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Description
This is for 's Design a Mate contest: [link]

Al'haya is a Plains Unicorn, which means she has a heavier build, like a Fresian, a striped pattern for camouflage, and a very unique stand-up mane. She's a spirited yet gentle mare, and probably balances out the more fiery stallion disposition of her mate. It was pretty difficult to make a big gal like this look feminine, but I think I pulled it off alright. I went with a golden color for her, so that she could be told apart from her mate at a glance, but I made sure to include all the important markings for the breed.

This is easily the most difficult digital piece I have ever done (although I'll probably be saying that with each new piece for a while, since I'm trying a lot of new techniques). It's all digital, from sketch to final product. I still have issues with my light sources, but overall I'm really happy with how it turned out. I may have gone a little overboard, putting a hair texture on the edges of all her markings, but I really wanted to see what I was capable of. What really made this girl what she is, though, are the colored outlines. As soon as I finished those up, she went from "pretty" to "wow". Step by step progression is here: [link]

If you click "Download" she's at full resolution, which is HUUUUGE. I'm requesting a critique because this is an all new digital painting technique for me, and I need to know if I'm doing okay... is this professional grade? I know the anatomy's a bit off, since I used *no* references for my sketch, but seriously, how's the paint job? Any tips/tutorials on applying light sources?

Paper texture from cgtextures.com

Description
This is for 's Design a Mate contest: [link]

Al'haya is a Plains Unicorn, which means she has a heavier build, like a Fresian, a striped pattern for camouflage, and a very unique stand-up mane. She's a spirited yet gentle mare, and probably balances out the more fiery stallion disposition of her mate. It was pretty difficult to make a big gal like this look feminine, but I think I pulled it off alright. I went with a golden color for her, so that she could be told apart from her mate at a glance, but I made sure to include all the important markings for the breed.

This is easily the most difficult digital piece I have ever done (although I'll probably be saying that with each new piece for a while, since I'm trying a lot of new techniques). It's all digital, from sketch to final product. I still have issues with my light sources, but overall I'm really happy with how it turned out. I may have gone a little overboard, putting a hair texture on the edges of all her markings, but I really wanted to see what I was capable of. What really made this girl what she is, though, are the colored outlines. As soon as I finished those up, she went from "pretty" to "wow". Step by step progression is here: [link]

If you click "Download" she's at full resolution, which is HUUUUGE. I'm requesting a critique because this is an all new digital painting technique for me, and I need to know if I'm doing okay... is this professional grade? I know the anatomy's a bit off, since I used *no* references for my sketch, but seriously, how's the paint job? Any tips/tutorials on applying light sources?

Paper texture from cgtextures.com