Forerunner armor again

A year ago I tried my hand and imagination at visualizing the exoskeletal armor suits of the Forerunners (Design no. 1 + Design no. 2). I gave it another go, aiming for a slightly less rigid feel.

For those versed in Halo lore, the hard light cloaks are of course far from canon (at least as far as I know), but I found the concept interesting enough to experiment. If anything the cloak concept reminds me of Destiny, and if any of the developers at Bungie should happen to sneak a peek: feel free to borrow it for any upcoming expansions. Wink, wink.

Polyguys

Playing around with a low-poly artstyle.

Map of Innokentiy Peninsula

The silvery crown of the Siberian tundra: a ragged fringe of fiords and land-tongues half-amalgamated into the arctic ocean.

A Russian naval outpost perches by the foot of Imitr Peak. Deserted. Windows here have shattered like sheets of ice, and snow has swaddled the place in a heavy blanket. Crumpled playing cards, an orthodox icon framed in flaking gold, and other forgotten keepsakes lie scattered in and among the banks of white. The snow is dotted with the glint of outdated ammunition cartridges. There are bullet holes in the walls.

White tigers stalk the taiga: coniferous forests made swollen and tumorous with snowfall. The cats’ padded paws make no sound above the howl of the wind. They pounce seemingly out of nowhere. No tracks can be found. Men go mad staring into the white without sleep. 

Great peaks jut painfully from the snow and ice. Many a tunnel and cavern has been dug into their sides, whether by wind or tool or claw. None still bear any sign of habitation, but some reach surprisingly far into the rock - too far for safe exploration, regrettably. There, traces of long-eroded wall carvings can still be made out: broken petroglyphs, with loose ends that offer up too many shapes to the eye. The deeper indentations are stained a dark indigo, a pigment like that of squid ink. Cephalopod ink, however, is not commonly known to shine in the dark.

Blizzards and hailstorms tear across the desolation without warning. However, by all accounts their frequency appears set, purposeful almost. It’s as if a great maw is slowly but surely grinding and gnawing, chewing the peninsula into white, just blinding white.

Innokentiy Peninsula, Siberia, Russia

Artography - Maps of places not real - Vol. 01

Map of Cardiac Island

Something heavy lies over this island. Whether it’s the air - thick with heat and plant pollen - or the water - saturated by ocean salts and subterranean gases; the lone, rocky landmass possesses a languid, verging on fetid aura. The ever-present miasma of sulphur doesn’t help.

Apart from a small number of scientific expeditions and foraging stops by seafarers, Cardiac Island has remained very much on the edge of human knowledge. As would indeed be expected from such an isolated speck of land. And yet, parts of its unique landscape are featured in a surprisingly wide host of mainland folklore. Early 16th century records left by both Spanish and Portuguese sailors tell of witches’ covens in the night, by the oxidizing shores of Lake Hemate; its waters bloodied by animal sacrifice under a Harvest Moon, and naked feet dancing across its surface. Rumor and records of unknown origin together hint at ancient, shaped statues buried under the slow flood of lava from Mt Coriolis. And early legends on both sides of the Pacific describe a solitary island which rises and sinks every three-thousand years, they claim, to the pulsations of the Earth.

On the Western edge of the island, the caldera of Mount Coriolis gapes an open wound. It hemorrhages molten rock, slowly but ceaselessly into the lapping waves below. Black grass grows where the lava temporarily stagnates. And out of the thick fog banks, new land rises: scabbed-over rock cradling poisonous pools. 

Despite its exposed location in the open Pacific Ocean, with the harsh climate this entails, the heaths and highlands of the island sport an abnormal array of flowering plant life. Great clouds of flies and bees buzz between tufts of grass, keeping close to the ground lest the unpredictable ocean winds should steal them away forever.

Cardiac Island, South Pacific Ocean

Artography - Maps of places not real - Vol. 01

Map of Fěnhóngsè Estuary

One of China’s Invisible Rivers. The Fěnhóngsè carries with it seeds and multicolored petals from the very core of the Empire. It ends its journey just like it began: as a fanned-out network of rivulets and waterways spread so wide as to virtually disappear into the landscape.

Vast fields of lotus grow in the sediment of the river deltas. Among the area’s impoverished fishermen and rice-farmers, tales abound of golden riches hidden in the silt; lost trinkets stolen away by the currents inland. The local herons seem to listen in on the stories, stalking long-leggedly between the lily petals and expertly spearing small goldfish for themselves.

The summer rains have carved natural terraces out of the slopes of Cherry-pit Peak. They are too dry for growing rice, too brittle to properly irrigate, and so are left to the whims of nature. Bees keep hidden-away caches of honey among the wildflowers. People say the bees live by a strict hierarchy: that the quality of the honey increases with each step up, and that the Thrice-Striped Queen rules from on high. By the shoreline, the mountain roots cradle a beach of miniature peach trees, whose sweet fruit more than make up for their small stature. Shrunken peach pits are mixed in with the smooth stones of the strand.

At the mouth of the sea sits Turtle-shell Archipelago, home to tucked-away communities of fishermen and women. Across the bay their cousin clans pluck rice from marbled ponds. The calm waters between them are dotted with makeshift floating markets and the toy boats of children. Glittering ripples tell of curious fish tasting the air.

Fěnhóngsè Estuary, East China Mainland

Artography - Maps of places not real - Vol. 01