OK now I want to play with this Harmony program. I can't draw terribly well but I bet you I'd have some fun. I'm so jealous you get to be an animator, what type of things do you get to work on? I did a short animated film back in the old high school days, took me about a month to do a 30 second clip of a dog chasing after a ball. I so wish I could have kept it all but everything had to be handed in for assessment and I never got any of it back. I LOVED doing it tho.
I think it stands out of Spike so much because of his colour, actually. He seems to POP out of the background so much more than even the craziest coloured pony, and it's like the lines used for his outline and esp his eyes are...too think? It's def something about his frame and the way he moves which distracts me. It could also be his eyes are slitted like a lizards' rater than the iris being a circle like the ponies. I know in one of the early eps in season one Applejack has a dog help her round up bunny rabbits and the dog also looked EXTREMELY computerised (as does Fluttershy's bunny now that I think about it). Maybe they drew the ponies extremely carefully and have them sort of pre-programmed in so it looks...more natural? While the sort of incidental so not as much work goes into them. Doesn't make sense with a main character like Spike tho.