absurdity is actually occurring.
But Gilbert and Sullivan... Most of their stuff is done in that style of "watch us, we are being silly!"
I dunno I probably cannot explain it correctly.
4210972 No, that makes sense. That kind of "straight" absurdity trusts the audience to pick up on the jokes, which leaves the potential for people to miss them and get confused or offended by the apparent "message" they perceive. There's a very big difference between that and the kind of absurdity that comes from more blunt-instrument silliness, where you cannot possibly miss that jokes are happening.
4211087
Yeah, that is probably it. A lot of movies and such nowadays suffer from this (the whole making sure that anyone with an IQ of potato or higher will get it) & it might be why I have the issue, like a sympathetic pain.
I do understand how with operas you do have to beat the audience over the head with it; You need the characters to be blatant while on stage, otherwise what they're doing could be overshadowed by something as simple as back-up performers or even just scenery. I would probably love their work if I could see it performed live, but the recordings or film adaptations I end up getting to watch just unnerve me.