Smerfarvin

Smerfarvin 4

Black ink and colour pencil on photocopy paper.

(post Newanda period)

This is another image from my "tracing" phase (see Miras Exterior 1 in Miras for explanation). The traced element is the impala (antelope) on the left.

Smerfarvin was a peaceful world, though they had stories and legends of ancient wars. At the time they made contact with other worlds they were a set of newly industrialising societies. They had sizeable metal works with smelters. Used wind and water power, and had recently invented the steam engine, but had no other internal combustion engines. They had recently discovered electricity and primitive radio. But had no electronics as yet. They were an artistic society that valued creativity. Though they had metal, they rarely used it in building. Preferring instead to build in wood. They had a technique whereby the wood of a finished construction would be treated with a mineral solution that more or less gave the wood a petrified quality, making it very durable and impervious to rot and termites. This meant that any wooden structure they built would last indefinitely, like stone. So that over the centuries these structures had accumulated. This combined with the fact that they carefully controlled their population by means of herbal contraceptives and abortifacients (a substance inducing miscarriage) meant that they had an excess of housing for their population. A child growing up and leaving his parents' home and perhaps raise a family of his or her own, would typically go out and just choose a pre-existing structure they liked that happened to be empty. Their wooden furniture was similarly treated and durable. So one could hunt for and collect furniture from other empty homes.

About a third of the southern hemisphere of Smerfarvin, around the south pole, was desert, and radioactive near the pole. In a large crater at the south pole was an ancient iron city inhabited by amphibious, somewhat humanoid creatures. The crater contained a number of seas and lakes. The Smerfarvins themselves knew about the great southern desert, but not the crater, city or its inhabitants at the south pole, because they had never managed to penetrate that far into the desert. The creatures that inhabited the crater, had never left it. So it appeared that Smerfarvin had once had an advanced civilization which suffered a cataclysmic collapse. The preoccupation of their legends was conservation and caution.

Smerfarvin 4a

Pencil on photocopy paper.

The original pencil of Smerfarvin 4. There is a section at the middle-left of the image that is based on a Barney design.

At the White Bar on Smerfarvin

Pencil on illustration board.

Zulu at the White Bar on Smerfarvin.

Smerfarvin 5

Black ink and colour pencil on photocopy paper.

Smerfarvin 6

Black ink and some pencil on photocopy paper.

A partially inked version of Smerfarvin 6a.

Smerfarvin 6a

Pencil on photocopy paper.

An earlier but more complete draft of Smerfarvin 6.

Smerfarvin 7

Colour pencil and some black ink on illustration board.

Smerfarvin 7a

Colour pencil on illustration board.

Detail of Smerfarvin 7.

Smerfarvin 8

Pencil on photocopy paper.

Smerfarvin 9

Pencil on photocopy paper.

Smerfarvin 10

Pencil on photocopy paper.

Smerfarvin 11

Pencil on photocopy paper.

Smerfarvin 12

Pencil on photocopy paper.

I have an abiding problem in my portrayal of human figures in that I tend to give them the proportion of children, so that they end up as stout, stocky figures. It isn't intentional it's just the way they come out. It is something I am seeking to overcome, and do on occasion. It might be compared to the way the figures in Japanese Anime change from realistic figures to simple child-like figures when expressing childish sentiments (usually with much arm waving). This has caused me a lot of trouble drawing the waist area, because there is simply no room for it. On a related note, I also have a tendency to draw men smaller than women in the same drawing, but the cause of this is my inclination to use up more of the surface area of the page on the drawing of the woman/women, and have to squeeze the man/men into what surface area is left over.

In the Lotus Pond

Pencil on photocopy paper.

Smerfarvin 13

Photocopy of a pencil drawing,

coloured in with colour pencil, and a little gouache.

A moody Smerfarvin picture.

Field

Gouache on paper.

Lizard

Colour pencil on illustration board.

Home

Black ink and colour pencil on paper or cardboard.

Smerfarvin 14

Pencil on photocopy paper.

A spaceship taking off from Smerfarvin. Smerfarvin came into open contact with alien races around the same time as Owel. At which time people from other worlds came to Smerfarvin, and the Smerfarvins travelled to other worlds.

Landing

Pencil on photocopy paper.

The worlds in the Milky Way inhabited by intelligent life were classed as either "contacted" or "uncontacted". The contacted worlds were part of a galactic civilisation, while the uncontacted worlds appeared to dwell in a universe uninhabited except for themselves. "Contact" was usually a rigorously controlled and structured process with a lengthy period of preparation. But the space war was sometimes forcing contact on worlds that would ordinarily be considered unready, such as Owel and Smerfarvin. At which point they discovered not only that there were countless others, highly advanced races, inhabiting the galaxy, but that they dwelt near the borders of a terrible war that had been waging for long ages.

Another chunky character

Pencil on photocopy paper.

Pegasus 2

Pencil on photocopy paper.

Another early design for the Pegasus (see Pegasus 1 in High School and early Art School). In high school I constructed this as a model from parts of two aircraft. The back end and cockpit of a Rockwell B-1 Lancer, and the wings of a B-52 Stratofortress (at a different scale).

As things have evolved, one idea for this spaceship is that it is used by the diplomat sent to Smerfarvin to negotiate the presence of a military base on the planet.

Pegasus 2a

Pencil on photocopy paper.

Interior of the Pegasus 2.

Figure 1

Black felt-tip pen and colour pencil on paper

(pre Morgan period).

Because of my habit of drawing stocky human figures (see Smerfarvin 12 above for discussion) I would occasionally draw figures with the express purpose of making them not stocky.

Figure 2

Black felt-tip pen on paper

(probably between Morgan and Newanda periods).

Figure 3

Black felt-tip pen and colour pencil on paper
(probably between Morgan and Newanda periods).

Sanbo

Acrylic (and maybe some gouache) on illustration board.

This is not a picture of Smerfarvin, but Sanbo is another world that Owel became aware of at around the same time as it became aware of the existence of Smerfarvin.

Sanbo Office

Pencil on photocopy paper.

Bath 2

Gouache on illustration board.

This image was difficult to make out even before the water damage. It depicts a woman in a bath onboard a large aircraft. Through a large window is visible large architecture it is flying by. The surface of the architecture looks like wicker work. Flowers frame the window.

Tall grass
Pencil on photocopy paper.

Dust

Black ink and colour pencil on photocopy paper.

The two of them lived more or less contentedly in an abandoned mining facility on an otherwise uninhabited moon.

Dust 2

Pencil on paper.

Barney did some work on the figures.

New Stuff Prep.

Pegasus 2b

Pencil on photocopy paper.

Pegasus 2c
Pencil on photocopy paper.

I revisited the Pegasus 2 design in the new stuff period, and considered modelling it in 3D. A variation on the Pegasus 2 idea is that a young local of Smerfarvin finds it buried in a ravine, apparently left there by an unknown alien centuries before. Soil erosion by a small creek had uncovered the abandoned but still intact craft. The craft's AI, embodied in a humanoid hologram, was also intact and sprang to life as the young Smerfarvin investigated.



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