Space opera on steroids!

As promised ... something special today! I have a story going here, a synergy that just happened between several sets of images.

Remember this, from a few days ago:

At the time I was kidding around, but you have to admit, there's something catchy about the tag line: "Once a starship pilot ... now the captive of ruthless warlords -- she will be the empress of rich and lawless galaxies."

Okay. Right. So here -- from yesterday -- is the babe who used to be the starship pilot and is now the captive tempting the Fate Worse Than Death (which probably wouldn't even make her sneeze anyway)...
And that's quite the serious hunk of babe. In fact, it's such a serious babe, you have to wonder that if she's the captive of warlords without a whole lot of ruth, why isn't someone rushing to rescue her?

Then I remembered this:

Now, milday's in tears about something, and there's a spaceship right there. Uh huh. So the pilot who will one day be the Empress of the Galaxy (watch your six, Ming!) used to be milday's private pilot, shuttling her hither and thither to all those romantic trysts and political intrigues. Shades of Three Musketeers in space (aka The Three Musketeers and Luke Skywalker).

And then our pilot (and she seriously needs a name) was made off with in one of these political intrigues, in which she saw, or heard something she shouldn't have. Milday just lost her best friend and most trusted confidant. So --

Enter our hero, who used to be the copilot, flying shotgun on these missions ... and he's a cyborg. He's a "fifty," meaning he's still (only?) 50% human. The rest was replaced after a battle or terrible accident which blinded him (see those eyes!) and destroyed his limbs. The rest of him is gorgeous, of course; and the collateral damage didn't get to the dangly bits, thank gods. (And he also seriously needs a name!)

So here's our hero, who's about to wade through rivers of blood to rescue the pilot he flew with for years, on milady's orders. Being a cyborg, and a "fifty," he can't go without orders -- because in his world he's, well, something of a second-class citizen, considered less than human. (This is not my uidea. It's borrowed from a Mel Keegan story which is coming up soon from DreamCraft.) Of course, he and the pilot babe were lovers long before he was cyborged, and if milady doesn't have the hots for him, she needs to have her contact lens prescription checked.

And that's not a bad story. I'd enjoy reading this! Writing it? Mmmmm ... dunno. Don't really have the time. But it's interesting to play with, isn't it?

Jade, 10 January

Playing with light and reflection ... gotta love this

Playing with light and reflection... and the small images Blogger pastes into the page really don't serve the purpose here. Below, you really have to click on this, see it full size, to appreciate it:


Just a shot-short post today. Work has been ballistic (and yes, it's Sunday on this side of the dateline), and things came up in the late afternoon which meant I didn't get a chance to do much of anything! But these are pretty complex images, well worth a look, and with any luck at I'll be back tomorrow with something really good. There's a fair bit of work to go on the project I want to share, but I think I can get it done tomorrow. Fingers crossed!

Jade, 9 January

The power of negative space

Negative space. Sounds like something right out of Torchwood! But what is it really? It's the blank spaces in a picture ... and it's useful, because it's filled with possibility. You can use negative space to make your hero stand out of the background, or you can use it to utterly change the characteristics of a piece of art...

This one was inspired by with works of the late, great Frank Frazetta, who was famous for leaving great swathes of the canvas dark. The empty spaces would fire your omagination -- you'd literally see things in the empty areas. Sometimes he'd shade in, with broad strokes, a suggestion of what was back there in the shadows. But when this one was finished, I couldn't help seeing all that empty space and thinking...

Just when you've got it pegged as a classic, high fantasy, shazam!


You find out it's really a massive Italian space opera shot in 3D and filmed on four continents. (Uh ... not. Bit it was a lot of fun doing this. Click to see it at large size, and check out the credits...)

Must go now! Sorry this is brief, but I've been going flat-chat all day and am tripping over my eyelids! Sleep, you say? Why, yes. What a good idea, why didn't I think of it?

Jade, 8 January

Neil Travers and Curtis Marin ... Happy Post 450!

Here I am creating characters again ... Hellgate this time! Just a quick post today, because I'm buried in work, and also these characters do not yet have the Mel Keegan stamp of approval. I'm just giving them a "work in progress" airing, because I think Mel is very likely to approve these characters, and because I really like these shots:


Everything is carrying ten layers of textures, and literally all the fabric textures were switched out for my own textures, which gives the costumes a very "new" kind of look. Also what's interesting about this is, the artist has to invent "26th Century Chic." The clothes are still recognisably jackets, jeans, pants -- and I doubt that a leather jacket and a pair of jeans will change much! But Curtis Marin, especially, was always described as very up-market and fashionable, so ...

The jacket is a Chinese brocade. The pants are cut like business slacks, but they're black leather! The shoes are cut like jogging shoes, athletic shoes, but they're gray leather. My guess is that leather, being a natural material, will be cloned in their century. You do not have to kill Bambi to get deerskin, or murder a horse to get the horsehide of which the best shoes are made today (bet you didn't know you were wearing horsehide on your feet), and you don't need to kill Miss Piggy to get a pair of gloves. You just clone the skin industrially, the same way we're about to start cloning transplant organs in our own century, and maybe whole replacement limbs in another 50 years or so. SF comes true. (Wonder if they can clone pork chops and bacon, so I don't have to feel guilty about BBQ...?)

I do suspect that I'm going to have to create some character-specific skinmaps for both these guys, because Neil and Curtis are actually described as being quite "fair," since they're in space most of the time (aboard the carriers, the salvage vessels, whatnot). I need to conflab with MK about this, and won't get that before the weekend. Work. Gak. These skinmaps are exactly what we want to see, except for the fact they're a few shades too dark. So --

Work in progress, guys. But nice, you have to admit! Neil Travers and Curtis Marin...

Incidentally, I've just seen the first half of the new Hellgate book (It's HUGE -- just half of it is the size of any ordinary Keegan book, and twice the size of any usual modern ebook), and I know the rest isn't far behind, so just hang on a while longer.

CG art-wise, I have Vaurien, Jazinsky, Travers, Marin, van Donne and Ramon designed. Next come Mark (now, he's the major challenge) and his two kids and their partners, and Harrison Shapiro and his new romantic interest, and Tonio and Rusch. With these done, I can start the art for a big "adventure playground" for folks who love Hellgate as much as they love NARC. Remember the project, "The World of Hellgate" ...? We're still going there!

Oh yes, and this is Post 450. You wouldn't believe it, but the big five-oh-oh is coming up before the end of March! And I need to think of something absolutely out of this world to do for that one. Good golly, Post 500, who'd've thunk it, when this blog started up in late 2009?! Can't believe it myself.

Jade, 6 January