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Gojira007 β Always, Forever
Published: 2012-09-11 01:58:52 +0000 UTC; Views: 3516; Favourites: 76; Downloads: 42
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(Download for full-size)"I love you,
always, forever,
near and far,
closer together...."
-"I Love You (Always, Forever)", Donna Lewis
So this is an idea I'd been mulling over for some time now, directly inspired by a conversation with my friend .
Basically, we were talking about the frustrating fact that a lot of Sonic clubs on dA have bans on/unfair rules about fan-art that depicts homosexual relationships, and I pointed out that it's at least understandable in the case of Groups dedicated to a specific heterosexual pairing, but she then raised the point of how fan-art has the liberty to change the gender of the characters involved.
It inspired me, and from that this idea was born: Sonic and Sally, as seen from four different gender perspectives. The original (Sonic male, Sally female), the gender-swapped version (Sonic female, Sally male), the male/male version, and the female/female version.
I wanted to be sure to avoid many of what I feel are the pitfalls a lot of Gender-Swap art falls into in my opinion, specifically basing the changes on stereotypical ideas about what personality traits can generally be associated with what genders, so I made sure each version was in a situation that I consider to be classic SonSal (the "Do it to it" fist bump, a bit of playful teasing, a loving kiss, and a good run together). Likewise I didn't want to go overboard on the physical change, but I did still want to make the change apparent; I almost didn't even give female!Sonic her single bang of hair, but that seems to be a trait literally every female Hedgehog in every version of the "Sonic" franchise has, so I ultimately thought it was appropriate.
I also kept Sally (or Saul if you'd prefer, with apologies to for blatantly stealing his gender-swapped Sally name x3) vestless across all four versions, as I find the clothing double-standard in the "Sonic" franchise more than a little annoying and thought it'd help get my point across.
All that, and it was honestly REALLY fun to make, too. 83
The individual versions, in case anyone's interested:
Original: [link]
Gender-Swapped: [link]
Male/Male: [link]
Female/Female: [link]
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Comments: 41
This made something rattle in my brain.Β Which is a good thing.Β It's an inspired idea and I couldn't help booting up the dusty old Word program and writing.Β Actually writing!Β A little snippet of a story for each version of this couple.Β Thanks for drawing this.Β We should all remember that love is love . . . no matter what.Β
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Wow.
I think inspiring you to write may be the single best compliment I have ever received on my art.
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Even if I don't post any here I'll have to be sure to send what I have your way.
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VERY excited to see, in any case. <3
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Goji, what a great and poignant piece! You're right: love is love, no matter what it looks like, so long as nobody is getting hurt.
Great work!
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So very happy to hear you like it so much, and I entirely agree with your sentiment. 
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You're welcome!
Enjoy your holiday
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Thanks, I will. You too. ^_^
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No prob want to be friends
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Any gender, any combination, if you really love someone, then it doesn't matter.
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I really like all these. The male/male one is totally my favorite, but the female/female one is great too, gotta love the classic windblown carry pose. Saul's expression in #2 is well done.
I've thought about gender-swapping these two before, but Prince Elias kind of messed it up for me by looking too darn much the way I'd imagine a male Sally would look. Yet here I see that it really doesn't matter, he looks great. XD
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I'm very happy with the male/male one, mostly because I think it's the first time I've drawn a SonSal kiss that I'm actually entirely happy with. XD;
One of my goals going in, actually, was to make sure Saul was not like Elias; I don't know that I succeeded at that, admittedly, but it does indeed hint at the extent to which Elias does steal that thunder a tad. Minus, y'know, the whole polar-opposite personality thing. X3;
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Aw yeah, this is so cool.
(Boy, pardon if I get incoherent. Still somewhat caffeine buzzed.)
I gotta tell you, you are the main spark to keep my love for this pairing burning. You know my feels on the aspects you mention in the description, and I really like these. Good choice to keep designs similar with small tweaks; it keeps focus on personality in the characters. The slightly more unruly hair on Saul is a pretty good such tweak, and yeah, bangs on girls are kind of a universal Sonic-style model. (My take on f!Sonic has bangs, too, if you remember - just kinda spiky bangs XD)
(Also it's always nice to see more brown-eyed Sonic <3)
Nice point about the vest, too. As much as I like jean vests (I got a thing for them, haha) it's this detail that seems to be mostly for decoration since it doesn't look like she ever uses it for something. (like keeping NICOLE in, or such)
It's a little hard to see, on the girl/girl version, that Sonic's bangs are that (they register as part of the eyeridge at first; I might have widened the "hair base" to cover from one side to the other of her mid quill there, if that makes any sense) but other than that there's no such confusion. The eyes-from-side look better here! 
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Whoop, cut myself off there by accident. XD;
Thank you as always for your insightful, encouraging comments.
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Caffeine Buzz is a fine prism to view things with; no need to apologize. ^_^
And hey, I'm all too happy to be the torch-bearer for SonSal; goodness knows I'm passionate enough for it. ;3 But yeah, thank you sincerely, it means a lot to know my work has that kind of effect. I do indeed remember your female Sonic, by the way, and while I did try not to model mine after yours, it was an inspiration even so. ^_^
Also, I break it down like this: when drawing Sonic in his modern design, "Sonic Adventure" and on, his eyes are green; when going with his SatAM or Classic design, it's either full black or brown.
I honestly prefer Sally with her vest, not for reasons of "propriety" or some such nonsense but simply because her design feels fuller and more distinctive with it than without. The reason underlying its creation, however, irks me, and continues to irk me, and so it simply had to go for this pic.
And yeah, I caught the slightly difficult visibility of the bangs too. It's a consequence of both female Sonic poses being running poses, which would blow the bangs to the side, although I also just sort of goofed a bit on the lines for the female/female scene; the pencil line version made the bang more visible. I'm hoping to do another female Sonic pic soon, though, so hopefully that'll clarify things.
Anyway, thank you as always
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What an awesome concept! And that's a good point about allowing gay character pairings even in groups only for canon relationships; Even though I've done some gender-swapped art, I hadn't really thought about that dimension of it.
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Very glad you approve.
And yeah, one of the reasons the conversation was so inspiring was because it made me really rethink a lot of the ways in which I conceive this Pairing, and many others I 'Ship, it was honestly kind of electrifying.
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Well I'm glad you have friends you can have such meaningful discussions with! (I think) I know what you mean about it being electrifying; there is something fascinating and exciting about discovering new and interesting ways to think about something you thought you already knew well.
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I'm glad for that too; indeed, I'd say you're one of those friends too, just for the record.
And yes, that's it exactly. I've been at the SonSal game for well over a decade now; it's kind of mind-blowing when I realize there are corners of it I had yet to explore. <3
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Well thanks, I appreciate that ^_^
Sometimes I wonder if it's possible to, I guess run out of way to think about and explore something, which I think can be kind of a depressing thought if it's something you like thinking about, but then you talk with other people and get different perspectives, and it's like a whole other area of thoughts opens up. For me, it's almost in some ways a relief to know there's more.
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You're very welcome.
And yeah, it is indeed nice to discover new things, big and/or small, about things you love. And in a way, it's almost not possible to run OUT of things to learn about those things we love; even once you do know all the nooks and crannies, that very knowledge makes it possible to MAKE new aspects and elements, even if it's just in your own head, if that makes sense?
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Yeah, it does make sense. ^_^
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Agreed. Thanks. <3
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YOU THIEVING RAT! RETRIBUTION SHALL BE MINE!
Nah, just kidding, I'm actually kinda pleased you chose 'my' name for the He-Sal XD
Anyway, that aside, lovely picture you got here, and I love the designs you have for the genderswapped Sonic and Sal counterparts. One of the more interesting forms of artistic protests I've seen in a while; nice job ^^
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What a lovely all-caps sentence to have coming out of a Steve Butler-drawn madly-grinning Robotnik. l3
And hey, glad to hear! Thank you kindly. ^_^
also he-sals she-sals by the sal-shore >w>
Thanks; dunno if "protest" is quite the word I'd use, but I certainly do hope the pic is effective and maybe shakes up a few people's preconceptions. ^_^
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Love like that is universal and trancends all levels.
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Sally look's hadsome as a guy and Sonic looks cute as a girl.
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No arguments here. ^_^
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Their babies would be adorable.
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This is just TOO cute and too awesome! While each pair carries the base essence of the relationship well, each image also has its own energy and charm to keep the whole thing lively. Your gender-swapped designs are great too - I particularly love Saul's eyebrows. X3 I do think my overall favorite is the f/f; it has so much joy in it it's hard to resist! But I love all of them, and this is just a fantastic idea i might have to steal. 83
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Super-happy to hear you like it so much.
Likewise happy to hear you liked the f/f one most of all, as that's the one that was hardest to actually make; I struggle mightily with that pose every time I do it (likewise Sonic kisses are hard as balls to draw right, but in this case I managed to get it down easy enough X3).
And hey, I'd be more than happy to see your and anybody else's take on this notion. Indeed, I'd look forward to it.
Thank you, as always. ^3^
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