@milkyfederation and I did an art trade, and I got to draw his amazing characters! The Space Freelancers are a bunch of dorks, and I had a lot of fun drawing them! They all have so much personality, and the way Bernat writes and draws them makes them feel insanely human… even when they’re not human at all!

Go give him a follow, he posts a lot of amazing stuff for his setting The Milky Federation, and cool stuff outside of that too!

So we did a small art trade with @wolfsbaneandthistle , one of my favourite mutuals, a wonderful person, and an amazing artist and worldbuilder.

On my side, I drew Clatter because it's the first character I saw from the Little Bird universe, and I love the Zoronxie's species design. THAT MOUTH IS ACTUALLY JUST A NOSE HOLE! BRILLIANT!

I also did a quick interpretation of Cereza and Hán Hui Qún, two human crewmembers. I would have loved to draw every member of tLB, there's a ton if cool alien designs, but I don't have the time or energy.

Anyway follow Aconite, they're the best!

New concept thingy for a currently unnamed sophont. I have somewhat stupidly established a rule in the collective world in which all of these beings exist that all sapient species must have a five letter name, making titles a bit hard to come up with. I’ll come up with something eventually though.

I’ve had this idea for a while, but this is my first time trying to put it to paper. The basic concept is that they are mobile structures made of a wood pulp/paper mache-like material, analogous to termite mounds or wasp nests. The eusocial colony that built and lives inside the structure has highly specialized castes for each of the structure’s necessary bodily functions, filling the roles of muscles, nerves, and connective fiber. Though none of these creatures are sapient on their own, they come together to form an intelligent collective conscience.

Because the shape and structure of the hard outer parts is not determined by the resident creatures’ DNA, colonies can take on a near infinite variety of sizes and body plans. They may also incorporate materials besides just the aforementioned wood pulp, such as glass or metal, if they come across it.

I am currently undecided on whether I want to have the general theming for these things to be more organic, as shown in the bottom left of the first image, or more robotic, as shown in the upper right. It could be the case that different cultures around the world land on different spots on the organic/robotic scale. It’s hard to say this early on.

The social structure of these beings is a bit more solitary than humans, with some colonies, especially larger ones. behaving and being viewed as more as nations than people. They are highly protective of the land they claim and the resources held within, and will fight off any unwanted invaders that may enter, often with weapons built into their bodies. If another colony is found to be trustworthy, they may form an alliance, with larger alliances comprising possibly thousands of individual colonies. Battles between these larger alliances can be broad spanning and massively destructive.

Their reproductive process involves two colonies first gathering the materials required to build the outer shell, mostly just plant matter. After that, one adds a queen to the materials and another adds a few drones. These initial organisms will construct a starting body for the colony-to-be. The structure of this new colony is not set for life, and may be expanded and renovated in accordance with current tactical needs or fashion trends.

That is all I can currently think to say about these things. Like all of my other assorted worldbuilding messes, I will add onto this post later if there is anything interesting I can think to expand on.

Initial idea for a sophont alien just to get out of my head and draw something. Too similar to an orca (obviously my starting point), and I don't know if it makes that much sense but I think it's cute, I like it.

Here's the part where I try and make sense of it after the fac- I mean everything's very well thought out from the start.

From a cold and humid environment. They evolved from a big alien that relied on it's big size and group tactics (supported by its generalist omnivorous diet) to scavange kills and dominate territories.

Their intelligence began developing, they started experimenting with inventive ways to modify their environment and make life easier (like farming). At which point they started to become more social and live in bigger groups.

Space civilizations made contact with them before they developed complex technologies. Maybe after a few thousand years they'd have, but the prejudice that stayed is that they're lazy, dumb and unambitious, and their relatively slow metabolism doesn't help them discredit it.

They sense mostly via their hearing (same hole as the breathing one), and have poor eyesight. Green-ish skin to give them more of a reptile / dino vibe.

Their clothes would cover their ass-tail and genitalia. I didn't have it in me to design them.

Maybe they are members of the Milky Federarion, maybe they are a part of another intergalactic union I don't know.

Background Hole Station workers, it was fun to design a uniform and apply it to different species (tho I cheated a little bit picking the most humanoid ones).

This uniform is universal in every public Hole Station in the human sector. Being a point of connection a lot of aliens live and work there. These guys are from a small Hole Station.

Under the Milky Federation, every sophont species is considered "people", and is referred to as [planet of origin/evolution]-ian people. Let's see who we've got here.

-Mussosian teen who just started working. Her species don't use gendered pronouns but being socialized with humans she uses she/her.

-Uronian manager with a lot of responsibility who hates being patronized by humans who think he's cute.

-Middle aged Earthian receptionist with a sunny disposition.

-Young [Unnamed planet] receptionist without a sunny disposition.

-Logic R&Droid who's in charge of schedules, but not of his own image.

-Kuatonian security with an energy detector, Earthians have a hard time relaxing with them being in charge of the body search.

-Older Liloquian director of the Station. Humanity is very new to Holes, a liloquian technitian was put in charge years ago.

Random characters I haven't put that much thought into, I don't have a story. They're either background characters or disfunctional and quirky coworkers in a story where they have to respond to a Hole Station emergency (like what if the station was held hostage and these idiots were the only ones who could do something before reinforcements came).

Man alien biospheres is so cool. What a special series. I've enjoyed it greatly and have learned a lot.

Finally finished this sheet about the Zaabuas pregnancy process. The Zaabua do have their sexual differences but only the male and female can get pregnant and give birth, while the vonithral who are a whole complete new sex to the female and male cannot. The vonithrals are the only ones of the 3 sexes to have the capability to produce fatty nutrient rich milk for the new borns and adults Zaabuas. These have not been illustrated yet but I do plan to show off the male, female, and vonithrals, sexual dimorphism and their unique individual characteristics in the near future. If either the male or female carry children they automatically earn the title of “mother”

But enough of the sexes and more about what we are here for. Pregnant Zaabuas commonly only get 2 to 3 offspring at a time but in some rarer cases 4 to 5 can form inside the pregnant individual, though this is a highly risky process and most of the time both the mother and the developing offspring are at greater risk of death. As more weight being brought onto the mothers back might succumb them. Though males are at greater risk of this happening as their smaller much less muscular bodies might become too much to carry, while females have a better chance of carrying more than 3 offspring, as they are much larger and have higher amounts of body fat and muscle.

Once the fetus has gone through its 4 month gestation period it sprouts out of from the mothers back with distinct two orb like sacs that are called cells. These cells are responsible for holding genetic material, sodium hydroxide, and warm water, this combination creating a heat pack for both the mother and offspring. The orange outer cell responsible for holding the water, genetic material, and other general waste from the fetus, while the inner cell that the fetus is wrapped around is responsible for holding in large amounts of sodium hydroxide. These two cells are held together by a thin but very elastic layer of see-through skin, this keeps the two cells from touching each others chemicals. Though sometimes this is not enough from bursting inside the mother.

Due to lack of nutrients or a genetic mutation. Nearing the 4 month mark, either the inner or outer cell bursts inside the mother triggering the exothermic reaction and implode both the fetus and mother from the inside. Though this happens rarely among the individuals. Another thing that could happen that isn’t life threatening to the mother but the fetus, is that the outer cell responsible for holding the warm water and carrying the fetus and inner cell in place could burst before birth, leaving the mother to excrete it out of the body mistaking it as the fetuses waste leaving the fetus without the outer cell. This wouldn’t be too much of a big issue as the fetus can still use the mother’s body warmth and have a slight chance of survival if it was later in development. But due to the below -60 dagree weather on Borease if the fetus was still alive by the time it was birthed it wouldn’t have much of a chance drying out before shortly freezing to death.

On the plane back home I drew some old designs that I've abandoned for far too long, the Space Freelancer's main rivals, a small group of bounty hunters I've nicknamed The Girls.

The plane was very bumpy, and these designs are not final, but I'm happy I revisited them.

Meryam is very intense demolitions and weapons expert. Cim Di is the muscle, very well read, strong and silent type. I haven't decided the name of the third member, but she's an expert hacker who loves drama.

The SF and them were once one group. One of them is Néstor's ex, I think it's obvious which one. I'll try to explore them more at some point because I love them as foils for the story.

Original design from 02/2021. I was never satisfied with the colours and the inconsistent artstyle.

On vacation, trying to relearn how to draw without a computer so I can practice anyway. Starting with something easy, some designs I know by heart.

Just saw a "there is no planet B" shirt and started laughing to myself at the thought of there being a planet called "planet B".

I love my brain, I'm so happy with so little.

Exploration of an old species design I did on the train, I've decided to call them mussosians. As always I like to take a general species and try to design a character by exploring its possibilities and limitations of characterisation.

This teen mussosian is a background Hole Station worker who grew up in the human sector. She styles her eyebrow as if they were bangs, keeps a long ponytail and has several piercings. She uses she/her pronouns, even though her species traditionally don't use them.

On vacation, trying to relearn how to draw without a computer so I can practice anyway. Starting with something easy, some designs I know by heart.

Xa ontogeny

The Xa and how they grow. The brown-feathered kiddos past age of 1,5 are already able to fly somewhat. Xa don't show any sexual dimorphism, so there's only one Xa image for each life stage. Here's more about this sophont: https://www.tumblr.com/total-convergence/726112557515128832/tcxa

On vacation, trying to relearn how to draw without a computer so I can practice anyway. Starting with something easy, some designs I know by heart.

“Salvage” created for Critical Chips 2, published/edited by Zainab Akhtar~

- Uuuh yeah... Give me one ticket for the new Lion King Remake Musi- ABSOLUTELY NOT! You know it'll be my turn before the movie's over. - Coome on! My treat. - No way, you know I hate musicals, watch it when it's your turn again. - Hey guys keep it down, we're in public, you're embarrassing us.

The Martian city state of Neocropolis is dead set on fighting, well, death. One of the solutions they have come up with is transferring your consciousness into a mechanical body.

That is, of course, expensive, so some people decide to share the cost, putting more than one consciousness in a single body. That makes Neocropolis the city with the highest number of people per capita in the human sector.

Ever since its creation, the Martian city-state specializes in scientific research to avoid death. Its founder is still alive (as just a head in a jar) after a couple of centuries.

Neocropolitans are modified to have purple skin with stripes, and a lengthy life (although that tends to be cut short for the everyman due to economic disparity).

Despite being a small one, it is one of the most powerful Martian cities thanks to its alliances. No rich or powerful person dares antagonize their source of "eternal life", which gives the city carte blanche to do all sorts of experiments.

The Raging Machines' guitarist, K, was a neocropolitan who's consciousness was put on a machine post mortem without her consent so that she'd keep working.

Neocropolis' name is a play on words with neo (new) and necropolis (cemetary), the city that gives a new definition to death. Etymologically there's nothing else funny here, carry on.

I've shared this one once before, and there's some things I'd change now, but I still like it a lot. Domesticated pets of the future! (03/2022)

In this drawing you can see:

Mazonian Turtle: very chill, but not very smart, can roll up into a ball.

Liloquian Kazoo: energetic and curious, they sing all the time.

(Unnamed planet) Slug-Hamster: very inactive, mostly looks cute.

Earthian Cat: it's a cat, but edited with new technology to change its colour.

(Unnamed planet) Dog-Owl: smart and weird, can fly.

(Unnamed planet) Bat-Cat: reserved, like a significantly less hairy cat that can fly.

Quadriyan Dog: loyal and playful, tho it has weird bug-like mandibles.

(Unnamed planet) Ferret-Snake: sociable, furry, long and limbless.

Liloquian Dog-Deer: smart and very trainable herbivore, a liloquian's best friend.

Furbo: artificially bioengineered by aliens to be the perfect pet, not very popular with humans, who seem to share a primal fear of the colourful, chatty creature.

Creature names in the MF universe mostly follow the naming convention of [Planet of origin]+[animal with similar ecological niche/that looks similar].

The drawing is two years old and I see some mistakes and things I could've done better (the Owl-Dog is pretty basic), but I still like it a lot. I have to draw more aliens.

Which one's your favourite?? Which one would you adopt??

Hey everybody, go check out @simon-roy 's new book Refugium on Kickstarter! If Simon's reputation on its own somehow isn't enough to convince you to back it, there's a whole mini specbio guidebook with entries from me and like a ton of your other favorite artists probably.

Here are my little aliens without the text and weathered effects

- Ooooh that one is so cute!

– Mmmmmh how much is it?

+ That one'll be 24,99 moneys.

– ... Aww man! I'm 6 moneys short.

+ Sorry ma'am, no moneys no earthian horse.

– Wait can't we bargaiTHAT'S A HORSE?

The official currency of the Milky Federation is called "the Money".

One Money equals more or less one Euro (because I'm lazy). Less than one Money is called a fraction of a Money. So "0,50" is half a Money, "0,10" is a tenth of a Money, "0,39" is a thirty-nineth of a Money, and so on.

It is a mainly digital currency, and is very controlled by the Federation. Since it intervenes in the economy, the Money's value tends to be very stable, or even increase.

Although it is not imposed, it tends to prevail over other currencies thanks to its stability and hegemony. So much so that other allied but not federated members have adopted it.

Naming it Money makes it more adaptable to everyone and is a strategy to essentialy own the word and concept. (It's definetly not because I think it's the funniest name possible).