Greetings. This was the piece that most grabbed me from today's Drawfriend on EquestriaDaily 08/29/2017, and I wanted to share some feedback.



I'm a big fan of artists who explore new and interesting poses that deviate from the standard upright forward-facing 3/4 view. There are so many different contexts that allow for ponies to twist, crouch, jump, roll, stretch, and even lie down, and it's nice to see an attempt at one such dynamic action pose. This particular one is especially tricky, as it places the head away from the viewer and therefore requires a bit of magic from the artist to still keep the face readable and give it some attention. With this picture, the key object of focus is the ball of sun she is holding, making the face actually secondary. It's still relevant to the image, however, as the expression on her face informs us of her mood. This picture could have easily set her up as aggressive or emotionless toward the ball without needing to change the body language, and it would still work. It's just a matter of the tone you chose to set, and it looks like you wanted to maximize the sense of innocence.



Despite the difficulty of rendering this pose, it looks like you mostly pulled it off. The foreshortening is by far the most difficult aspect of it, and it doesn't look like it slowed you down. I can clearly see some depth that makes the tail look closer than the mane, and I have a good visual indication of how the limbs are moving. I like your idea of raising her lower legs to cradle the ball of sun so that she's resting on her back instead of her rear, but since you lifted up her backside so high that some of her back also looks to be off the ground, it comes across like she's using her wings primarily to support herself. I also like the effects of the ball itself and how the little swirl of solar radiation draws a direct connection to Daybreak via her eye producing the same effect. I do, however, think that ball is about to flop right out of her grip and over her shoulder, based on how she's holding it. Assuming she's got the other side covered by her unseen front hoof, she's holding it with three hooves, and the two hooves on this side are mostly holding it from the back. The reason I know it's the back is because we can see that Daybreak's horn goes in front of the left-hand side of the ball, meaning that ball is already extending far into the z-axis already. I believe this is an issue of perspective from this angle, as something tells me you wanted to convey a ball that was contained within her torso so that it was completely under her control, in the same way that Daybreak controls the sun and/or treats it like a toy.



I do like your choice of color for this picture. The shading is effective and actually makes the character look surprisingly dark considering she is holding the brightest light source known to man with fire shooting out of her body. I'm actually surprised you chose to shade her mane and tail as if it's regular hair, though I suppose nothing is saying it's not. The color of the shoes really pops against the grey fur, and the cutie mark has a nice curve to it to help imply that depth. Your choice of lighting helps draw attention to the object of interest, which I would say is the most important part. I'd call it successful.



The line of action has a sufficient curve to it, and you did a good job varying the limbs in interesting ways. I believe the one exception would be the tail, which has an initial downward curve that fights against the line of action only to pull up and meet it at its apex. It creates a slight disconnect that clashes with the harmony a bit, like throwing an argument into an otherwise quiet room.



One thought to consider for the future, especially with a pose like this, is to be mindful of that z-axis when planning out the foreshortening. There's an all-too natural instinct to pull back into that standard 3/4 or profile view, because a correct production of foreshortening distorts the body in a way that looks unnatural if drawn by itself. That's why references and tutorials are so important when learning foreshortening, as it's essentially an unlearning process, defying what your mind thinks for the purpose of imitating reality. With pictures like this, you're on your way to a really awesome foreshortened image, and I think you can surpass what you've presented here. Keep on trying those crazy poses, and make the most!