#Space Opera Project

[cheshire-castle-library]

Joining Snippet Sunday!

Everyone thank @tracle0 for the brilliant idea! (And reblog their post while you're at it!!)

But it was also that 72 hours that made ignoring things I didn't want to deal with sound like a normal idea, instead of questioning whether the station was about to cave in, or - more relevantly - if I had company.

I turned down the last corridor to the "surface access lift".  Caught something in the corner of my eye, glanced half-heartedly and shrugged.  More rattling, but really what didn't in Earth Central.  The "up" button was already lit on the lift panel, which was less the gravlift it should have been, and more so an elevator system some extremely driven agents managed to "procure" the night before a local hotel demolition, sometime in the 80's.  My head slowly started questioning, through the murk of exhaustion, as the elevator made its sharp, echoing 'ding'.  The sound set my sluggish nervous system on fire, hair on end, banishing any thoughts that tried to form as the florescent light poured out of the elevator into the dark hallway, illuminating me and the flood of dust and lint in the air as I stood somewhat dumbly before it.  The dawning anxiety you get when you realize you're dreaming washed over me as I squinted into the light.  Slow thoughts percolating poorly through exhausted synapses and pseudo-cells, as I tried to either decide I'd already passed out and was dreaming, or if what I'd seen was real.

The elevator door shut without anything leaving the car, my eyes still locked on where the 4-or-so foot tall figure stood behind the door.  Was it even a figure?  A street sign?  A diamond-shaped head on a stick-like body with a single eye seated off-center of the face that managed to blink at me once before the door shut between us.

Another moment passed with me squinting at the elevator door.  "Autex, proximity bio scan."  My voice echoed back to me metallically off the deck plating of the dark, empty hallway.

["Attention: Insufficient Host Intracellular Energy."]

"Shit."

The interface voice of the Autex slurred in my head as it read off a litany of diagnostics and repairs it was initiating on my body, as my consciousness fell out of my grasps, and my body fell to the ground.  Half-thought questions about the blinking street sign, the Autex, and my impending concussion floated lazily in the dimming murk between my eyes.

"Belvedere Thurston, you are Summoned by the Triumvirate of Founders," a voice like tar and leather echoed in the hallways, and the last thing I saw, squinting through fading vision, was a "Road Work Ahead" sign with a mustache and one, off-center, eye leaning over me.

[cheshire-castle-library]

"Mana"? Eh, what's one more particle in the quantum soup.

ok the last post was infodump friendly. this one is NOT.

i expect you to explain your/something about your magic system as badly as possible. i want to be confused. i want to lack context.

i'll start:

big wyrm gives off radiation that is also magic. ohhh no gas.

[moku1107]

[desolate-room]

alienkasa 👽 gnarp gnarp ⭐️‼️

+ playlist I listened to while drawing this!! ⬇️

[cheshire-castle-library]

It was a fandom daydream that got _extraordinarily_ out of hand. It's been over 5 years of living rent free and getting refined/rewritten to the point the source canon is long dead and gone, so its time for it to pay up!

What's the theme/allegory/underlying message in your piece that you are most excited for?

OKAY!

WRITEBLRS if you're seeing this, you're legally obligated to reblog with an answer, and then a new question for the next person!

Here's the start:

Which of your OCs is most likely to punch somebody in the face?

[pillotalkin]

I was so captivated by the "Opera! Space Opera!" designs that I just had to make a sticker sheet out of 'em!

 I’m going to be selling these stickers at Brooklyn Anime Fest this Saturday (July 27th). If you’re interested, more details can be found here (brooklynanimefest on Instagram), and I'll be posting my full catalog for the event very soon!

[gameboy-mystery-part2]

Edited myself onto a pjsk card!

[prskfancams]

Opera! Space Opera! 3dmv and virtual live performance side-by side comparison🛸👽🐙🛸🐙👽🛸🐙👽🛸

[cheshire-castle-library]

There's an axolotl themed race called the Rihas, and they're pretty vein and shortsighted. But their princess - one of the few of their race who don't go though metamorphoses (like how axolotles go from purely water based to muddy land based) is trying to take over the empire from her very evil dad to try and fix it. But she's got chronic baby face and has been the empire's mascot since she was born, and so her whole story arc is figuring out who she is apart from what she was born as and used for - and how that will inform her fixing her empire into a not quite as shitty social media dictatorship.

The big antagonist is actually the consequences of our actions and our irresponsibility and faults. It's not malicious, and that's earth shattering because a lot of horror has come of this thing they are fighting but no part of it was "on purpose", there's one person to blame, but he didn't want this to happen either and in his own shitty way tried to fix it and failed.

This is a "love is the answer" story, but its not just "prince rescues princess" falling in love, but the hard won love carved out of blood and tears that comes with deliberation and choice and agency. Its the love of family and found family, and the kinship that even enemies can have because hate is not the opposite of love, its just a different passion of care for another being and even that is beautiful and can bloom. This is an enemies to found family story.

The point at which my favorite two idiots figure out they would raze stars and consume the universe if it meant staying together, is the point at which their adopted kid calls them both dad - which is a situation that arose out of mutual idiocy and spite. One told the kid "call him dad" because the informality in it would drive the other up a wall. The other told the kid "call him father" because the excessive formality would annoy the hell out of the one. However it backfired horribly and they both realized they liked being dad/father and they had to rethink their "hate/stress sex" relationship to figure out what emotions were really driving all of that.

No one is coming out unscathed in this, which is life. But the important part is that they are coming out of it with a support system, people they can rely on and people they would kill god for. This is not a "and falling in love fixed my life" nor is it a "and I was able to cut out the parts that were toxic to me so I could live better" story. It's not always that easy. You can't cut out some things, and other things that you maybe should, you don't want to. You chose where you stood, and hell or high water you will remain. BUT you can get smarter, stronger about it. You don't have to do it alone. It's not always as easy as blocking someone from your DMs, sometimes its accepting it as it is, and choosing to patch up your wounds when not if they come. Sometimes that's what life gives us, but we can do more than get through it. We can thrive in adversity, like the finest wine grapes. The soil that fails to nurture us opens us opportunities if we take our own agency in our hands and hammer it into a shape we can love.

BONSU: there is a lot of disability, neurodivergence, and lgbt allegory in this that maybe wasn't intentional, but its here. It was supposed to be gay though, so don't get me wrong there's also like direct mlm as a primary feature

Let’s follow that first prompt up, and take this chance to share some fun facts about our story! You can either do a five point bullet-style list of fun facts about what’s going on in your wip, or just use this as an opportunity to ramble!

Looking more guidance? Make them come from the center of the story!

[daily-emunene-vitamins]

EmuNene Vitamin - Day 53

today's vitamin is from the wxs 1st single cover !! they're chibi... auhurhghh

[cheshire-castle-library]

Snippet Sunday

Layne sat in his dad's laps, arms wrapped around across his shoulders from behind.  Comfortable and safe, but it was a gesture of personal affection his Dad seldom showed.  The sort that only happened in private moments, behind closed doors.  Usually with his Father, and no one else around.

It wasn't that Halcyon Thurston was an unloving or distant parent.  Just that he came from a species, a culture, that discouraged contact.  Discouraged admitting emotions or expressing them in any way.  He was Phrontian at heart, even though science and happenstance had changed his physical body into something closer to Earth-Human than anything else; but the expectations and norms of childhood still carried sway.  Still dictated his actions.  And Layne's parents had made no bones about that.  Layne could remember numerous times when his Father had explained "Dad isn't comfortable with that," or "It's okay Layne, but we need to be aware that Dad comes from a culture where that's not something you do in public, so don't just hug him without permission."

Layne had learned early on that love didn't have to be tactile to still be felt.  Which was why he found himself filling with a certain world-shattering kind of fear only children know.  When the fundaments of all you know changes and the heroes and gods become mortal.  Because his Dad held him close, breathed shallowly, spoke softly about how their little family came to be.  Because his Dad was not curt or "efficient" or "accurate"; but gentle and patient and careful, elaborating far beyond the needful explanation.  Because Layne could feel the hot tears land, every so often, in his hair.  And all Layne could do was be there.  Place a hand on his dad's wrist where it rested on his collar bone.  All he could do was be his Father's son in his Dad's arms.

This is absolutely not in-line, but a sort of "short story" I'm writing honestly because its interesting and making me write in this universe. I'm also slowly learning that I write in a really round-about way, and that's why I fall off of projects??? So here's something that may one day be part of whatever form this project takes in its final state?

[toothedmaw]

Sketchbook dump

Remashing an old concept.

Like the basic creature design, but I ked to work on my colour schemes! So I'm going to try it again with markers and get a more varied scheme.

Playing around with this Space Opera is quite fun, allowing me to have quite varied species, fashion, and moods.

The initial quick concepts! Still need to concept two more of the guns! But generally, I like the variety and group dynamic. Pyotr is probably my favourite of the Guns, so far. He's such a geek, rat-man and I love that for him. He's really into Korme'kisian Space Pop, which is basically just alien Hatsune Miku.

[virtual-minotaur]

Oh! Also! I made a community! For space operas! :)

If you enjoy space operas in general... so do I! Join my community and let's talk about them!

[shootingstarbit]

NENEKASERS HOW ARE WE FARING...

[vintagedparamedic]

Finished this up the other day painted with acrylics and some ink .. let me know what you think ..

[meoproject]

I'm a bit lost as to what I want to do with the narrative of "Something Borrowed" (that's the "official" name of the fantasy story Beriith & Val are from I'm working on, the tag is "#project:a fantasy setting" because im bad at naming my projects)

Right now I'm kinda working on it as a series of (random order) vignettes (and pictures with lore dumps on), and it kinda works for me because I get to work on the scenes I wanna work on and not have to worry about 5 months of work I'd have to do to get to the scene I wanna work on.

But I would also like if there was like. A real linear narrative. And I think that would be easier for potential readers as well. Not that readers are my main priority (sorry this is my comfort project and very, very, very self-indulgent) but I like sharing my work and when I do, I generally want my stories to be at least somewhat accessible.

I'm not at the stage where I can seriously start any huge project just yet; I'm supposed to be graduating by the end of the year, so I have several large school related things, one of which is my thesis, coming up. So for the time being I will focus on making vignettes or other short and/or sketchy comics anyway.