Life on a Gas Giant's Moon...

So what would life be like on a world similar to Earth, but which is merely a large moon around a huge gas giant? This digital painting explores that possibility. Here, we see a cold world, not unlike Earth during an ice age, orbiting its parent gas giant. Such worlds would have massive tides, impressive auroras, and regularly solar eclipses. The concept of day, night, and seasons would be different with an additional element introduced since not only does the moon rotate and go around the sun, but the moon goes around the parent gas giant as well. Worlds like this one almost surely exist - we have found gas giants large enough to theoretically have moons as massive as Earth - all that is needed is for them to have enough water and exist in the star's habitable zone.

Digital painting create in Photoshop Elements 10

Approaching a Swampy World

Just to change things up a bit, here's one of my more recent science-fiction space paintings.

View on approach to a warm, soggy world covered with shallow oceans and vast tidal estuaries. The world has little geological activity, and slow erosion has reduced the planet's land masses to swamps and low-lying hills. Vegetation covers the landscape beneath the perpetual fog banks and slow rolling, drizzly cloud formations. While rather hot and soggy, this planet is full of life and worthy of exploration.

Created in Photoshop Elements 10:

Stepping Stones to the Stars

One of my other hobbies is creating digital space art; while I've focused more on acrylic paintings in the past few years, this other form of art I also enjoy. Most of my space art was up on another website, but I felt I should bring some of it over here to present a consolidated collection of my artwork.

The road to the stars is represented in this image: life starts on the Earth-like world and eventually realizes the nature of the heavens above. Then, life moves on to the planet's moon, and eventually to other worlds in the star system. Someday, the bright star cluster beyond will be within reach...