Maryanne’s musings:

Everybody can relate to a ripped horse rug.  But can we really blame them when we wear distressed denim and kooky fashion? 😉

My favourite part of this one is the expressions in the last panel.  I started a Photoshop file where I doodle horse faces and expressions and it’s a really handy reference.  I’m also pretty happy with the tippy-toe pose of the front leg on the horse in the middle panel.

One thing I almost forgot was to change the lighting between morning and afternoon.  A cheeky Photoshop overlay layer sorted that.  Ok so the lighting highlights should now be on the opposite side of the characters given it’s the end of the day, but I think how it is is enough of a change without backtracking heaps to change all the character highlights (It’s not that hard. I should have done it!).  The background impression of grass was a very quick scribble of some standard Photoshop brushes using the table pen’s pressure for opacity.  I love my graphics tablet!

The bit I think I should have worked at more is the pose of the girl in the centre panel. People are really tricky sometimes. I think I needed a decent reference so maybe I’ll get one of those poseable artist mannequin things.   I made SO MANY minor adjustments to this pic after the linework was “complete.”

Enjoy!