Background ponies

For a list of all ponies that are mentioned or seen on the show, see list of ponies.

For a list of background ponies with their own pages, see Category:Background characters.

Several background ponies can be seen attending Cranky Doodle Donkey and Matilda's wedding ceremony in Slice of Life.

Background ponies are ponies that appear in the background during most scenes in episodes and possess character models that are used frequently to fill out crowd scenes and incidental characters in the show. In late April 2013, Discovery Family (previously the Hub Network)'s Facebook page and Twitter account referred to Trixie, Princess Luna, Daring-Do[sic], DJ Pon-3, Spitfire, Princess Twilight Sparkle, Queen Chrysalis, and Zecora as background ponies.

Introduction

Main article: Animation

Each episode goes through several stages in pre-production: premise, script, dialog recording, and storyboard. The storyboards detail each shot and most of the layout, posing, and camera actions. After storyboarding, backgrounds are created or re-used, and the preliminary staging, composition, and color balancing is refined by the layout department, who ship the layouts to the animation department. After animation and animation revisions, the episode is further refined in post-production. The initial two or three dozens of background ponies were summarily approved by Lauren Faust, intended to fill the background of places populated by ponies.

Usage

Background characters are dropped into scenes only in the layout phase, after storyboarding has already finished. From a story standpoint, they are interchangeable and serve the purpose of populating scenes whenever ponies other than the main or supporting characters are needed. Crowd scenes are often filled with multiple copies of the same designs, in crowd scenes in Friendship is Magic, part 1, Friendship is Magic, part 2, The Show Stoppers, Luna Eclipsed, and many more episodes. In The Ticket Master, Boast Busters, Fall Weather Friends, and The Super Speedy Cider Squeezy 6000, there is a galloping "mob" of ponies, consisting of Diamond Mint, Berryshine, Shoeshine, Lyra Heartstrings, Lemon Hearts, Daisy, Amethyst Star, and Minuette, and in some shots the entire group is duplicated to increase the number of ponies. They also use colorfill on a lot of ponies, changing the color but leaving the same cutie mark and design.

The design for all characters and their color schemes are subject to approval by Hasbro. The background ponies mostly share two body types–one male and one female-and are generally only differentiated from each other by pony type, mane style, mane color, coat color, eye color, and cutie mark. There are hundreds of different ponies whose color schemes or designs are distinct from each other even though they share the same design, although some of the background ponies are used more frequently than others, such as Lyra Heartstrings and Sweetie Drops. These two ponies are used by a layout artist for added visual gags.

Recurring background ponies

Among all of the background ponies that are used in the show, there are twenty-two mares that are used consistently in Ponyville, and as a result are the most commonly seen in the series. They typically occupy crowd scenes and react to actions performed by the main cast, or, on rarer occasions, even interact with them. These twenty-two characters consist of six Earth ponies, six unicorns, and ten Pegasi, each one sharing her design with at least one other. Their names as given by the show, merchandise, or currently held with a placeholder, are as follows:

	Background Ponies	Similar Design
Earth Ponies	Berryshine	Cherry Berry
	Sweetie Drops	Shoeshine
	Golden Harvest	Daisy
Pegasus Ponies	Derpy	Sunshower Raindrops
	Cloud Kicker	Merry May
	White Lightning	Sprinkle Medley
	Rainbowshine	Orange Swirl
	Sassaflash	Parasol
Unicorn Ponies	Twinkleshine	Lemon Hearts
	Minuette	Sea Swirl
	Lyra Heartstrings	Amethyst Star

Other recurring background ponies include Rose, Lily Valley, "Candy Mane", Lyrica Lilac, Royal Ribbon, and an assortment of male ponies, but they are absent from the list due to a relative lack of appearances and/or an offset of shared designs.

Equestria Girls

Some of the background humans were based on background ponies, such as Lyra Heartstrings and Sweetie Drops, but none of these humans are among the students who appear in the first film My Little Pony Equestria Girls.