Sunday, May 22, 2011

The Black Pearl

There have been a few changes to the Black Pearl and Golden Apple coats over the past week, including the introduction of some brand new items that you can submit illustrations for. Here's an overview of how the Black Pearl now works.

The Black Pearl now lets you submit illustrations for Golden Apple coats (as before), Helios's Ray (backgrounds for your horses' pages) and the Horn of Gold (coats for the companions).

The Black Pearl costs 2 passes and you need 5 karma points to be able to use it.

Creation of illustrations

To create a new illustration, you can use any computer graphics editing software such as Paint, Photoshop or Gimp. You're not allowed to just submit a photograph - it must be an illustration or drawing and it must be your own work - don't copy it from anywhere or you risk having your account suspended. Make your illustrations as life-like or imaginary as possible.

If you're not sure where to start, many Howrse players provide outlines of horses (line art) that they've given their permission for other people to use and submit as coats. Check out the Black Pearl - free line art forum post if you'd like to use one. So you could start with of these and just colour it in any way you like!

To send your illustrations, you must use the templates provided by Howrse:

  • for the Golden Apple
  • for Helios's Ray
    • A black frame marks the position of the horse to help you position your landscape properly
    • The frame and the horse it contains must be erased before you send your illustration
  • for the Horn of Gold
    • The top frame is for the awake Companion
    • The bottom frame is for the sleeping Companion

Your image must be placed on the transparent space on the provided template. You must not change the size or format of this template.

Make sure you follow Howrse's instructions or your artwork may not be accepted. You must save your work as a .PNG file.

Publishing your illustration

Now, when you send in your illustration via the Black Pearl, it won't be published right away.

Firstly, Howrse will check it to see if it meets all the criteria for submission and then it will be sent to the Creation Space for other players to vote on it.

If your illustration wins the vote then it will be published on all versions of Howrse at the end of the month (including the different language versions). You will also earn passes as your illustration is used by players - see our post on the Creation Space to learn how much you can get.

If your illustration doesn't win the vote then it will appear again in the Creation Space the following month to allow players to vote for it again. If after 3 months, it still doesn't pass the vote, it will be removed.

If your illustration doesn't get voted on to the game then you will get back the passes you spent on the Black Pearl. However, if your coat isn't accepted because it doesn't fit Howrse's criteria - which can be found on the Black Pearl page you won't get your passes back - so be careful!

Good luck with your illustration submissions and let us know how you get on.

Lucy

18 comments:

  1. they shouldnt just base everything on passes. this sucks. you even have to buy a pass in order to be eligible to win passes, that doesnt even give chances to other people who actually have talent! sigh.... just a thought.

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  2. how come everything is based on passes? couldnt we just submit illustrations without the use of passes? some people actually have good potential and talent, and i feel it goes to waste. thanks...

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  3. I wish that we could free passes more often... i know that when we buy passes it helps pay the people who work Howrse but y do so many people have to work it? Then we wouldn't be protesting all the time! and y cant we use the black pearl however many time we want when we buy it? I think that if they just upgraded the privileges with the black market things we wouldn't be protesting so much... <3

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  4. Everybody who posted about passes:

    Howrse wouldn't have black pearl w/out passes because w/ out passes there would be no website

    Horse has to PAY for graphics and promos

    Also:
    @ Natalie Paris

    We have ALOT of chances to get free passes and black market items

    We have the lottery

    The right to trade and buy bmi's

    And we have the potions

    EVERYBODY GET OVER IT

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  5. I agree, It doesnt make sense that you have to pay passes to create any black pearl item. People should just have to follow the rules for makeing a black pearl and follow the standards and basics. Its not fair that so many people have to pay JUST TO CREATE SOMETHING on howrse when you have true talent.

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  6. Give it up guys you have to pay because they need money, it's true that they make a lot of money through pases and while you may thinks it's u'unfair' that you have to pay what £3 for 2 passes but (and this is coming from an art student) the graphics/art/web designs areas don't pay particually well many artist work freelance (mean they from job to job instead of holding down with the same company)this means that they can either get alot ofmoney at once and none the next...summing up it's a tough business and they need to pay to get the freelancers to do their job...think about it from this angle they have to pay:
    - atleast 2-3 people to keep the website up to date
    -people to do they web design/graphics
    -to buy their URL/place on the 'net (it's their own page so they have to buy a page after all it's not facebook or myspace)
    they must have struck a deal with owlet to do passes meaning they lose money through paying them as i sure owlet don't give them their 'benifits' for free.
    + many more technical jobs for example the encoderes and the people who make sure the page doesn't get viruses..in all there are SO many things....just get off their backs about it.
    besides you can buy passes with your reserve on the passes page every 50 days or something...grow up they need to make a living after all.

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  7. PEOPLE Howrse needs money. I don't get why you all are always protesting. If you really have the talent and really want to TRY, then work hard to earn free passes. That's what I did to get my black pearl. Buy pass horses. Be happy howrse allows pass horses. You people just want a shortcut through everything and that's not how things work in real life. Get used to it.

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    1. I agree with you, i had to work for my own passes and i created a black pearl like 5 minutes ago...

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  8. This website has gone to the whiners. Just keep crying about passes and we won't have a game. They make quite a few ways to get passes. And if you can't get them, sorry about your luck. Ow has gone out of her way to make you all happy in other areas. That's why we with seniority have big issues with all of you who cry about this sorta stuff and that is why we are not as polite to you as we should be. You have our Karma taken, our divines messed with, and a million other changes have been adjusted to suit you.

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  9. This totally sucks!!!

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  10. Why is everyone whinning about passes?! Either save them when you buy them with your reserve or let this game END... Now, I have a tiny question. How am I supposed to use the correct format for a GA illustration?

    Thanks.

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  11. You can't complain about passes cause that's how howrse earns their money and if they were not earning money then there would be no game.

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  12. We get a pass every 30 days after 50 days on Howrse. Stop complaining!

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  13. Stop complaining about not getting passes. For one, they're not that hard to get. Two, how do you expect Howrse to keep running? Magic? No. Money. Which comes from people buying passes.
    And almost/ every month, howrse has events that you can easily snag a few BM items for free.

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  14. Ti get the correct format. I saved the template to my computer then pasted my drawing in it. Do not change the size of the template!

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  15. Just to let you all know, you do not need to spend money to earn passes. I have never paid for a single pass ever, I play fairly, don't cheat and currently have 57passes on my account not including the passes I have sent into the bp system or the 20 passes I am about to get since one of my limited coats got into the game.

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  16. I do buy passes sometimes. If you really want to do things for free then don't play the game. There are a lot of things you can do without buying passes. Save equus and buy them every thirty days, buy pass horses, and such...as well as buy and sell horses for passes. Stop complaining. I had just as much on the game before I started buying passes as I do now. and when I can't buy them anymore I will still love this game.

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  17. I almost feel like swearing right now. Howrse encourages people to buy passes because they have to pay site revenue, a fee for keeping the website on the net. Their only source of income is through passes so without them the site would be removed from the internet.

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