Science Fiction Cover Art

[Sineva]

Animated version.

https://twitter.com/x/status/1596660646581510144

 

[T. A. Gardner]

Kevin Davies made this model of the Hooded Swan.

Okay... An origami space ship...

 

[Sineva]

Angus McKie created the cover art for the paperback editions of Brian Stableford's Hooded Swan series, depicting the eponymous starship. The images were later picked up by Stewart Crowley for his Terran Trade Authority books, though presented as illustrations for a different story. Stableford had a pretty sarcastic sense of humour, like his narrator, Grainger, the ship's pilot. 'Hooded Swan' was an alternate name for the dodo and Stableford used it as an ironic commentary on the obsolescence of the idealism of its creators against the emergence of a galactic empire from the mergers of multistellar corporations. McKie was more literal, modelling the silhouette of the ship on a swimming swan. In any case, the design proved to be a favourite with readers of both franchises. To start with, here are a few of McKie's most beautiful and evocative covers.

One of the paintings was also used as the cover art to the 1984 Q5 album Steel the Light

And heres the title song in question,plus the rest of the album,for those who are curious

 

[TsrJoe]

I do like the Soviet capsule design

 

[Michel Van]

sadly Painter Renato Casaro has passed away
he made mostly cover for Movies but also sci-fi stuff
like this Perry Rhodan

 

[Justo Miranda]

sadly Painter Renato Casaro has passed away
he made mostly cover for Movies but also sci-fi stuff
like this Perry Rhodan

Uno de los nuestros

 

[Hood]

 

[Michel Van]

That Renato Casaro movie poster for soviet version SOLARIS
and here his Flash Gordon poster

 

[Graham1973]

View: https://youtu.be/jjHiPcroIPg

 

[Graham1973]

Another Syd Mead vision of future sports....

 

[martinbayer]

Another Syd Mead vision of future sports....

What is this future "sports" thing that you speak of?

 

[Graham1973]

What is this future "sports" thing that you speak of?

Racing robots instead of Animals.

 

[Graham1973]

Author Paul Myron Anthony Linebarger (Pen Name: Cordwainer Smith)'s novel 'Norstrilla' (1975) had a tangled road to publication originally being published in two parts 'The Planet Buyer' (1964) and the posthumous 'The Underpeople' (1968) the book not finally reaching publication as a single novel until 1975. The covers for the various US editions were John Schoenherr, Jack Gaughan and Gary Morrow.

 

[martinbayer]

Racing robots instead of Animals.

Racing robots instead of Animals.

I sense this is starting to trend towards the spirit of Robot Wars, see https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robot_Wars_(TV_series), except sans human remote control, but with AI in charge instead. Please, do go on, but broaden the scope from linear racing (lame!) to octagon death matches...

 

[Michel Van]

I sense this is starting to trend towards the spirit of Robot Wars, see https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robot_Wars_(TV_series), except sans human remote control, but with AI in charge instead. Please, do go on, but broaden the scope from linear racing (lame!) to octagon death matches...

it gonna end like this...

View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t-XbDgXvNhI

 

[Graham1973]

Some early (1975) 'Star Wars' concept art by Ron Cobb.

 

[jeffb]

Same artist, three books by Philip Jose Farmer. I haven't read them, so I don't know if the cover for one of them is relevant, but it obviously refers to Gustave Moreau's 'Oedipus and the Sphinx' of 1864.

Great book series. Artificial universes and multiverse hopping, great fun.

 

[Michel Van]

Great book series. Artificial universes and multiverse hopping, great fun.

the cover artist is Boris Vallejo

 

[Graham1973]

Chris Foss in a 'suggestive' mood on the cover of a 1970s piece of crank scholarship that argued that 'manna from heaven' was the output of an algal based 'food generator'.

 

[Graham1973]

The German and Japanese cover art to their countries respective editions of Australian Science Fiction author A. Bertram Chandler's 1965 novel 'Empress of Outer Space' the first novel in the 'Empress Irene' trilogy. The German cover is by Johnny Bruck, the identity of the artist for the Japanese cover is unknown. Both fall into the 'macho women with guns' school of science fiction art.

 

[jeffb]

Another classic, Edgar Rice Burroughs - A Princess of Mars, with covers by Michael Whelan and Frank Frazetta.

Michael Whelan


Frank Frazetta

 

[Graham1973]

The cover art by Peter Elson for the 1980s reissue of some of A. Bertram Chandler's novels in the UK. These scans were sourced from the ISFDB as rather sadly none of these images are preserved on the artists website.

 

[Brett Davidson]

Pascal Blanché. A bit risqué.

 

[Brett Davidson]

Drew Struzan is dead, alas.

https://70sscifiart.tumblr.com/

 

[Sineva]

A digital x-wing test from way back in oct 1978,tho physical models were still the cheaper option,however 6 years later they would use digital effects for the spacecraft in the last star fighter.

https://twitter.com/x/status/1978128705961546076

 

[Grey Havoc]

Drew Struzan is dead, alas.

https://70sscifiart.tumblr.com/

Also via that blog:


RIP.

 

[Graham1973]

A digital x-wing test from way back in oct 1978,tho physical models were still the cheaper option,however 6 years later they would use digital effects for the spacecraft in the last star fighter.

https://twitter.com/x/status/1978128705961546076

Interesting I remember seeing a single reference to that project in an early book on computer graphics (The title escapes me.). From what I remember the author had stated that the results had not been worth the expense, but didn't include any pictures. I'm going to say that given the time period that's not a bad result.

 

[Michel Van]

A digital x-wing test from way back in oct 1978,tho physical models were still the cheaper option,however 6 years later they would use digital effects for the spacecraft in the last star fighter.

View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m8aYL2l5quU


yes Lucas worked with CGI already in Star Wars: New Hope
The Dead Star animation that show main Target is made with Computer
but it was simple and easy to save time and Money
because it needed high end Computer to produce and rent time were expansive.

No you couldn't just buy a Computer for that in 1970s,
you needed to rent time on Large Mainframe computer, who cost millions of Dollars in that time...

1978 it was still to expensive to make X-wing so in detail for Star Wars: Empire Strike back.
1982 the prise on rent computer time were low to make TRON or Last Star Fighter.
But Art Durinski who work on TRON, had to make model "simpler" for rendering.

The CGI division at Lucas Film form later own company called PIXAR...

 

[Graham1973]

This video covers some of the early CGI work including those 'digital X-Wings' and several appearances of 'Adam' who's face should be familiar to anyone who's seen the original T.R.O.N as it was in modified form used for the Master Control Program....

View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i8zjMQz5Ftg

 

[Sineva]

View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m8aYL2l5quU


yes Lucas worked with CGI already in Star Wars: New Hope
The Dead Star animation that show main Target is made with Computer
but it was simple and easy to save time and Money
because it needed high end Computer to produce and rent time were expansive.

No you couldn't just buy a Computer for that in 1970s,
you needed to rent time on Large Mainframe computer, who cost millions of Dollars in that time...

1978 it was still to expensive to make X-wing so in detail for Star Wars: Empire Strike back.
1982 the prise on rent computer time were low to make TRON or Last Star Fighter.
But Art Durinski who work on TRON, had to make model "simpler" for rendering.

The CGI division at Lucas Film form later own company called PIXAR...

It reminds me of when good old cell animation or even physical models were used to simulate graphical displays.
The computer graphics map of manhattan in 1981s escape from new york was actually a simple physical model with the edges of the buildings taped to produce a faux vector type graphic effect.

View this content on Instagram

View this content on Instagram

 

[Michel Van]

It reminds me of when good old cell animation or even physical models were used to simulate graphical displays.
The computer graphics map of manhattan in 1981s escape from new york was actually a simple physical model with the edges of the buildings taped to produce a faux vector type graphic effect.

View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X9frBKmg30Q

fantastic work by certain James Cameron

 

[Graham1973]

One last video from me, someone commenting on the legendary 'Star Fleet Technical Manual'

View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BoHL6ArXpR0

 

[Graham1973]

A Robert McCall image illustrating what NASA called the 'Integrated Manned Programme' for the Post-Apollo period and the inspiration for much that appears in the series 'For All Mankind'.

 

[Graham1973]

A Bruce Pennington flying saucer, this is one of the illustrations for the book 'Eschatus' (1976) in which the artist offered his visual interpretations of the prophecies of Nostradamus.

 

[Graham1973]

A Syd Mead cityscape for an unknown publication.

 

[Graham1973]

Not strictly cover art, but worth looking at nonetheless, an advert by an unknown artist depicting the Holden 'Hurricane' one of the few concept cars created in Australia.

 

[Graham1973]

The cover art by an unknown artist to Alan Dean Foster's 1987 novel 'Catchalot'.

 

[Graham1973]

A pair of John Harris artworks for unknown publications, the asteroid visible in the background of one of them may be the one seen on the cover of 'The Best of Trek #13' in Post #281

 

[Grey Havoc]

On a tangent:
https://gizmodo.com/barbara-gips-alien-tagline-dead-obituary-2000675504
RIP.

 

[southwestforests]

Refueling in space 1954 style.

Edit: posting that around 05:30 in the morning in my time zone my brain wasn't spooled up enough to think to credit where I got it from,

https://flic.kr/p/2rp9cJN

View: https://flic.kr/p/2rp9cJN