Welcome back to the sketchbook for a significant update. Last time was spent doing development art for a comic strip I am planning to do. This time, we’re going to check out the future of Cosmic Dash in the form of the cover to the upcoming novel, Cosmic Dash: The Swarm.
I believe this is the first time I have publicly mentioned the full title, so my dropping it now is how you know this is a serious post. Let’s get into the cover, the project, the process, and the cover, shall we?
First, here is the sketchbook page for this Cosmic Dash cover image.
For this sketchbook update, I wanted to highlight the design process. This preview image shows that, but keep reading for even more details about how I developed the art.
Cosmic Dash: The Swarm
Cosmic Dash: The Swarm takes place a couple of days after the events of “Ladies Fight” as the crew sets out for the planet Cosaya, along with their highly illegal Kemezeckian colonist passengers. Little do the crew know, however, that the planet has been cut off from the wider galaxy by a secretive alien race hunting for a terrifying new species that wiped out a colony. With new allies and enemies in tow, the crew makes emergency landfall and endures an all-night siege from The Swarm.
The novel will be written and published in a serialized format familiar to anyone who has been reading Fang & Bone or The Dead Life. I don’t want to focus too much on the format right now, or estimate a page count. I’ll just note that I have three goals with the project:
- Reintroduce characters and aspects of Cosmic Dash for possible new audiences
- Maintain as fast a pace as possible without sacrificing too many details
- Further lean into the sprawl of existing stories within the setting and connecting them to this narrative
Will I be able to accomplish these three things? I have no idea, but I hope so. That’s the nature of following that webnovel approach and my tendency to actively write and edit a narrative as a serialized project. It’s high risk, and it has not exactly been particularly rewarding yet, but I am having fun with it. It clicks for me and makes me happy.
The Process
The process of developing the image is covered in this little gallery below. My original concept (1) for the cover was more complicated and featured several more characters, including Mara and two “new” ones. I’ll explain who they are another time. It was a fun concept, but for a cover, I felt that it had too much going on. I felt like I needed to go simpler, and for lack of a better word, more iconic.
I ended up switching to a more shape-driven design for the second round, and also leaned heavily into the feeling of isolation and overwhelming odds (2). Additionally, I kept the focus on Dash and had a fun time adding in all of the alien creatures. It felt like that combination of cartoony, adventurous, and science fictional that I aim for with any Cosmic Dash project. I felt very confident about my choices and decided to move on.
Once the pencils were locked in, I went ahead and inked the image (3). Knowing that I would need to have two “planes” of lighting effects, I went ahead and pre-masked the swarm of creatures. They have a name, I just don’t want to reveal it yet. Pre-masking allows me to block out certain things for individual effects and adjustments, of which there were many.
Oh, and the total number of layers in the final image in the Adobe Photoshop file was 23.
It is not a deeply detailed rundown, but I figured showing off some of the stages would be a fun little expansion to this cover reveal. Speaking of which, here is the full reveal, including the textless version.
Please let me know what you think! I’d love to read your thoughts and speculation on what is going on. Are you excited to get new Cosmic Dash stories?
Support Me and My Work
As always, if you are interested in supporting what I do, you can do so through donations on Ko-Fi. I also take commissions. Due to a recent career transition, your support means more than ever.
A simple monthly donation opens up my ability to produce more stories, art, and more. And if you cannot swing that financially (I get it), simply commenting on posts like this or sharing them on social media is a huge help and costs nothing.
