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MysticSparkleWings — Art Style Challenge by-nc-nd

Published: 2018-06-13 23:38:24 +0000 UTC; Views: 12354; Favourites: 206; Downloads: 18
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Description 11/11/18 EDIT: I've updated the hair colors to more accurately match mine and did some other minor but noteworthy fixes; mostly just bringing the gradient in the hair down further on a few, but the most notable being the adjustments to the Monster High Style hair; I'm still not sure it's 100% perfect, but I dare say this works better overall. I also did my best to adjust the My Style one to match...eh, I'm not so sure about how it came out since I had to color edit the scan directly. But whatever, I'm still really proud of how this whole thing turned out.  



Okay, okay, I know I am super-duper late getting on the train for this challenge. But in my defense, part of the reason I didn't do it when it was first going around and was really popular was in part because I felt like I wasn't artistically ready to do it, both in terms of skill and in terms of tools. 

But after I got the new tablet, it just kind of clicked like, "Yeah, it's time to give that a try." So I did.

It was a lot of fun, but it took a lot longer than I expected and than it probably should have because I'm such a perfectionist and a procrastinator. I worked fairly consistently, but I spent a lot of time trying to find good references and studying little tiny details...wasted a lot of time trying to find old tutorials I swear once existed but have evidently disappeared from the face of the earth...But all of that went towards trying to capture each style as accurately as possible, though some were easier than others because I tried to do a few in the style I most remembered since they've had multiple style versions while still staying kind of the same? (In that vein I also picked whichever logo was either most familiar to me or that I felt best associated with the drawing since most of these have had multiple logos over the years.)

I've actually had the my-style portrait done for a while, as anyone paying attention to my dA ID may have already known. I also have an alcohol-marker version and a realistic-ish digital version that I did also for comparison's sake for myself, and because I had an end-of-school project I wanted to use to show off some of my art skill to my classmates, and while I had started work on this project, I knew it would be nowhere near ready in time. Which was accurate, since it's been almost a week since the project was due. (In related news, I am now on summer break, woo!

Also apparently I like drawing the same thing over and over because that means total I now have essentially ten variations of the same picture. I would ask why, but I have no answer. 

Speaking of answers, let me address the elephant in the room: Why is Winx Club not here?

Simply put, I do Winx style stuff all the time. This to me was supposed to be an opportunity to branch out a little, picking styles I've either never drawn in, or I have, but it's been a pretty long time or I never did it "seriously." (I.E. trying to be as accurate as possible.) But based on my experience, I'm not going to say this is the only time I'll ever do the style challenge--there are so many more I'd love to try! So maybe I'll include it in a future one. 

I will now talk about each style individually, as I think that's the best way to fit in most of what I want to say: (consider this your wall-of-text warning)

My Style:
Not much to say here since my style is included mostly as a basis for comparison. And to be fair, this challenge isn't as interesting as a full body comparison would've been, but after how long just these headshots took me, I'm glad I wasn't crazy enough to try that. I technically have more than one style; I have a more chibi and a more anime/realistic, and even between mediums (markers, pencils, digital, etc.) how the final product turns out usually has a notable variation. But I went with what I feel like is my best-polished style around here lately, which is the colored pencil on tan paper. I just wish I had put down some white pencil under the skin as a base first, but oh well. Also, the glasses are here and no where else because I really wanted to be able to do all the eyes in their entirety and it not be mostly a waste, in addition to having to do the glasses probably would've made this take twice as long to finish, and when I first did one of these the idea was it was going to be my new profile picture everywhere (before I decided to do this challenge), and big sunglasses are kinda my staple. B)

Disney Princess/Disney Renaissance/"Classic" Disney Style: I, like many others, grew up with Disney as a large part of my childhood. For years I've played Disney Princess dress-up games online, used Disney Princess merchandise in various forms, and watched most of the movies at least once if not more. As a really little kid, I was always dressing up in those kid fluffy princess costumes and prancing around the house wishing I was one. While I didn't really grow up during the Renaissance, I certainly remember those movies the most prominently and probably had the most exposure to them. And partly because she had more of the better references I could find, Ariel has the most influence here, but I also tried to take some from Cinderella, Aurora, and even a little from Alice, even though she's not a princess. I think those were the four that over the years have made the most impact on me and that I've identified with the most. 

The style itself is very soft and simple; I noticed that even in the most recent 2D films the shading is often minimal. Since I did this style first, that was very encouraging. I'm second-guessing myself on the hair coloring just a little, but that's my fault for having such funky colors, I guess. The funny thing though is that I think visually this style suits my face the most. Also, I went with the 2009 logo, since when I looked at my options that's the one that was the most familiar to me. (Just a side note, I have no idea what kind of Dinsey Princess I would be. There's not really a good fairy tale that I know that involves pink and blue hair on the heroine. Ideas are welcome!)

Monster High Style: Dramatic change of tone. Monster High...wow, there's a lot I could say here. Back in 2010, I actually hopped on the bandwagon pretty early, in the fall, just a few months after its premiere. It was my first real introduction to a fandom environment on www.monsterhighdolls.com, and its influence would eventually lead me to join dA. My first four deviations are all very poorly done, never revisited OCs, even! And I leave them up because of what they represent. I owe a lot of who I am to this franchise...Which is exactly why I was, have been, and still am greatly disappointed by the 2016 revamping. (No pun intended.) I could go on for hours about my problems with it, but I can say at least one thing about it: The box/promo art, at least from what I've seen, didn't really change. That style still seems to be true to what it's always been. And that may be because it's the same artists as always, I don't know. But I have always really loved it, and so I did my best to emulate it here. 

In the past when I've tried to do MH style, this is more of what I was going for, but in the past, my skills just haven't really been there to truly do it justice, so this was a fun little experiment. It mostly presented its challenges in the hair; the main girls in the original artwork all have a lot of streaks and color, so rather than do a true gradient, I decided to do some color layering to kind of imply the same effect, even though I don't really have streaks. Also, I was tempted to do a monster version of myself, but I turned the idea down for the same reason a few other styles aren't present this time around; everything else is human and having all humans makes drawing comparisons a lot easier. And to be fair, I probably would've spent forever trying to figure out what I should be. But lucky for me, regular humans do exist in the MH universe and therefore we haven't broken any canon or anything like that. It's not perfect, but I feel like I did the style reasonable justice.

Ever After High Style:
I was also quick to jump on this bandwagon when it first came out. And the franchise has ignited a bit of a weird obsession with old fairy tales for me. I've since collected quite a few books on the subject, even though I've only ever posted one OC and had about five fleshed-out ideas for ones that never saw the light of day. It's just...does that not look complicated? I've always been kind of afraid of trying to emulate the box/promo art style because...I mean, it looks fableous, (to borrow the show's terminology ) but it also has so much detail to it...Regardless, I do have to say I am kind of sad it seems to have kind of dried up for some reason, though I would very much like to blame Descendants for stealing the thunder on that one, maybe I'm just bitter. I don't know, I don't have any data in front of me to prove one way or the other. Frankly, though, I feel like EAH actually does the concept better in most ways. Heck, I think it would've been a perfectly viable idea for Mattel and Disney to team up together on the idea, rather than have this (I guess) unintentional competition. (Which it would appear Disney has unfortunately won by a wide margin.)

Full disclosure; I very heavily considered cutting this one, but I couldn't really think of a good replacement at the time, and by the time I did think of a few options, I'd already started on it and it didn't seem quite so bad as I thought it would, so I stuck with it. Truthfully, the style is very detailed as I anticipated, but the thing is that most of the detail is really in the hair. And for better or worse, if you study the pictures like I did, it appears it's really just a clean base version with intentional scribbles over top to make it look more storybook-ish. This one definitely took the longest out of all of them, and I'm still not quite sure about the hair, but ultimately I'm happy I stuck with it. And it's pretty neat to see the side-by-side with MH since they are technically sister franchises. 

Also, fun fact: there is an MH x EAH crossover book called, "The Legend of Shadow High," by the author of the first EAH book trilogy and her husband, and there was supposed to be a crossover movie too, but for some reason the movie was canned after the MH revamp. Which is weird to me because the book used the revamp concept as far as I can tell (I still haven't gotten around to reading it) and was still published after the fact...And one of the assumptions we fans made about the rebranding was to make the two series fit together better. Instead, it seems the redux has effectively kicked EAH out of the picture...why? Thoughts??

Dr. Seuss Style:
Now, I'm sure at first this seems like a bit of an oddball, and to an extent it is, but Dr. Seuss is a very distinct style that, much like Disney, was a very prevalent part of my childhood. Some of the first books I ever read and fell in love with were Dr. Seuss. In Elementary school a few years we celebrated his birthday and were allowed to wear hats all day, which I loved. I remember watching VHS tapes that were essentially narrations of them, and I ate it up. To this day I have an entertainment documentary VHS called, "In Search of Dr. Seuss," that I still go back an watch. Seuss-landing is probably my favorite section within the Universal parks. There's just something about the whimsy and uniqueness the style inspires that I don't think I'll ever be able to let go of. 

To that end, it appears very simple to draw, but the devil is in the details. There isn't really any shading in the colors, but rather the style appears to be very clean pen lines and therefore uses various techniques for ink shading. And therein lies the catch; it's clean pen. So while at first I almost thought I could just use the initial sketch, upon studying the style I realized that wouldn't be true to form. My sketches are quite sketchy indeed, so the idea went out the window rather quickly. Also, if you go to Google Images like I did, most of what comes up for Dr. Seuss are non-human characters. And most humans you will find are male. So that in itself presented a bit of a challenge in terms of finding good references, but I think in the end I managed to do pretty well. Again, I'm second guessing the hair, but I couldn't really think if a way to substitute the gradient that I thought would really fit with the style, so I just stuck with it. This one was definitely one of the most fun to see finished though.

Bratz Style:
Why no, I didn't have enough doll franchises up here already. (Just be glad I ultimately turned down the idea to also include the MyScene style too this time around ) To the surprise of probably no one, Bratz was another big influence on pint-sized Mystic. As a kid, I really loved their sassy presentation and the detail put into their clothes, which at the time (circa 2005-2009 ish) to little me seemed to sometimes be just flat out better than Barbie, namely in that Barbie's "denim" was usually just a print, while Bratz seemed to at least try to truly mimic the material, which for whatever reason was just a big deal to me as a kid. I still have a bunch the DVD movies and I remember really loving the Babyz and Kidz spin-offs, since (though I'm sure canon was broken at some points, I was too young to care) it expanded the characters and made them more than just generic teenagers. Sort of. And for years I had Bratz posters all over my walls because they came with the dolls and I hated the wallpaper in my room. I, like many others, have had my problems with the newer redesigns, but mine mostly come from marketing ploys that I know are strictly in place to keep the girls relevant, and I actually really appreciate things like the addition of knee joints to the dolls. And I happen to have one of the newer ones; the doll itself really isn't that different from the ones I played with all the time as a kid. So as far as revivals go, I don't really have a problem with this one. 

Picking out what to do for this style, in particular, was tricky because simply put, Bratz has had multiple art styles. To the point, it would seem with every new doll line they came up with they made a new style to go with it. O.o Or maybe they just had different artists every time? I don't know. So I went with what amoung my options was the most familiar to me, even though for whatever reason there doesn't seem to be a whole lot of it out there. My main references were like one picture of Cloe and one of Yasmin because those were the two best that I could find to see the details. I feel like this one has the best hair out of the bunch even though doing the shine on it was surprisingly tricky. And I find it a little queer this is the only one here that really has airbrush/soft shading, but I digress. I also went with the logo I remember the best, even though you can't really see the halo against the white background. I'd say this style suits me the best personality-wise since I like to think I'm a sassy potato.


Total Drama Style:
Normally crude humor and parodies aren't really my thing, but a few years ago when I first saw this show it immediately caught my attention because of its unique art style and kept it for the...well, drama. I don't even watch reality TV, but there is a certain charm to the lengths of absurdity behind some very true-to-life ideas this show can go to, particularly after about the second or third season. And the characters are often fairly memorable, even when they're kinda supposed to be forgettable. Though I'm not as big a fan of the seasons that take the focus away from the main/original cast, I can definitely see why the series persists. 

Gwen and Dakota are the two favorites of mine that stick out the most, so the look I went with took most of the hits from them, even though the show has proven to have a wide array of different traits within the style that are largely what set it apart from other shows. I've actually done what feels like a lot with the style years ago, but I was mostly just borrowing the visual style because I felt the atmosphere suited what I was trying to do with the characters, and not really using it because they were supposed to be OCs for the show. (Though I did have a pretty lengthy RP with a friend that did include the show as a plot point, kind of.) 

This is another case where I played with the colors of the hair because I felt like a straight gradient just wouldn't fit with the show's style, and I'm quite pleased with the results here. Also, I went with the Total Drama Island logo since the first season is probably my most favorite and it was one of the better ones I could actually find.

Mummy Nanny Style:
And now for the one nobody has ever heard of before, which we all knew was coming because that's just how I roll. Mummy Nanny is a German-French cartoon, of all things. And as far as I can tell it never actually aired on TV here in the states, yet somehow the series managed to get DVD releases here for all 26 episodes at some point. I happened to have two of them and a couple of months ago I actually watched the whole series start-to-finish on Youtube. The series to me looks very American, style-wise, but considering I know next to nothing about German or French cartoons otherwise, I suppose that's not really my call to make. But I do think it would fit right in. It does have some deeper plot points and can have a few serious moments, but for the most part, it is a very episodic and comedy-based series. I just wish it had been popular enough to warrant more of it, as the series ends with a few plot points unresolved and remaining questions. Me personally, when I was a kid I saw large interest in the idea because I have a strange allure towards Ancient Egypt, specifically mummies. And re-watching it now, with more than a few documentaries under my belt, I can say that there are a surprising number of elements they get right, despite the nature of the show overall. It's definitely a very unique show and probably is a very acquired taste, but I do totally recommend checking it out.

This style did borrow trouble in the sense that, much like Total Drama, the characters follow certain rules but are often still very diverse and different from each other. Ultimately, I mostly used Samantha, her mom, and Nile, but I also tried to follow the impressions of the style and be unique from the other characters. Originally, I wasn't sure what I was going to do about the hair gradient, but I think the solution of just the flat colors side-by-side like this suits the style the best. 

Also, now's probably as a good a time to mention as any other, since I feel like the styles do have a few similarities (namely the eyes), that there are two main reasons I didn't include Tim Burton's style; 1. EVERYONE does Tim Burton, or so it seems, for this challenge, and I figured I had enough styles that are widely covered by the first three, and 2. To my knowledge, most of Tim's work his style is known from is Claymation, which means I would've had to try to emulate that look for my own satisfaction, which just wasn't something I felt like doing. Maybe I'll attempt that particular challenge in the future, but not today. 


Let's see...I think that's everything, but if there's something I forgot to mention, I can always edit this later, right?

Haven't decided what my next project is going to be yet, but let's hope I pick something that won't take quite so long to finish.  

Bonus: Honorable Mentions that were almost included are the likes of: Winx Club, MyScene, Tim Burton, Scooby-Doo, Fairly Odd Parents, the original Power Puff Girls, Codename: Kids Next Door, My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic, The Last Unicorn, 6Teen, Sailor Moon, Generic Anime, Tokidoki, Pokemon, Shopkins/Shoppies, Modern Disney, Cyberchase, Arthur, etc.

(I guess this is in the right category, I'm not sure. )


Artwork (c) me, MysticSparkleWings  
I do not own any of the copyrighted properties shown, nor do I claim to


Where to find me & my artwork:
 My Website  |   Commission Info + Prices  |   Ko-Fi  |   dA Print Shop  |   RedBubble  |   Twitter  |   Tumblr  |   Instagram  
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Comments: 27

Brysiaa [2020-08-25 07:46:26 +0000 UTC]

👍: 1 ⏩: 1

MysticSparkleWings In reply to Brysiaa [2020-08-25 17:13:42 +0000 UTC]

👍: 1 ⏩: 0

Andromeda2345 [2020-01-09 02:17:51 +0000 UTC]

This is true lol

👍: 0 ⏩: 0

mattjohn1992 [2019-12-15 09:38:17 +0000 UTC]

that are Cute, Nice, Hi

👍: 0 ⏩: 1

MysticSparkleWings In reply to mattjohn1992 [2020-01-03 03:38:49 +0000 UTC]

Hi, thank you

👍: 0 ⏩: 1

mattjohn1992 In reply to MysticSparkleWings [2020-01-03 04:37:44 +0000 UTC]

your welcome, and Can I have Art Trades please

👍: 0 ⏩: 1

MysticSparkleWings In reply to mattjohn1992 [2020-01-03 05:39:01 +0000 UTC]

I'm sorry, I have a lot on my plate right now and unfortunately, I don't have time for an art trade for the time being.

👍: 0 ⏩: 1

mattjohn1992 In reply to MysticSparkleWings [2020-01-03 10:08:18 +0000 UTC]

Ok, maybe  I will wait ok

👍: 0 ⏩: 0

Club-Dreamiverse [2019-01-17 06:43:26 +0000 UTC]

Sweet!

👍: 0 ⏩: 0

Day-DreamingSnarker [2018-08-20 00:24:49 +0000 UTC]

Just a passerby seeing this. I have to say that you did a really great job on all of them. 

The Disney style looks very spot on and adorable.

I actually do remember watching Mummy Nanny, albeit in Spanish, and there's some, if not all, episodes in Youtube. 

👍: 0 ⏩: 1

MysticSparkleWings In reply to Day-DreamingSnarker [2018-09-15 01:21:45 +0000 UTC]

Terribly sorry for the late reply! 

Thank you for the kind words; I really appreciate it!

*Gasp* A person who actually remembers it! I was concerned any actually existed! 
I'm not sure about Spanish, since I don't speak the language, but I know all of the English episodes are there.

👍: 0 ⏩: 1

Day-DreamingSnarker In reply to MysticSparkleWings [2018-09-15 01:49:57 +0000 UTC]

It's okay.

I felt bad that the series, Mummy Nanny, never got a proper ending. I would have liked to see more...maybe someone should write a fanfic about it.

👍: 0 ⏩: 1

MysticSparkleWings In reply to Day-DreamingSnarker [2018-09-15 05:23:23 +0000 UTC]

Agreed! So many unanswered questions  
A fanfic would definitely be interesting, though it'd have to be do just right to really do the series justice. 

👍: 0 ⏩: 0

Fistron [2018-07-16 20:35:35 +0000 UTC]

Very good

👍: 0 ⏩: 1

MysticSparkleWings In reply to Fistron [2018-07-17 20:58:29 +0000 UTC]

Thank you!

👍: 0 ⏩: 1

Fistron In reply to MysticSparkleWings [2018-07-18 02:42:34 +0000 UTC]

👍: 0 ⏩: 0

BarbiesAndBriars [2018-06-20 15:00:16 +0000 UTC]

The Disney Princess style looks like Mysticons to me.

👍: 0 ⏩: 1

MysticSparkleWings In reply to BarbiesAndBriars [2018-06-21 03:42:41 +0000 UTC]

Hmm, I'm not really familiar with Mysticons myself, but I have seen a few commercials and I think I see our point; though I have to wonder, do you consider that a good thing or a bad thing?

👍: 0 ⏩: 0

AlexzandriaS [2018-06-18 11:21:27 +0000 UTC]

You hit the nail on the head with this style challenge! You put a lot of effort into making good replications of the styles you chose to emulate. I really don't have much else to say than great work, Ivy! (also, after reading your description, I'm going to have to check out Mummy Nanny sometime!)

👍: 0 ⏩: 1

MysticSparkleWings In reply to AlexzandriaS [2018-06-21 03:40:19 +0000 UTC]

Thank you; that's really encouraging that my efforts evidently weren't for naught (I hope you do; I'd love to have someone to talk about it with!)

👍: 0 ⏩: 1

AlexzandriaS In reply to MysticSparkleWings [2018-06-22 00:08:33 +0000 UTC]

You're welcome! Imitating other's styles can be very difficult (I've tried), so the fact that you did it so well is incredible .

👍: 0 ⏩: 1

MysticSparkleWings In reply to AlexzandriaS [2018-06-22 01:19:59 +0000 UTC]

Don't I know it can be! Especially when the right references are on the tricky-er side to find  

👍: 0 ⏩: 1

AlexzandriaS In reply to MysticSparkleWings [2018-06-22 16:06:26 +0000 UTC]

Oh yeah, it's even worse without good references!

👍: 0 ⏩: 0

Montidrawz [2018-06-17 05:02:27 +0000 UTC]

such perfect representation of the styles..

👍: 0 ⏩: 1

MysticSparkleWings In reply to Montidrawz [2018-06-21 03:36:18 +0000 UTC]

I'm glad you think so

👍: 0 ⏩: 0

sleepy-peachy [2018-06-13 23:41:15 +0000 UTC]

you replicated the styles very well! i love it!

👍: 0 ⏩: 1

MysticSparkleWings In reply to sleepy-peachy [2018-06-21 03:35:20 +0000 UTC]

Thank you, I'm glad to hear that

👍: 0 ⏩: 0