In Defense of Equestria

DETAILS. SO MANY DETAILS. Please, validate the effort put into this and zoom in. Things like the clasps and links that hold the armor together. The details on the helmet, both Celestia and Twilight's peytrals (the chest plate thingies). ALL THE THINGS.

So, a really freakin' long time ago, I was asked if I could do a picture with Celestia in armor. I went "Heck yeah! That'd be fun!" Since it wasn't a commission, I took my sweet, sweet time on it. I'd work on it for an hour and then leave it for a week or three and then pick it up again for another couple of hours. Stylistically, this is such a crazy departure from the usual sketch vomit I submit (I say that lovingly, the sketches are me learning and experimenting with digital medium. This was an actual test of my skill). There are still some errors, but I need to call this done and it get it out there.

About halfway through, I realized this would be the perfect picture to record to make a timelapse of. By then, it felt too late. Whoops... Instead, I'm going to offer up the huge Photoshop file. I approached this like an oil painting (that's my undergrad degree. This was an experiment in process. NEVER AGAIN. That was a stupid decision.) so there are a lot of superfluous layers. Every layer is numbered in order of creation (mostly) and named. Layers with a "-" in front is a hidden layer, like a reference picture or something that became useless later.