twocupsofsugar
Just a place to stash my art
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Latest Posts by twocupsofsugar
A redraw of my eldritch sona I drew last year.
I usually don't reblog stuff to this blog but this feels relevant to my project and I'd like to share. The link is broken but if found a good website with excerpt from it : https://www.urticator.net/essay/0/19.html
look, I know I've talked about this essay (?) before but like,
If you ever needed a good demonstration of the quote "Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic", have I got an exercise for you.
Somebody made a small article explaining the basics of atomic theory but it's written in Anglish. Anglish is basically a made-up version of English where they remove any elements (words, prefixes, etc) that were originally borrowed from romance languages like french and latin, as well as greek and other foreign loanwords, keeping only those of germanic origin.
What happens is an english which is for the most part intelligible, but since a lot everyday english, and especially the scientific vocabulary, has has heavy latin and greek influence, they have to make up new words from the existing germanic-english vocabulary. For me it kind of reads super viking-ey.
Anyway when you read this article on atomic theory, in Anglish called Uncleftish Beholding, you get this text which kind of reads like a fantasy novel. Like in my mind it feels like it recontextualizes advanced scientific concepts to explain it to a viking audience from ancient times.
Even though you're familiar with the scientific ideas, because it bypasses the normal language we use for these concepts, you get a chance to examine these ideas as if you were a visitor from another civilization - and guess what, it does feel like it's about magic. It has a mythical quality to it, like it feels like a book about magic written during viking times. For me this has the same vibe as reading deep magic lore from a Robert Jordan book.
a cool artists gave me this prompt: biblically accurate angelfish and i was inspired
What could’ve been. Classic speculative space art by Robert McCall
Flora of the Vreem Home World
Flora on the vreem home world is more closely related to fauna, as the two share the same phyla. This is because, the origins of multicellular photosynthesis is fundamentally different than earth's.
Unlike on earth where eukaryotic photosynthesis evolved via symbiosis with cyanobacteria this process never occurred on their home world. Instead their version of photosynthesis developed later as a type of membrane bound protein structure in the earliest ancestor of both their flora and fauna phyla. As a result the flora across the vreem home world is more closely related to their animal life than those on earth.
Here's a collection of different flora-fauna your might come across on the vreem home world. Most flora use a red photosynthetic pigment in their foliage, but other pigments such blue-green and even gold are also found across the world and are typically more common among aquatic species. Each species is listed with an earthling name along side its Onomatopoeia derived from Khllk, a commonly spoken vreem language.
Singing Suitors "Hornfoots"
Evolved from a worm like ancestor, their leaves are modified gills filled with the red photo-sensitive pigment used in their process of photosynthesis. They get their name in khllk due to the rattle like "seed pots" which when blown in the wind produces a sound similar to a "Vreem" chirp. They are colloquially called hornfoots by humans, as their root structures are made of heavily ossified tissue baring a resemblance to horns. Water is drawn from the soil through capillary action similar to trees on earth. Hornfoots are a relatively primitive group of floral type fauna as they retain a central cavity, mouth, and two simple compound eyes. They protect their fills by pulling them inwards into their central cavity.
Sticky Vines Predatory flora are common across their homeworld. Sticky Vines, typically hang from the stocks / branches of other flora and use their two sticky oral arms to snag flying pray. While their too small to be considered a threat to the vreem, their oral arms are difficult to spot in the red jungles they grow in, and as a result they often present a collision hazard below the canopy
Barnacle Snakes Are a related species to sticky vines, whoever they retain more of their ancestral form. They typically grow rooted to a larger structure, a rock face or another large flora species. They share a similar gill structure like hornfoots, but theirs are sticky. They're predominately air filter feeders, surviving mostly on spores and small bugs. Unlike hornfoots they have a complete gut.
Land Corals Red Cups, Anemone Grass and Blood Leafs are three flora species which are from colonial clade. They individual flora which are comprised of smaller specialized clones which function together as a single organisms. This tends to give them a more "plant-like" appearance, similar to other colonial animals like corals on earth.
Pneumopods This group of animals tend to occupy the "insect / bug" niches like those of arthropods of earth They're very small organisms no larger than a human fingernail. However their biology share more in common with echinoderms (starfish / sea urchins) than insects. They have an endoskeleton comprised of plates as a row of tube feet for locomotion. These two have photosynthetic spiney membranes. The species on the right are gliders and feeds on the hemolymph of other flora.
Just a chill lichenite lounging around. Decided to draw a full body lichenite to get an idea of what their suits look like. Underneath it all lichenites look like regular humans but have slits across their body which allows their suits to intravenously connect to their bodies.
The suit itself is grown rather than manufactured and tends to look like a nest of bandage wraps in its immature form. Young lichenites are placed within them soon after birth as they can't survive on their homeworld without it.
Another thing the Imsee do, full body bio-sculpting.
The Imsee throughout their history have experimented a lot with genetically modifying their own species. In fact, they have some of the best gene-modding technology around. . Full body genetic reconfiguration is broadly accepted among the Imsee and there are two morphs which are the most common among their population.
Yehenne, Shadow Wanders
The Yehenne is an imsee modified for a purely aquatic lifestyle. They are similar in appearance to earth's whales, particularly the sperm whale and are capable of diving to incredibly deep depths. Their echolocation is much stronger than other Imsee
Yihinee, Sky Children
Sky children are imsee which modified themselves for terrestrial living and flight capability. The Imsee clade evolved from an avian ancestry and once this was discovered their species was dedicated to unlocking the power of flight ever since. Yihinee morphs are common among the map makers of the Ways of Water.
Another sophont I've been working on. I've been trying to design these guys for a while. They've had a lot of iterations figured it was time to post them here.
Anyway, here are the Ah'Chikiri, reptile like aliens from a dying world.
The Ah'Chikiri home-world is a little bit like mars, it orbits a red giant and the majority of their worlds oceans evaporated a long time ago. Water still exists on the surface, but its isolated to lakes and aquifers. Rain is rare and generally unpredictable.
Their civilization is actually quite old, and predates the Imsee, by thousands of years. They used to be an FLT-capable civilization as well but at some point in their history their interstellar civilization collapsed and only the populations isolated on their home-world survived. Most of what remains of their civilization prior to contact with aliens in the modern era are a bunch of city states warring over the remains of their ancient technology, what they call "Earth-Eaters", Many millennia old autonomous machines created to terraform their dying world.
The Ah'chikri reproduction system is somewhat unique in that they have androdioecy, so their two most commonly occurring sexes are males and hermaphrodites. The hermaphrodite sex is generally larger than their counterparts.
Ah'Chikiri eggs are hatched in water and can under go two forms of metamorphosis either into a nymph and develop into a type of tadpole where they later grow into juvenile Ah'Chikiri or into a barnacle form and become filter feeders, during this state they can produce more Ah'Chikiri larva through budding. So a single egg can reproduce a ton of Ah'Chikiri.
Young Ah'Chikiri don't really need their parents to survive, and will generally form small nomadic troops among themselves. I'm still working on their social structures as it varies a lot more by culture than it does with other sophonts.
Just some drawings I've been working on. I've got some world-building stuff i need to get around to posting on here.
The Asari, if they weren't humanoid
an idea i had
Tried my hand at redesigning the Asari from Mass Effect if they were a little bit less humanoid. One of the things about the Asari is that they're considered relatively attractive by pretty much most other aliens in the setting, so i didn't want to deviate to much from something that was fairly humanoid-ish. So I kinda went with something that was a combination between a bird and a rat, and i interpreted their crest as a fringe of feathers sort of like what cockatoos have. Turians I think are going to be be raptor like so having some bird features in as for salarians, I think the overall slender build and large eyes would be what they'd find appealing.
Decided to try coloring this in, I'm still learning how to use markers. Ever since my old graphics tablet died, I've been really debating whether or not i should buy a new one or just stick with doing things traditionally. (I'm not a big fan of pen tablets for drawing ) On one hand, messing around with markers and color pencils is really therapeutic for me right now, but I always feel apprehensive about doing things traditionaly, I guess I'd call it FORO (fear of running out). Its dumb i know, they're kinda meant to be used but still.
Either way, i think it came out okay.
drew my caves of qud character and a few other critter things. Decided it was time to dust of my fine-liners and do some line art.
The Battle of Neptune IV by Oliver Cuthbertson
A tree thing and some robot drawings, not sure what direction i was going for the last robo but it was fun to draw
The Dram
A slight redesign of one of an older design, in color this time. These are the Dram, a mammal-like sophonts from an very earth like planet. On the left is a female and the right a male. They're the closets your going to get to a "humanoid" alien in the known galaxy.
Some bits on Biology
I call them mammal like but their not like placental mammals, they're really more akin to marsupials and monotremes in that young are hatched very underdeveloped and are nurtured in a pouch. While not depicted accurately here male dram are considerably larger than their female counterparts, and are around 2x times their size on average. They're feathers are display features which are used to express mood, and in mate selection. Oh and they're also venomous, they've got two fangs in their mandibles which in ancient times they'd use on their prey. They're aren't exactly immune to their own venom, but they are resistant to it.
The average global temperature on the dram home-world is considerably cooler than earth is while they are capable of regulating their own body temperature they do terribly in temps greater than 80 degrees fahrenheit, and often find room temp uncomfortable. When working in environments of other sophonts they tend to wear refrigerated chill suits.
Some bits on Culture
Dram family structures are similar to lions, so polygamy is the norm and their societies tend to be matriarchal. Their home-world is currently in its glacial maximum stage of their ice age so the northern hemisphere is largely covered in permanent ice sheets. Due to over industrialization by nations in the south their planet is unfortunately dealing with gradual global warming. The effects of which were much more intense and immediate due to their planets larger axial tilt than that of earth, so as you can imagine they're dealing with a lot of issues as a result. They were contacted by aliens , ~20 years ago and interacting with the wider galaxy has only added to their list of political and socio-economic problems.
In terms of tech, they're a little more advanced in some aspects and behind in others but they've got a comparable tech level to 21th century humans. (so us right now!) And they've already made crewed missions to other neighboring planets in their star system.
I really like the idea of the sort of role reversal, where instead of humans getting contacted by aliens its the other way around. Like I can imagine the dram equivalent of SETI discovering human ship or message and all the shenanigans that would cause. Would be a cool story i think.
Imsee Dancer
Imsee don't usually wear clothes most of the time, (its a hassle in the water) but when they do, its for the holidays. Dresses with long ribbons and bells are popular. Much like dolphins Imsee are adept at aquatic acrobatics and the bands and ribbons are designed to produce memorizing matters when twirled and spun.
Mix that in with some nifty anti-grav technology and you've got quite dazzling the display of dancers jumping from floating pools of waters.
Going to start designing some better clothes for my aliens.
Just a lot of sketching as of lately, its the holiday break and I'm soo not motivated to do anything substantial.
reworking an older alien design for the Dram, the old design looked to much like a griffon without wings, and i wanted them to look more alien but keep the original vibe.
And a portrait of a Lichenite, adding to my list of gene modded humans. Despite their appearance they aren't modified much, they're actually wearing an environmental suite made from a genetically engineered species of lichen that's grafted to the body (it not really removable). The horns are not a standard thing, their suits come from different cultivated species.
Redraw of an older character, learning a new art program and still getting used to it.
Imsee Cuisine!
Imsee are opportunistic obligate carnivores so most of their diet consists primarily of meat and animal fats.
Imsee lack taste, literally. During their evolutionary development they lost the ability to taste all flavors except for salty and as a result imsee cuisine generally tends to emphasize, appearance, smell, and texture. Much of their food is very aromatic or pungent and is not always appealing to other sophonts.
Imsee were kinda late to the whole using fire to cook things, mostly due to the difficulties of maintaining a fire pit close to their preferred living areas, i.e close to the water, and that their main appendages used to manipulate their environment sits on their face. Cooking gets a little dicey if you’ve got to put your face right up to an open flame. So cooking with a flame was not something that was done on a regular basis and was relegated to special occasions. Instead Imsee utilized either acid or parasite-cooking. Acid cooking works on a similar principle as ceviche, raw meat is soaked in a mild acid to clean it and to denature protein. Acids were typically derived from plants. In some instance food could be “cooked” in the harvested stomachs of other animals. Fire worms are small 6 limb vertebrates which spit acid as a form of self defense against predators and are a common source for acid in many imsee cultures.
Now for parasite cooking:
Imsee are usually filled with parasites which they get from the food they eat. This isn’t particularly a problem for them as a healthy Imsee can live a long and happy life as they have a pretty strong immune system and advanced medical technology. Parasites are pretty prevalent among aquatic life on their home world and some are prone to breaking down their host tissues when they begin to proliferate making meat that is easier to break down and digest. They also provide a lot of intriguing texture that the imsee palette tends to like. Early imsee farmers would purposely infect their animals specifically for that type of meat. Due to ethical concerns modern imsee no longer use live hosts for this but instead lab grown organ meat instead.
While fire stoves are pretty much non-existent in most Imsee households, they do utilize chemically heating pads. Sorta like a hot patch but gets hot enough to simmer water. Most heat pads can be reused multiple times but generally lose strength with subsequent use.
Haphazardly put together recap of my favorite artwork - 2024
Not as much art as i wanted to get done, but significantly more than I've ever done in, well years actually. I made this blog in 2018, and never really took art seriously until this year. I had actually considered quitting it all together a few years ago (general depression and lack of motivation), but found myself constantly wishing to write stories and making comics again but my skill was never in the place I wanted it to be.
Well this year, i got the guts to really get it together and try to improve and while its been difficult considering my lack of time nowadays (and my overall wish that i did it sooner) I'm happy that I started now rather than never.
There's still a lot I want to work on, skill and technique wise but I've discovered the mediums I like to work with, where i want my art to be skill wise, and what i need to do to get there. So for once, I have a sense of direction and even an action plan of sorts. And I've done the thing I initially set out to do, learn to draw robots (there's a long story in here but way too long for this post)
Anyway cheers to 2025, and hopefully nothing world shattering happens and another year of trying to Git Gud.
So long 2024, see y'all 2025, Happy Holidays and Merry Christmas!
Alright, I've sorta only talked about humans a little bit in my world-building project union-station (working name considering changing it) but earthlings are kinda rare in space, mostly because they don't travel or migrate much. Most humans you'll see wondering the known galaxy are their genetically modified descendants. (I've taken to calling them colonists). Chimeras, are one such group. They're from a tropical world called Amazon (named after the then long gone amazon rainforest). Life on amazon had a higher degree of biological compatibility than on other alien planets, and a unique domain of life which was capable of modifying their own genome by integrating the genes of other organism. So when the first human colonists came to amazon, they opted to splice their genetics with some of the fauna there.
Genetically chimeras are a bit more biologically unstable than other old era colonists in that they're prone to some rather interesting mutations with the most common being the duplication of organs and other body parts. This amazonian is sporting an extra set of arms, which is a fairly common mutation among the population.
a collection of fun doodles and studies, of some critters
The parasitic wormfolk of Gnth are amicable people, they wear masks to give themselves faces
Red Dragon, colored pencils
This is a scan, so its not nearly as vibrant as in person. I haven't done anything major in color pencil in years so it was fun to work on this. Also if you haven't noticed by now, I'm a really big dragon fan.
Decided to do a slight redesign of my greylings i posted a long while back i want to do a big post on all of the "genetically modified humans" (i.e my excuse for humanoid aliens, as while I prefer non-humanoid aliens i still like the classic humanoid ones too) in my setting, I've been looking at a lot of fashion as of lately and was enamored by the work of balmain fall 2022, This outfit is fairly conventional but i really want clothing styles in union station to really weird and out there.
Inspiration was pretty much from these outfits
I'm going to try and find away to shoehorn these dresses in there some where, especially the one on the right
Some more world-building notes, still experimenting with line-art, thinking of doing my line art traditionally in the future. Anyway some notes on early Imsee writing implements.
As a species with long lifespans, the imsee have incredibly detailed and extensive memory retention. So for a very long time, most of their knowledge was retained through oral tradition. However as settlements grew in size and social life more complex, they realized they needed a method of information storage. As an amphibious species, where water is a key aspect of everyday life, mediums like paper or ink simply weren’t an option for them. Instead Imsee's early writing utilized wax. Early wax tablets were derived from animal fat, which were then poured into a dish and hardened. Text is scrapped onto the surface using a needle. If the author wanted the text to be permanent a layer of resin was applied to its surface and placed into storage.
just another batch of sketches, i haven't worked traditionally in a while, so have a messy doodle