Updated (April 2014)
About this Project:
“In The Year 2525” is a Science Fiction story that takes place in the 26th Century and stands as one possible outcome based on past and present real-world events that will indelibly shape our future. It combines raw humor, attitude, action and whimsical light-hearted moments (including the occasional 80s reference) with a bit of humanity’s more serious long forgotten history.
The historical information used in this novel is based on real-life documents, empirical evidence and recorded testimonies pertaining to paranormal experiences, including but not limited to: sightings, alien abductions and demonic possessions. Over the past few decades governments, military and religious factions around the world have disclosed classified information to the public as they begin setting the world stage for a major life changing event. From the reader’s point of view, this information will be revealed through the eyes of the story’s main character, Irene Jameson, who will discover the answers to some of humanity’s longest unanswered questions: Who are we? Where did we come from? Why are we here?
From ancient cave paintings to the discovery of ancient structures on the moon, actual historical references have been researched and their results compiled to create an entertaining and educational Sci-Fi Novel designed for an audience who may otherwise be unaware of — or uninterested in — the fact that humanity does indeed have an untold history, one that not only shaped our civilization here in the present, but one that will continue to shape the civilizations of the future.
That is of course if by the year 2525, man is still alive.
About the World:
The story begins on June 18th, 2523 as the United States West Coast Metroplex experiences an early onset of a phenomena known as “Earth Changes”, a belief that the world will enter a series of cataclysmic events causing major alterations to life on the planet through a series of natural events such as earthquakes, pole shifts, and solar flares; events that will make a significant impact on social, economic and political systems across the world.
With the sun’s unusually high activity triggering major earthquakes along the Earth’s “Ring of Fire”, this technology dependent society stands on edge as it experiences for the first time in over a century sudden blackouts, disruptions rendering technology useless, and network outages creating havoc throughout the Automated Traffic Control Systems impacting all areas of society from transportation to the financial sector.
As panic mounts, evangelist Mary Camping takes to the streets with a strong anti-science, anti-technology, pro-God movement that begins to take root across cities throughout the country, and it was her accurate prediction on today’s events that has earned her the credibility to gain support for this movement. Her latest prediction reveals that rapture will occur soon in the coming years, a message that causes a major social shift towards religious interest.
Meanwhile tensions between the world’s two opposing super powers, The United Nations (UN) and The Coalition of Red States (CORE), put the world on the brink of conflict after the Coalition makes a major military move on and off the planet and accusing the UN’s Space Corp of weaponizing the sun after a solar flare had destroyed a high value military operation on Venus, a strike the Coalition considers to be an act of war.
About the Story:
Irene Jameson, a college graduate on her way to joining the Space Corp Academy at the City of Earth, spends her last day on Earth running errands with her kid sister Charlene. Over the course of this day Irene encounters several occurrences of an identity mismatch as bio-scanners, which are used to authenticate people through the Civil Database during transactions, identifies her as her late mother Miranda Jameson.
These bio-scan mismatches, which should be an impossible occurrence, will lead Irene to a locker at a storage facility which is registered under her mother’s name, an account that has remained active even after her death. With Irene’s ability to pass as her mother, she finds this mystery locker and its contents.
What she finds, both amazing and startling, takes her on a long path of discovery to unlock the truth behind man’s hidden history.
About the Art:
I am working on art for my Sci-fi novel. So far I only got the main character, but I hope to use her as a template for the other female characters. Eventually I’ll work towards creating male characters and then other world-objects from the novel.
I am doing all of the rendering under Cycles using Toon BSDF and Freestyle.
My Original Adobe Illustrator Drawing as Target (October 2011)
Blender Progress (August 2013)
I don’t have a completed body yet (missing hands and feet) with this current model as I have recreated the model from scratch a week ago. When I was learning how to use Blender through the online tutorials, I was under the impression that more vertices would have made a much smoother model, but as it turned out for what I was trying to accomplish, it didn’t look as smooth as I wanted under toon conditions and was a nightmare trying to manage so many vertices.
On top of that it slowed my PC down significantly in the view-port, so the model is now about 1/10th the actual size (file size and vertex amount) it used to be and ended up looking better. The light and shadows with toon I think turns out nicer.
I also have a quick turntable video of the above model, but it’s an older render: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sTjY4Y3L1PI