Cosmic Corpses: White Dwarf

Halloween's just around the corner, so here's my attempt at a Halloween-themed picture. And what's more 'halloweenish' than corpses?

What do you mean that's not the "right kind" of corpse?



No fluffy write up for this one, just an old, dead star about to reach the final stage of its undeath and finally cool into a white dwarf. Surrounding it, like a burial-shroud, is a planetary nebula, formed from its outer layers.

As planetary nebulae are a form of emission nebula, once the parent star stops producing ultraviolet radiation and ionizing the gas that makes it up, it will fade into invisibility, until such a time that a strong source of ionizing radiation (gamma rays, x rays, strong ultraviolet) passes by to light it up again.

 Our view in this case is from near a former Oort Cloud object, probably the size of Ceres.

Kerberos' Glare

Named after hellhound of ancient Helinik myth, this brown dwarf star marks the end of civilization and the beginning of the Dead Space, a region of the galaxy characterized by eldritch energies and terrifying anomalies.

Bathed in the star's ruddy glare, the Interceptor Alkeidis orbits Tartaros, Kerberos' middle planet, preparing to brave the Dead Space's unnatural depths and investigate the disappearance of the research ship Arkimedes.

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Long time, no post.

Because artist's block sucks. But I beat that down with a sledgehammer, the above is the result.

I had a few goals with this one. The first was to experiment with a new style of presentation, specifically a title and border. I think it works with this picture, at least.

I also wanted to try conveying a specific, deliberate emotional tone with this picture. YMMV on my success with this one.

It was also an excuse to run a couple of tests on myself, specifically on how well I could do a star (because stars have always been one of my weak points) and how well I could convey the vast, mind-numbing scale  of the universe. I like the result, but YYMV.

The fluff in the description is inspired by a recent obsession with Greek mythology, and not really connected with any of my other pictures.

LPS 1.3 - No, really!

Update number two...

I've finally started updating the bottom and the back, although it's still "functional" details rather than greeble as of yet.

The main engines are another homage to the E:D Sidewinder (of which this is most definitely not based on...that's my story and I'm sticking to it!), and are a pretty radical change from the monolithic block the area was in the beginning. I was originally going to give it round engines (and had even blocked out the required shapes a couple of times), but decided on a more "vent"-like engine as I do nothing  but round engines on everything, and it was a nice change of pace to do something different.

Additionally you can see the three landing gear on the bottom. Sadly, this is just a static detail, rather than the gear being actual physical objects; While I've done gear-as-object before, doing so in high-poly is currently outside the scope of my skills.

Unfortunately, I'm going to have to let this model stew while I work on others in the mean time. Being an idiot, I decided to break one of the cardinal rules of modeling, and model without a concept, and have thus run out of ideas for this particular model; so it's going to languish while I use the knowledge gained from working on it on other projects.

LPS 1.2 - This is not a Sidewinder...

So...update number one. It's actually starting to look like a ship now.

While looking for detailing inspiration, I ended up looking at the modern, Elite: Dangerous version of the model's inspiration, so I threw in plating that looks like its radiators as an homage. The top of the model is still the only part that has any detail, with the bottom having only a little basic plating and the back being completely bare.

The cockpit was actually the most challenging detail so far, since it was the first time I'd tried to make such a shallow indentation using this modeling technique. Like with everything else, I had to come up a process that worked, but it was a bit more complicated than simply  putting the geometry together and setting the bevel weights. Luckily the solution was just some choice loop cuts.

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I'm starting to notice some artifacts that are probably going to show up in the normal map baking, but nothing that can't be fixed by a couple seconds in photoshop, so I'm not particularly worried.

The render resolution of the model puts it at 790,816 faces, with the actual working resolution putting it at 49,426. I'd say that the model is a little under half done.

LPS 1.1

Long time, no post. Sorry about that.

In my defense, I've been in a bit of a creative rut lately. This is my attempt to remedy that through weapons-grade practice.

I'm tackling high-poly modeling.

The model above is a little over 360,000 faces (though I'm working at a much lower resolution that has it at only 20,000, and only up it when I need to see how it looks), and is vaguely inspired by the Sidewinder from the Elite series.

I intend to bake it onto a low-poly model at some point. In the future.

I hope.

Gratuitous Earth-like Planet

Gratuitous planet is gratuitous.

This came about while further refining a couple of the techniques I explored in Gratuitous Rocky Planet, as well as practicing earth-like planets, a type I've had some trouble with in the past.

I'm rather satisfied with the results.

Gratuitous Rocky Planet

Gratuitous, and shamelessly so.

This started out as a test of a new texture I downloaded this morning (CGTextures, the site I got it from, is an amazing resource; lots of interesting textures) and evolved into the above when I decided to use it to experiment a bit with post processing.

Specifically, I experimented with custom clouds, atmospheric glow (a gremlin I've been trying to squash since I became a space artist), and atmospheric haze.

Altogether, it's all rather subtle, but I think the results speak for themselves. This is, without a doubt, one of, in not the best, planet I've made yet.

Rogue Agent

Hyperion from nearly head on. This image is from the perspective a probe sent to investigate this mysterious object. Hyperion's unique "shockwave" can be seen on the left.

P/2586 E7, commonly called Hyperion, is an enigma. Hyperion behaves like any other Oort Cloud object perturbed from its original orbit (comets), diving in towards Sol before ricocheting back out to deep space, yet it's the size of Earth's moon. The largest object of its type yet observed, debate rages within the scientific community whether it truly qualifies as a comet. Typical of objects of its type, Hyperion outgasses as it approaches Sol. Unlike the more common comets, however, Hyperion's gravity prevents it from forming a traditional coma and tail, as most outgassed material simply collects near the surface, similar to Pluto's summer-time atmosphere. What material that does escape forms a roughly shockwave-shaped cloud, somewhere between a comet's coma and tail and an extreme version of Pluto's atmosphere in behavior.

Though its orbit is "mild", compared to similar objects, at it's closest to the sun, it passes a mere 30 million kilometers from the Earth's orbit, potentially close enough to interact, if weakly, with the Earth itself, should the timing be right. While the current configuration of the solar system puts Earth on the opposite side of Sol during this orbit, it's only a matter of time.

Of equal concern is the as yet unknown event which set Hyperion in motion. Astronomers are still trying to figure out what could fling an object of Hyperion's size towards Sol, and what other effects it may or may not have had.

Gemini

Inspired by the setting of an RP game I'm involved with. It's basically your average mineral-rich hell-hole. It rains sand, if that says anything.

Blanc

This is the result of some messing around in preparation of the next picture in this world-building project of mine. Specifically, it's a mockup of the Earth and Sol from somewhere in the vicinity of the Earth-Moon L4 Lagrange Point. The moon isn't visible because it's simply too far away from the Earth to fit within the image. However, at this scale, it would be about 13 pixels big; barely big enough to show a crescent.

I thought it looked presentable, so I decided to post it.

Whispers on the Winds

The WSL-3 rover, also known as Explorer, high over Wellington's western hemisphere.

Another in a long line of explorers, the WSL-3 rover begins its final, fiery decent to Wellington's surface.

Its mission is to explore the edge of a small sea on the western hemisphere of the moon. If the initial findings from previous probes are any indication, Explorer's year on the surface won't be uneventful.

LPS 1

The "Lady Luck" maneuvering to enter orbit of a previously unknown gas giant.

Something I whipped up to check if my texturing skills are up to snuff for another project I'm working on.

Turns out they're not.

Cold Summer

No story behind this one. I just wanted to try my hand at painting an atmosphere.

This is supposed to be Pluto and its moons some time around perihelion (closest approach to the Sun.). In ascending order, you have Pluto itself, Charon, Hydra, and finally Nix. Coincidentally, this is the warmest period in Pluto's year and bits of ices on its surface sublimate into a thin atmosphere.

Gold and Dust, The Singer, Kepler 78b

Pumping Station 8

Water is life on Aker. 

Gustav Crater, roughly 10 kilometers from the Proxima One base, is especially rich in it and supplies the thousands of gallons that Proxima One needs everyday for everything from agriculture to spacesuit cooling systems.

During a lull in the constant dust storms that ravage the planet's terminator, where day turns to night, technicians from the colony travel via rover to Pumping Station 8, which has been in dire need of maintenance for weeks. Luckily, with the arrival of the team of technicians, the potential disaster of its shutdown has been averted

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Nightingale (left) and its moon, Wellington.

 The only other planet orbiting Proxima Centauri, Nightingale, so named for the peculiar whistle-like noises produced by its radio emissions, is a run-of-the-mill gas planet, if small at only 80 times the mass of the Earth. It lingers at the very edge of its sun's gravitational sphere of influence, alone except for its single moon, Wellington.

Wellington, a roughly Earth-sized ball of ice and rock, is a near-double for our own Titan. Because of the tentative evidence found at Titan, Wellington has been the target of nearly every probe launched from Aker. Time will tell if the similarities between Titan and Wellington extend beyond climate...

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Kepler 78b

 Discovered just this year, this little, Earth-sized world whizzes around its sun in just over 8 hours, due to its 1/100th AU orbit. With a day-side temperature between 3680 and 5120 degrees Fahrenheit, Kepler 78b has been called a "lava-planet" by the astronomers who discovered it. It's been confirmed to glow in the visible spectrum

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This one doesn't really have anything to do with any of the others. It's just that its subject was featured in the news, and I thought it'd be interesting to do my own impression what this odd little planet might look like.

The motion blur effect is purely artistic license.

Baleful Sun

The Niña and Santa Maria as they insert themselves into orbit. The Pinta is out of frame.

Aker. 

Dry. Cold. Dusty. Dead.

Home to Mankind's farthest outspost: the Proxima One research station. Rivaled only by the terraformation of Mars in ambition and difficulty, this controversial project was initiated as much to accomplish its goal of studying the Centauri triplets from up close as it was simply because the people involved could. 

As much self-sufficient colony as it is a research outpost, Proxima One is home to almost 50 scientists and support personnel. As seen now, Proxima One is about to receive its first re-supply mission. 12 years in the coming, this small fleet, the Niña, Pinta, and Santa Maria, carries almost 100 tons total of seed, industrial and scientific equipment, spare parts, and small luxury items. Once their payloads are released into orbit to descend to the surface, they will have just enough fuel to make the 8 year trip back home, where they will be refurbished, refueled, re-loaded, and launched back to Proxima Centauri.

The planet itself orbits just at the outer edge of Proxima Centauri's habitable zone, whizzing around the star in just under 14 days. Combined with its 196 hour "day", this motion is just enough to generate a definite, if somewhat weak, magnetic field, protecting the planet, and its human inhabitants, from its sun's frequent, intense flare events.

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The backlighting is not purely artistic. It is a, I hope, scientifically accurate, or at least plausible, representation of the effect that Alpha Centauri's stars might have on objects orbiting Proxima.

Nova Mars

Nova Mars

A glimpse at a possible future. This Mars is in the beginning stages of terraforming. It's warmer than modern Mars. Wetter. There's even the beginnings of a thicker, oxygen rich atmosphere. But it's still bitterly cold and bone dry. Most of the new water is locked up in the giant ice sheets that now dominate the surface, unusable until such a time as the temperature is warm enough for liquid water.

Even now, this decreasingly, but still highly, hostile world supports a fledgling civilization; brave pioneers willing to risk everything to bring a dead world back to life.

This started life as a test of a method for creating realistic ice that someone [Ittiz] on deviantArt taught me, but it looked so nice that I was compelled to polish it up as a finished picture.

The starfield is courtesy of stock provided by this guy: [bloknayrb]

You can view a larger version of this piece here: [Link]