retrograde

 On occasion I write poetry!

I'm fascinated by the fact that just because our Solar System looks a certain way right now, doesn't mean things were the same all throughout its history. It's also amazing how in the past few decades of space science, researchers have noticed peculiar little incongruities about our planetary neighborhood, and from them have begun to tease out pieces of an incredible story--tales of wild planetary migrations, moon systems built from the rubble of an earlier satellite catastrophe, and episodes of intense bolide bombardment. It makes our present-day Solar System seem completely tame in comparison. I'm excited to see what other stories we can uncover as we learn more about our little spot of space.

Neptune's moon Triton is a definite oddball in its system. It's the largest Neptunian moon by far, looks completely unlike the others, and has a really unusual retrograde orbit. From this and other bits of evidence, most scientists have reached the consensus that Triton is probably a Kuiper Belt object that was gravitationally captured by Neptune when that planet moved outward during aforementioned planetary migration episode. However, in order for this to work, Triton would have had to have originally been part of a binary system, and the capturing interaction would have to involve its companion being flung away to who-knows-where. 

It's a rather poignant story when you think about it--somewhere out there is a missing twin, wandering the void alone after an unfortunate encounter with a big blue bully. Is there any way to figure out if a given object is Triton's missing companion? Makes you wonder if we'll ever happen upon it someday.

If we do, we should tell Triton.

 I wasn't feeling all that great today and decided to phone it in as far as art stuff.

I'm not really good at phoning it in.

This maybe isn't something you want constantly in your ear while trying to navigate a puzzle full of live currents and killer robots. But she persisted nevertheless.

 The last of the traditional media pieces (that I feel are worth sharing, anyway). I sort of randomly made up this character design for the Star Wars universe, but never did anything with her.

All this old art has given me a hankering for doing stuff with marker again. I'd love to get some Copics and go camp out at my local museum and just doodle colorful dinos all day. Sounds like a dream.

 Random creature design; the idea was that these blind beings float on the wind and absorb airborne nutrients through the gill-tendrils on the underside of their heads. I like its little rodent paws. Purple and red brush pen with colored pencil.

 She's at it again! Link's sassy little companion has been pretty busy with school (and playing through Echoes of Wisdom), but we finally managed to get some play time in. We might go challenge Ganon soon... but rest assured she'll be back to join Link on his Tears of the Kingdom adventures at some point.

This actually happened. It was great.

 More watercolor! I really love working with watercolor, but it does require a certain amount of work space that I just don't have right now. Maybe someday I'll get a dedicated art desk and then I can do more with traditional media. For now, though, I'm really uneasy with the idea of trying to fit open water on the same desk as all my electronics.

This character design was inspired by the cat-people in Escaflowne, a fantasy anime that I remember aired for a brief period on Fox Kids once upon a time (this really dates me). Later I learned that it was really a heavily-edited version of the series Vision of Escaflowne, which was decidedly not a kids' show. Lesson to dubbing company producers: if you're bringing an anime over to the English market with the intention to present it to kids, it would help if the title in question was aimed at children to begin with.

I also based this design after one of my previous cats, a lovely tortoiseshell. She was a sweet girl.

(Looking at this piece now, it's nice and all, but I seem to have had no concept of the idea of line weight. Those thin lines are really getting lost beneath the bold watercolor. I'd love to do something with brush pen and watercolor one of these days.)

 Sometimes I dabble in watercolor!

This was a design I concocted in college for a tabletop roleplaying campaign where my character was an eccentric mechanist in a world with Renaissance-level technology--kind of like Leonardo da Vinci, but female and questionably sane. It's always a great day when your character's skillset allows them to build their own combat vehicles with a few good dice rolls. (She ultimately ended up building her own airship, so that was fun.)

As an aside, I like the idea of tabletop roleplaying, but I haven't participated in any of it for a while because I had some bad experiences with groups who were unpleasant and unfriendly. I think if I were to do any more roleplaying, it would have to be with family and/or close, trusted friends.*

*I actually wrote a Neopets fanfic about this issue that I never bothered submitting to the Neopian Times. I'll get around to posting it on this blog eventually and ranting more about the importance of being a decent human being during highly social games that have to do a great deal with both group synergy and treating every player with respect and kindness.