The Elements Of Friendship, Book IS cover art

One of the very first things that I reckoned I would need to do differently on the next cover for The Elements of Friendship's cover art, for The Elements of Friendship, Book IS [interlude one-point-five]: Bonds, is that I wanted to do the characters in a higher resolution.
The lightning that's ensnared proved to be more of a challenge than I would have liked. Even though I promised her that I would not get her involved, I still ended up having to enlist the aid of StarryOak in perfecting it. The previous attempts at a lightning-cage were... a travesty, in essence. A "well made, well intentioned travesty" in her own words, but still one. I seriously owe her for all the behind-the-scenes work that she's put into EOF.

The design of Queen Selena was heavily derived from one of the concept sketches for Princess Selena as depicted by xebck in her fanart located here. Her Celestia-colored secondaries are a bit of a yin-yang thing that she and Celestia share in EOF, where Celestia has NMM-colored secondaries on her wings (like this gorgeous bit of fanart on Tumblr).

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After freeing Queen Celestia's sister from the pall of NightMare Moon, Twilight Sparkle has settled down in Ponyville with her new circle of friends. But no sooner does she settle down than a foe from the reign of NightMare Moon returns: Trixie Lulamoon! Bearing a mysterious trinket of great magical power, Trixie leads Twilight to test her assessment of friendship being the greatest magic. What is the Alicorn Amulet? How does it possess such absolute power? Where did Trixie get it from? Who gave it to her, and why? And what was the Sonic Rainboom, and how does it tie Twilight Sparkle to the friends she has just made...?

Cover resources:
Twilight Sparkle
Spike
Applejack
Rainbow Dash
Fluttershy
Pinkie Pie
Rarity
Trixie (without dwimmer shimmer or glow of Alicorn Amulet)
Queen Selena

Ponyville resource: matty4z.deviantart.com/art/pon…
Cloud resources: boneswolbach.deviantart.com/ar…, misteraibo.deviantart.com/art/…, misteraibo.deviantart.com/art/…
Sun resource: misteraibo.deviantart.com/art/…

MLP:FiM (c) Lauren Faust and Hasbro

EDIT 9 Feb 2017: Wallpaper version can be found here.