Absolutely HAD to draw something inspired by the eclipse today! :D I wasn’t in a location with totality but I was still lucky enough to see it from my building. It was cloudy at first so I wasn’t sure, but then it cleared right up for the maximum! What a treat :’D

I've had a few ref sheets in the works lately, and I got another one done today. :D Even after I decided to add her to Columba's pirate crew, I'd been stumped for a LONG while on what direction to actually take with the design in general and FINALLY I have one that I really like, especially after giving her a more harpy-ish treatment to add more variety to the many bird constellations. Pretty proud of the symbol integration on this one too, some are easier than others! She's the first I've fully completed of this group so things are bound to get tweaked later on, but this is a good start.

The name Apus means "without feet", as apparently these birds were once thought to not have any, and I thought that would fit perfectly into a double peg-leg to match the pirate theme. A bird-of-paradise could be any number of species under that name though, so I've incorporated attributes from several here, particularly the sicklebills and the various species that have those distinct tail feathers, of both the long and curly varieties. Colour wise, she predominantly resembles the ribbon-tailed astrapia.

Columba's crew isn't exactly evil per se, but they have lost their way a bit after losing their former captain and their ship. Apus loves combat, not for the sake of the outcome, but for the act of combat itself. If you were to lose your weapon during a fight with her, she'd gladly give you one of hers just to continue it! She'll also use her long talons to fight with, but only if she has no other weapons left. Hope you like her. :) ------- The constellation symbol for Apus was originally designed by Denis Moskowitz and released to the public domain.

Rough WIP from March 17th, 2024

whoops guess you're getting a rough design for Apus tonight too lol

The name Apus means "without feet", as apparently these birds were once thought to not have any, and I thought that would fit perfectly into a double peg-leg to match the pirate theme she's got. A bird-of-paradise could be any number of species under that name though, so I've incorporated attributes from several here, particularly the sicklebills and the various species that have those distinct tail feathers, of both the long and curly varieties. I may give her an actual sickle as a secondary weapon too, we'll see!

Even after I decided to add her to Columba's crew, I'd been stumped for a LONG while on what direction to take with the design in general and FINALLY I have one that I really like, especially after giving her the more harpy-ish treatment like Grus's current sketch. Pretty proud of the symbol integration on this one so far too, some are easier than others!

Symbol Design for Apus by Denis Moskowitz

Rough WIP from March 17th, 2024

I've been toying for a while with how to make some of the designs for the many bird constellations more distinct in Starglass Zodiac, and I think going the harpy route for some of them may work, so I tried it with Grus here

idk what his body and clothing are doing and there's a lot going on on his head right now but I'll figure it out. I'm coming back from a 3-day depressive episode so I gotta start somewhere, you know?

I like where this is going at least, I'm not sure if I'll actually finish this particular drawing or just use it as a springboard for his design sheet but we'll see. I'll officially decide what crane he's based on later, but for now I'm leaning towards the red-crowned crane.

Symbol Design for Grus by Denis Moskowitz

Finally, some more art! This time it’s a complete redesign for Aranea; a new concept, personality, story role, colour scheme, the works! She was originally a minor character, and while that’s still somewhat true here, I’ve specifically tied her role to the main plot via her new concept, and the reason she’s nicknamed “The Star Weaver”. Using her magic needle, she’s able to “weave” remnants of dead constellations and create glass portraits of them, which are then placed in the astral mausoleum to preserve their memory. Conceptually speaking, I wanted to combine the idea of lines connecting stars in a constellation, the connecting lines in a spider’s web, and the lines between pieces of stained glass to create Aranea’s core idea here.

The constellation for Aranea is based on the yellow sac spider, labelled as the “long-legged spider” by its original mapper, though I’ve incorporated a bit of orb weavers to match the theming too. I did leave a few hints at her previous peacock spider inspiration, primarily in her glasses and head stripes. Her glasses are meant to be like large, dark voids that conceal her expression, you never quite know what she’s thinking. This matches with her overall aloof and quiet personality, usually only speaking when absolutely necessary.

The first two months of the year are always odd ones for me, usually a lot of aimless sketching and WIPs until something gets finished (outside of commission work, of course), but I really like how this came out! It took the usual amount of workshopping and I’ve had it as a WIP for a while, but luckily it didn’t fight me as much as I thought it might.

Oops I drew Cassie again, it’s her birthday today so ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ It’s been a while since I drew Flicker though, they’re always fun to draw. Enjoy!

This one was a long time coming, updates to The Chamaeleon Three! It was a difficult and delicate balance to strike with editing each of these, making sure their concepts and symbol integration were strengthened while streamlining a few things as well.

Lepus’s palette and design accents are very similar to Centaurus’s right now, as I plan to overhaul Rus’s colour palette with his own tweaks later. Between the two I think it fits Lepus a bit more.

I was already happy with Lynx’s prior pose so most of that was copied over here, and overall his tweaks are slightly more subtle compared to the others.

It was just a matter of cutting back on a few things to balance the level of detail and colour placement, which was easier said than done! Chamaeleon especially, I didn’t want her to lose her neon flare when trying to simplify parts of her design, so I had to take a long break after looping back on myself too many times. I’m not sure why it didn’t occur to me earlier to combine the concept of the mottled skin of a chameleon with spray paint splatter for her, but better late than never I guess! I wanted it to be more obvious that she’s a tagger without having to rely on her holding her spray gun or paint cans all the time.

I’m not sure who got the biggest glowup between them, but I’m super happy with all three, especially the improvements in the posing and overall anatomy/structure. This was quite a few months in the making, but it’s nice to see it complete now :)

Yay, more design tweaks! Though the primary focus was on giving Ophiuchus an updated lineup pose this time around, like I'm doing for Cassie and the rest of the zodiac. His previous one was a more standard character reference standing pose and I had his expression be more serious/angry, and while that is definitely still an aspect of his personality, I felt this one conveyed more of an accurate summation of his overall character story wise, and thus should be more optimal for the lineup.

Despite having the idea for a while, I realized that I don’t think I ever actually showed how his staff functioned in relation to his snake companions, so I put that here with his updated staff design. There’s more blank space on this than I normally like with my sheet layouts but I already made some of the other reference on his previous sheet so ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

If nothing else, I wanted to nail a very specific expression here, one that’s reeeeeally close to being friendly and kind but something feels off about it to the point of being unsettling. It took a bit of finessing and testing between the line art and colour phases, but I think I got there in the end.

Though I didn’t intend for his raised hand to parallel the one in Scorpio’s pose, the fact they are linked in that way is rather appropriate, ironically! In this case it’s meant to look like he’s beckoning you or is holding out his hand to aid you. Do you trust him?

Kind of a different upload for today, but it’s something I’ve been chipping away at for a while now so I thought I’d share! Updated magic colours and types for Starglass Zodiac (though I can’t recall if I actually uploaded any of the prior iterations lol oops)

How these will be rendered will likely change a bit as I’m still deciding how I want the FX in this series to look in general (for like the 80th time lmao), so this is purely for the colour design of each of them for now. As usual, I had to make a few changes from previous versions to match new or altered lore I’ve developed, but this SHOULD be all of the magic types at play here, with the exception of a few “offshoot” elements (Aquarius’s lightning, Pisces’s ice, etc.) which will be drawn differently but share the same colours as their base element here.

The colour of the magic is very important to the narrative, so pay attention to the similarities and shared colours for the actual comic later on ;) The fact that there is a lot of overlap between them is key! I had to carefully name some of these to avoid some of the bigger spoilers, and thus I have to resist the incredible urge to spill the entire plot right here xD Still, I hope you enjoy! Feel free to ask questions about these lore wise, I’ll do my best to answer them without revealing too much. I’ll probably tag posts like these for spoilers when the comic launches just in case, but I’ll worry about that later.

WIPs from September 21st, 2023 Alright so I almost never show stuff at this stage because I'm usually too embarrassed to post something this messy, but shaking that off is precisely what this blog is for so here you go! If you've ever wanted to know what I consider a "thumbnail" for my own work then this is it lol

Especially for covers and comic page planning, I usually end up at the greyscale shading stage within the thumbnail stage before I actually commit to a composition, as I can't properly gauge if it's going in the right direction otherwise. That said though, I really like how these are turning out so far! I tend to get decision paralysis with cover ideas, goodness knows that I continue to struggle with the main cover for this series, so having these go relatively smoothly tells me I'm getting better at it (hopefully!)

I have a lot of interconnected stories within Starglass Zodiac that I want to make dedicated side comics for, so any time I have an idea for a title and/or cover for one, I'll "jot it down" like this so I don't lose it. I've had the file for The Paladin's Shadow for a while, but Curse of the Hunted is a new addition from today (well, the story idea itself isn't new but the title/cover idea is)

The Paladin's Shadow is Aries's backstory, focusing on his struggle to live up to the reputation of the prior incarnations of his constellation, cementing them as a lineage of powerful and upstanding paladins. Aries has to wrestle with both his small stature and standoffish temperament by comparison, meaning he is constantly in the shadow of his own lineage and has to somehow forge his own path despite that. Curse of the Hunted is Orion's backstory as a once infamous name on the Astral Plane prior to his adoption as Taurus's zodiac companion. True to his namesake, he was once a skilled yet relentless hunter, and had his dogs (Canis Major and Minor) at his side. Though Orion could tame them to obey his own command, he is warned by Rangifer (the reindeer), that should his dogs ever turn on him, it will turn them to stone. Orion initially dismisses this by claiming they have complete loyalty to him, and as punishment for his hubris, Orion is cursed by Rangifer and given his half-deer appearance that is seen in the main story. This makes him the "prey" for once, and thus both Canis Major and Minor chase after him, turning them both to stone as promised. The guilt from their loss and the fear caused by being the hunted rather than the hunter does much to humble Orion, and he begins his journey to redemption afterwards. I don't have finished designs for most of the characters featured here but I like where their placeholders are for now. Oh and if you're wondering about the font, it's one I'm developing for this project specifically! :D It's called SGZ Display, and is based on the lettering I did for the main logo. I'm testing it out here to see if it reads well at smaller sizes, but it still needs work all around. It'll be a long while before these or the stories they're connected to are finished, but I hope you enjoy this little sneak peek anyway :]

I needed a break from character sheets and wresting with new colour schemes, so I return to my glowy comfort zone. Admittedly this looks like nearly all of the illustrations I’ve done with Cassie already but eh ¯_(ツ)_/¯ -throws this onto the pile anyway-

Art Fight '23: A small sample of attacks

From left to right, top to bottom: Dorado and Xiphias (owned by @akysi), Floyd Leeds (owned by @thewhistlegang), Wiggy (owned by @thesuperthing), and Aberdeen (owned by @twistedwingz)

A second batch of Artfight attacks from this year! Thanks for people's attacks/revenge arts~

Brownie belongs to Kathren @ Artfight Julian belongs to @boodee-existz Mud belongs to @basedducks2eletricboogaloo Flip belongs to @toyboxshark Dan belongs to CoalsandCinders @ Artfight Lupus belongs to @akysi Hyperdrive belongs to @trishabeakens Patrick and Lewis belong to @annacpadilla Bingo belongs to @dawginabottle Wesley belongs to @snoozerat

My funny beetle guy :] I finished some design tweaks for him in between the last bit of Art Fight stuff, so I figured I’d post it now! Pretty minor tweaks here, mostly just strengthening the symbol integration in his shape language, as well as giving him a better pose for the lineups I have going right now.

I sketched out the poses beforehand so it should work well with the rest of them when they’re finished, though I still have to update his extended reference and make sure everything matches. I may have to adjust a few things later on when he’s compared with the others, but overall I really like how this came out! It definitely captures his personality :D

Had an idea so I whipped up this little thing for today :'D I wish I had more to update you with though ^^' I've been pretty busy with Art Fight this month so work on this project has been paused for a bit, but I'm looking forward to getting back into it afterwards. :) Hard to believe it's been nearly a decade since this project entered my life, but it certainly wouldn't have been the same without it! Having a project for this long really makes me reflect on a lot of things, like how different it was at the beginning, and even how different I was too (it's been... a very long 8 years). It can feel like I'm going in circles whenever I return to old designs and concepts and tweaking them, but I think they're all changes for the better. At least, I hope so! Thanks as always for the love and support over the years folks, and look forward to more stuff later on! But for now, happy birthday Starglass Zodiac <3

WIPs from June 27th and March 12th, 2023 I'm in one of those mind states where it takes me literal hours to make myself upload my WIPs, even though that's the entire point of this side blog :') Not that I dislike these, rather I received some bad (but unrelated) news today/yesterday and that always ramps up my insomnia. I'm up WAY too late again and my mood has been awful all day, so this was inevitable

It's been a while since I uploaded a completely new design for Starglass Zodiac (as in a completely new character rather than just a redesign of an already made one) and I'm not entirely sure why. Like the last one was over a year ago??? I still have way more to do so I'm not sure why I stopped for a while, even when I was still doing art for this project rather than switching to another. I have a massive folder of WIPs still so maybe I got decision paralysis or something, idk. These are far from done but I did come up with some cool new scenes with them so that's neat!

The less specific or more basic constellations are usually the most fun but also the most challenging to tackle, because it can be hard to make the concepts interesting if there's no pre-existing mythology associated with them, which is the case for both of these and many others. A lot of the constellations, even among the official 88 modern ones, boil down to an astronomer somewhere being like "put a [thing] in the sky" without anymore specificity or reason. Custos Messium is a defunct constellation to boot, but the idea of a "harvest keeper" gives me a lot of cool visuals to work with at least. I'm particularly proud of their sickle and scythe arms that form a C and M, respectively. Plus with the defunct constellations I get to design their symbols :D Not super happy with the bodies for either of these yet, but I like their heads so that's a good start. Horologium is inspired by those awesome looking astral clock towers with multiple faces, but with that in mind I want to make its body more tower-like. In the story, it's the constellation of the clock that was given artificial life after being lost and corrupted by void magic, so I want it to look like the pieces of the tower itself got transformed into this hulking beast over time. Overall I just want to have more non-sapient creatures inhabiting this world for variety's sake and to create bigger threats for the cast as stuff ramps up in later chapters. Defeating Horologium in particular is going to be quite the feat, but I am excited to finish writing/drawing that part of the comic at least!

Some Scorpio design tweaks for tonight! :D I’m jumping around a lot of different WIPs in preparation for Art Fight next month haha The changes are all cosmetic this time around, with the biggest change being adding another darker shade of purple for more contrast! All of the functions of his armour and cape are the same from his last design sheet (from 2020, ah!) so I’ll have to update the extended refs to match this later. I wanted to show all of the new art here first :) Enjoy!