Hello fillies and gentlecolts! Calpain here with the revival of an old feature we had on the site a year or two ago: Artist Interviews. Back in the day we interviewed a number of artists from the fandom, from the up and coming to the already popular! Now, thanks to collaboration with awesome user TwilightisMagic, we bring you our first interview with artist Luted.
Check on after the break on what makes this artist tick and expect some new interviews from here on out. Also feel free to leave comments below suggesting artists for future interviews!
TwilightisMagic dA
- First of all, Luted, how long have you been drawing? When did you start? What is your artistic story?
Depends on what you mean. I've drawn for a long time, since I was small I always liked drawing. That doesn't really count, so I'll skip to when I was bit older? So I used to dream of becoming an anime artist. I drew humans, anime things, and I really liked drawing fashion. Though I never really got the hang of human anatomy, I did it mostly for fun. I also liked drawing horses and sometimes older-gen My Little Ponies too. I think I even experimented with some weird photo-manipulation type things too, which ended real quick. And I liked drawing animals, like dragons and birds. To put it shortly, I drew a bunch of random things for a while until the very first episode of Friendship is Magic popped up on Youtube. Then I witnessed a fandom build itself off of this weird show, and lots of fanart of ponies began to show up everywhere, and then I started to draw more ponies. Somehow throughout all this I found the grimdark MLP community, surfed everything in it, and it kinda shows. I became a huge fan of the show, started viewing more and more MLP works, and suddenly everything I draw now is a pony. I loved drawing ponies, it was fun and I could be as creative as I wanted with them. And although I never cared much of popularity, for the first time my stuff was seen by people with the pony fandom so huge. In the long run, I've also somehow vastly improved in drawing humans though that is kinda useless as I rarely ever post anything that isn't a pony. But that isn't really important. And now I'm in this interview. Wheeeee~ C:
- What inspired you to start drawing ponies?
I grew up on generation one MLP and generation three. This computer I'm using still has some cringe-worthy old Microsoft Paint pony scribbles from my miniature self somewhere in the files. Then I kinda stopped drawing ponies, thinking I was too old for it (uhhh, __ years old is too old for MLP? Noooo..../coughbroniescough/) and drew other things for a while. I also became "part" of a tiny fandom of MLP fans long before bronies. They were mostly older-gen MLP toy collectors, but there were some amazing pony artists too that sadly are now under the dust in the present day. That caused me to draw ponies again a bit, but only occasionally and I was GOD awful at it. Though when Friendship is Magic popped up, when I became a fan of the show I started drawing nothing but ponies. And then all that other stuff I mentioned above happened. :>
- You make your works in a very special (and, in my opinion, exceptionally beautiful) style. What inspires you to draw in this way? Are there any artists, pony or otherwise, whose work influences yours, or is it something you came to on your own?
Well... there are some awesome artists that really have influenced me. CosmicUnicorn and Ventious on DeviantArt are probably the ones that influenced my stuff the most visually. I really love both of their art style and they are really inspirational. Really elegant, emotional, lovely art they both have. <3 They might have influenced the way I draw ponies now.
- Is there anything in particular that you like about the pony form, as depicted in your style?
I hope I'm not misinterpreting this question, but I'm thinking "what I like about drawing ponies the way I do." For some weird reason I really like drawing the manes of ponies. I really like drawing long flowy manes and tails and it shows, I guess. It's just really fun.
- I notice that you’d made a digital picture in the past, but have since kept to traditional tools near-exclusively. Are there any particular reasons as to why you prefer the traditional medium and tools to the digital ones?
When I first started drawing more often, I loved looking at art from the rest of the MLP fandom. Seeing that the majority was digital art, I got myself a tablet that I was real excited about at first. Although I did eventually get a hang of it, it personally was too much of a hassle to just sit down and draw. It is hard to understand, but drawing with actual physical things is so much easier for me. If I wanted to shade something, I could smudge it with my finger. If I wanted to shade something digitally, I had to switch to airbrush and zoom in and out of the drawing. And I was so accustomed to the simple take-out-a-piece-of-paper-and-start-drawing, that I went back to that and started to forget about my tablet and now I just don't use it at all. Though, countless digital artists make some serious works of perfection that I'll never be able to understand the process of. Hats off to the millions of you out there.
TL; DR digitally drawing doesn't work for me because I'm too impatient (and my painfully slow computer is too). >_<
- Which among the tools you use for drawing you like the most? Is there any drawing tool or medium that you want to try but haven’t had the chance yet?
I use charcoal most often because I find it really simple to use and versatile. Makes shading easier most of the time, though there's always the fact that it is pretty messy. I sometimes wish I could try those fancy looking ink calligraphy pens, I've borrowed them a few times to write and I think they could be fun to use for drawing. One day I'll get one...well, I just don't really know where. I'll find out one day. Soon. Later.
- What is the picture you are most proud of so far, and why?
Ummm... that's a hard question. I don't really know, but if I had to choose real quick I would choose this. I had a really pleasant time drawing it and the mane and adding the little bits of color and seeing it turn out mostly the way I wanted it to.
- Are there any ponies or nonpony FiM characters that you can call your favourites in the sense of personal liking of them or in the sense of drawing them, or possibly both? Are there any reasons you can name for that preference?
Discord. Always happy to see him. Best "chaotic neutral" character ever. He's hilarious, sadistic, witty, playful and pulls the best gags ever. Is it strange to say that I'm also obsessed with his voice? But the largest reason why I like him so much is pretty much what happened to him in the season 4 finale. I loved his relapse back into a "villain", that was entirely believable and the best way to lead to huge character development when he realized his mistakes. And his friendship with Fluttershy is the most adorable thing. <3
- What do you like to see in other artists’ work? (Styles, themes, approaches to the creative process etcetera)
Honestly, there isn't really anything I specifically look for when viewing other art. I really like any style of art, if it cute ponies or chubby ponies or skinny ponies or happy or dark or fantasy or simple...doesn't matter as long as it looks like effort was put into it I guess. /shrugs/ Though I am attracted more to darker themes or drawings with stories behind them. I really like stuff that makes me think or keeps me up at night.
- Is there anything you’ve learned from your experience as an artist that you could see being helpful to others and possibly share?
Well, here goes... If you aren't having fun, take a break. Doesn't matter if you are a popular artist or not – if you don't have FUN out of making art, don't force yourself too much. You'll turn art into a chore instead of simply drawing. And the more you care about popularity, the harder it is to have fun drawing...yeah. There's your fortune cookie wisdom of the day.
- Thank you very much for your time, Luted. I absolutely love your work, and I look ever forward to seeing more of your gorgeous, elegant ponies.
You're welcome! And thank you... I can never thank you enough for all the support, honestly. <3 And thanks for inviting me to this interview, it was interesting to do. ^_^ Wish you the best.
Follow Luted Here
Twitter: Calpain
