Prototype Celestial pony at Pony Fair West

[Heart Of Midnight]

Concerned Pony met a prototype!

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Snapdragon, My coffee almost flew out of my mouth when I saw that picture!

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LadyMoondancer, those prototypes look really interesting! Thanks for the photos!

[LadyMoondancer]

Awww, thank you for the thanks (hee hee) but Chocolate Starfire took the pics that made all this speculation possible.  <3

Concerned Pony is a treasure, as always.  <3

[Carrehz]

Although I don't know why they would make them all earth ponies if they were normal ponies.  They don't look like Sweetheart Sisters . . .

Yeah, I think that's what always stuck in my mind, the curious lack of unis/pegs in the set - they usually only did that if they were one of the earth pony-only molds. Definitely feel like there's some big part of the puzzle we're missing here.

[reanna-mator]

So cool! I can see why looking like that they didn't get finalized thought. They always look so beautiful in the promo art. In fact that's the shirt I'm wearing today!

[Lilja]

Although I don't know why they would make them all earth ponies if they were normal ponies.  They don't look like Sweetheart Sisters . . .

That's a good point! They look to be from before Hasbro phased out unicorns/pegasi completely. When the gimmicky sets didn't have a unicorn and/or pegasus there was usually a reason for it (ie the gimmick made horns/wings inconvenient or they were in some specialized mold)

Maybe since they have antennas on top of their heads, also adding a horn to one of them might've been seen as redundant. The lack of pegasi could be because the swirly pattern they were to have all over their bodies wouldn't have worked with, or didn't look good on wings. The existence of the pegasus prototype kind of speaks against this, but maybe that was just a designer grabbing whatever mold they had on hand to get an idea of how the pattern would look on the pony. It looks far from final in any case.

[reanna-mator]

Although I don't know why they would make them all earth ponies if they were normal ponies.  They don't look like Sweetheart Sisters . . .

That's a good point! They look to be from before Hasbro phased out unicorns/pegasi completely. When the gimmicky sets didn't have a unicorn and/or pegasus there was usually a reason for it (ie the gimmick made horns/wings inconvenient or they were in some specialized mold)

Maybe since they have antennas on top of their heads, also adding a horn to one of them might've been seen as redundant. The lack of pegasi could be because the swirly pattern they were to have all over their bodies wouldn't have worked with, or didn't look good on wings. The existence of the pegasus prototype kind of speaks against this, but maybe that was just a designer grabbing whatever mold they had on hand to get an idea of how the pattern would look on the pony. It looks far from final in any case.

The point about the mold is an interesting one. Makes me curious about how each set was developed over the years.

[Heart Of Midnight]

Awww, thank you for the thanks (hee hee) but Chocolate Starfire took the pics that made all this speculation possible.  <3

Concerned Pony is a treasure, as always.  <3

Ok, then thanks also to ChocolateStarfire! 

[Snapdragon]

I got A photo of them, which was linked earlier in the thread; I'll repost it in case anyone can't get IG to work! At the time it was more of a perfunctory photo, because I figured that we had already seen these prototypes! I wish I had realized before the event ended!!

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[ChocolateStarfire]

Awww, thank you for the thanks (hee hee) but Chocolate Starfire took the pics that made all this speculation possible.  <3

Concerned Pony is a treasure, as always.  <3

Ok, then thanks also to ChocolateStarfire! 

You're welcome!

Post Merge: September 09, 2022, 10:09:33 PM

I got A photo of them, which was linked earlier in the thread; I'll repost it in case anyone can't get IG to work! At the time it was more of a perfunctory photo, because I figured that we had already seen these prototypes! I wish I had realized before the event ended!!

visitors can't see pics , please register or login

I think the issue here was that they weren't really announced and folks seemed more interested in the booths and events rather than the prototypes. I wish that there was a presentation set up so that we could have learned more about them? Ah well.

[Primaltimediamond]

oh wow, these are very cool to see!! Never even heard of Fancy swirl ponies, they would've been gorgeous I bet. Though I imagine those antenna would've broken off or gotten lost if removed over the years for sure.

[Lady Frostbite]

Huh. Maybe they couldn't figure out how to do the swirls like they wanted and that's why they scrapped them?

(Disclaimer - I haven't seen the photo yet, still wrestling w/ Instagram lol - so I might be way off here)

I remember reading a while ago that there was a Monster High char (Kala) who was originally intended to have swirly/marbled skin, but they had to scrap it because the plastic mix kept reacting badly and burning, or something like that? I wonder if something similar happened here?

I first saw the post on mobile at work and I thought she was badly painted too, the marbling is a much better explanation, thank you!!

[maycrestmom]

thanks a million for sharing photos and a bit of history :-) really loved seeing the celestial prototype

admittedly I had thought they were going to be produced in the bride pose so yep, thought we got the colorswirls when celestial pony idea was scrapped.  Admittedly I also had thought it was a paint job style NOT a vinyl mix so seeing that prototype explains alot :-) huge thanks for post!

[Artemesia's Garden]

Oh wow! No headgear though? Thanks very much for sharing these photos.

[Carrehz]

Yes, I was wondering where their antennae things were too! It doesn't even look like there's a space for them (like how the Pristina proto has a hole for her gemstone)... Really makes me wonder if this WAS just them testing different ways of doing the marble/swirl effect (which would explain the discrepancy with this proto being a pegasus, when the art has them all as earthies), or maybe the antennae were a later addition?