Latest Posts by twocupsofsugar - Page 2
Just my current (wip). I'm working on another short comic, its only going to be a few pages, but hopefully you'll find it interesting. I'll post the whole comic once I'm finished drawing it
Thinking of some ideas for what a vreem language might look like. I figured since they have crab claws they would have a hard time using cylindrical writing tools so i came up with a stamp like pen instead. This is an example of Khlhk and is one of many vreem languages in my setting. It uses a vertical script of lines and dots and is an agglutination heavy language, so an entire sentence or phrase is also a single word.
Also an example of some graffiti with a stylized version of the script.
its been a while since I've painted a creature thing. Was working on this way back, but my old tablet broke and that kinda made me loose my enthusiasms to finish it. Its done now.
Finally finished this, some constructs
I refer to sapient/sentient machines in my setting as constructs partially because the term AI is really broad and can apply to a lot of different type of synthetic forms of life/existences. So to keep it simple all constructs are AI but not all AIs are constructs.
These two are some typical designs among CSG/Human (left) and Brakken (right) constructs. The first is a mobile assistant, a type of specialist construct that is meant to go places where an AI network can't while the other is a Brakken mother unit. The majority of human civilization is governed by the CSG, central service grid a vast AI network that manages all aspects of human civilization. They've governed earth and its many colonies for a very long time and most people under their care life relatively safe, post-scarcity lives. All the CSG has historically had problems with control and governing overreach.
The brakken are eusocial aliens who have a queen. The queens primary role is to produce new members for the colony, provide generation knowledge, and support colony cohesion via the psychoactive pheromones she produces. When the queen dies, a whole is left in the colony and in some instances another queen is unable to take her place. Sometimes colonies can reject the queen. Mother units are essentially bio computers which take on the role of a queen of a colony when needed.
a little fan art lagi from panzer dragoon orta
thinking more about my alien dolphin/whales
I'm thinking that Imsee evolved from an avian ancestor, something similar between a bat and pterodactyl that then transitioned to a semi-aquatic lifestyle. (which at least to me explains their body plan) So in a way a Imsee are weird penguins that just so happen to look like dolphins. Also, they are born with coat of fur which later sheds off during adolescence, and a bit like seals/otters they have to be taught how to swim by the adults.
I've also decided that the Imsee "species" is actually made up of three different closely related squid-whale species that can all reproduce with each other. Fig. A are River Imsee they have slender bodies and longer mandibles, B. Coastal Imsee, they're the most common and historically had the largest population on their homeworld, and C. are lake Imsee, they have stockier bodies and were typically found more inland than their river counterparts and were rarer too.
In modern times, Imsee are fairly homogeneous, due to a centuries of intermingling. So as a whole, they phenotypically vary a lot.
Now there is another species which are also Imsee, D. Deep Children. These are genetically modified Imsee who are adapted to a purely aquatic lifestyle. Imsee pretty have the best biotech around, and so deep children are created from adults who undergo a sort of metamorphasis via a pool of nanobots, called the Pond of Change. Its sort of a risky procedure (mostly because it heavily modifies the brain) and has a lot of ritual involved so its not something that's done casually. Deep children are a bit like biological super computers, anything that requires a lot of math and consideration, its usually a deep child that's figuring it out.
Art practice, I've been working on cleaning up my anatomy, there are some parts which are still very much wonky, but its better than before.
Was in a dream vibe and decided to draw a harpy
A little more about the Qoati, early ideas really.
Qoati Replicants
The Qoati are my precursor species of aliens that once had a civilization across the galaxy. (really the only species known of that had a civilization that large). They have some bizarre technology, many of which defies our understanding of physics. These are essentially robots, created by the Qoati, millions of years ago to manage Interspace (an artificial alternate dimension) and part of their strange appearance is because, they can freely move between interspace and normal space. Some replicants are actually 6th dimensional constructs that can only exists across both interspace and normal space
As to what their made off, well that's anyone guess. But its definitely not matter that's for sure.
Design wise, I want Qoati tech to look ambiguous, almost as if your looking at something recognizable but also not really. Is this a living thing, or a statue?, what am i even looking at, kind of vibes.
Mercurions, aka cyborgs
In my setting Union Station, humans have been in space for more than a millennium and as such have culturally diverged a lot from their terran ancestors. The history of the mercurions is kinda complex. For one, they aren't actually from mercury despite the name, they instead originate from the colony-ship Mercurion which was created as part of the New Horizon Initiative by the governing bodies of the sol system. The goal was to set humanity among the stars, but the Mercurion never arrived at its intended destination, and instead ended up 100 light-years off course in an unknown and hostile star system. Early, FTL at the time, was very risky.
Multiple catastrophe's aboard the mercurion caused the handful of survivors to turn to reproductive cloning and later cybernetics to survive.
As a culture, their society is highly stratified as a result of the Merilink system, a state-enforced caste system managed by a super computer (to be clear not a sentient AI). The initial idea behind Merilink, was to create a meritocracy, were all mercurions were born at the same level of citizenship / rights and could elevate their status based on merit, which usually ended up meaning either wealth or "labor productivity". As expected, it resulted in a deeply rooted system of inequality.
A long history of warfare, imperialism, and xenophobia has essentially left mercurion society fairly isolated from the rest of the interstellar community until fairly recently. There's a movement amoung them to reduce or even remove the merilink system although whether or not it'll actually happen is still up up in their air.
I still have a lot more to put out for these guy's I'm just really bad at getting it out of my head and onto paper
All three of the founding species of my setting together with their initial concept sketches and their current final art. The veem changed the most as i felt that too many of the aliens I've drawn so far were too mammalian like. I've got two more alien I'd like to add but I'm still working working on coming up with a better design for them.
alright, finally finished the vreem page. Just a little side note, smart-plants aren't actually plants in the traditional plants. They have more in common with animals and fungi physiology wise than they to to most terrestrial earth plants. So they have a rudimentary nervous system. I'll get around to drawing them eventually once i get a better idea of what the vreem homeworld is like.
Decided to do a bit of painting practice, tried a different technique, not sure how i feel about it, the colors are kinda dull.
Been a little busy lately and and didn't have much time for art as of recently, but I've come up with another group of colonists. I don't have a name for them yet, but their essentially humans / alien hybrids who have a genetic trait which causes the duplication of certain organs or skeletal structure. This one is sporting an additional set of eyes. Just a quick bit of line art.
My most recent attempt at drawing this character, The Archon Aziza, from my fantasy setting The Last Seer
I'm no where close to be done with it but the basic colors are where they're supposed to be for the most part. Speaking of which i should really get around to posting the old lore I've got floating around on reddit onto here.
Also the peacock is apart of his body
an art trade for @gt-ridel they asked for an axolotl dragon and I immediately thought of olms, so an olm wizard.
"They seemed very tired and lacked the desire to move this cycle. Today, this one felt no desire to feed themselves. The rest of the colony is in the same state. My friends, the brakken, are falling very ill and we do not yet know why" - Starmaker , They Who Drinks Deeply of the Clear Waters
The Imsee and their first encounter with BWD, or Brakken Wasting Disease.
The Brakken are unique uplift case in locale space as unlike other sophonts as when the Imsee came across the Brakken weren't originally sapient but were close to it. They were the Imsee's first attempt at genetically engineering an entire alien species and while for the most part the process was a success it did come at a cost.
Brakken wasting disease is the result of the slow breakdown of their cellular structure that first starts in the nervous system and spreads through out the body. The mechanisms of the disease isn't entirely understood as there isn't a viral agent but appears to spread through pheromones and results in the incomplete formation of many important proteins and metabolic enzymes. Its a very slow disease that is difficult to detect and often times when it is, its already too late.
It's first appearance among the brakken completely took the Imsee off guard and nearly whipped out the brakken species, but in modern times, while they still lack the technology to cure it they've significantly increased the lifespans of those who have it and their quality of life.
I'm slowly making a few characters for Union-Station. This is Francis, a CSG construct that works as an architect on the station and an unnamed Brakken that they're found of. Robot characters are still difficult for me to draw but I'm getting there.
colored in background, Almost done with it, unfortunately, like half of it is going to be covered up. This is my second attempt at this drawing actually, the first one was really crusty and pretty bad. Much happier with this version.
This one was my first try.
Work in progress illustration,
I'm slowly working on trying to get better at drawing backgrounds and i want to get in the practice of making more illustrations. There's a little story here, which i wont talk to much here other than its not a particularly happy one.
A rough sketch of the Dram, another alien species from my worldbuilding project. I wanted another group of aliens which can be considered the closet to humans in terms of biology and body plan. They're built a bit like bears, but are comfortable walking on either four or two legs. They're sort of the new comers to the setting as they haven't spent much time in space and are supposed to have a sort of modern tech aesthetic.
Although I'm not sure if i should make them even more alien in appearance with out moving to far away from the "like-bipedal-humanoid-alien-but-also-not-really" vibe they have at the moment.
A slight update from my old sketch, I wasn't particularly happy about the head. A little too mammalian but i wanted to maintain a a few recognizable bits from the old design. Out of all of my alien designs they've changed the most from their initial concept sketches.
Another sketch WIP
Still have more aliens to draw, this one is for the Vreem. A diminutive species of alien only slightly larger than a mouse. They have an interesting symbiotic relationship with a species of plants collectively called the Tyreem. The plants are not sapient themselves, but they they are able to pass as intelligent very well, at least to the Vreem and have evolutionary co-opted vreem intelligence into cultivate themselves. Its an idea I'm still in the process of work-shopping but in the meantime I've been redesigning these guys