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Description
A lot of text, because this is more about the concept than the art!

The muscular hyper-masculinity of the Viking penguins got me thinking about Harry Harrison’s Deathworld again, and brought me full circle back to an idea from my early college days (highly derivative of Deathworld and Harrison’s other gritty space opera sci-fi) for a specialized branch of elite galactic troopers called the Double Gravity Marine Corps (abbreviated as 2GMC). The idea was this elite martial organization consisting of individuals recruited from high-gravity planets and given the best of the best in terms of weapons and training, blah blah blah, we’ve heard all that space marine crap before. But I still think it’s an idea with a lot of fun visual potential for those who can’t get enough testosterone-soaked space war action.

The two guys at top represent something close to Harrison’s stereotypical chauvinist Hellenic/Teutonic ideal. My original image for the 2GMC marines was of something even more muscular and just generally heavier, more massive; I’ll have to draw those later. The gun with the cable on it held by the guy at top left is derivative of the Deathworlders’ powered forearm holsters. This lethal machine accelerates its gun into the wearer’s hand via hydraulic cable when sensors detect the “hand ready to receive gun” position of the wrist tendons. Also, though it’s apropos of nothing, I just think fatigue pants look way cooler bloused, as U.S. Marines wear them, rather than loose the way soldiers do. I don’t know why. *shrug*

The guy in the middle is the revised version I’m leaning towards for the 2GMC troopers. This variant takes advantage of lengthened limb bones, especially in the forearms, to provide leverage over raw power, yielding a chimp-like arm design. This was partially inspired by a high-gravity character from Steve Perry’s “Stellar Ranger” series, which is another great piece of guilty space opera goodness/badness. Once I started working on this guy, I thought it would be interesting if he also had much more prehensile toes, maybe to the point where he would wear specialized “gloves” on his feet and use them more like hands. It seems handy for zero-G as much as high-G, and I like the fact that it gives him an almost gorilla-like appearance. (Note the “monkey wrench” by his feet. I should have given him a banana.)

The guys on the bottom were inspired by ~spinery’s comment on the (Viking) Penguin Action Studies ([link] ). His facinating list of likely adaptations to high gravity reminded me of yet another Harrison series, the Planet of the Damned books (they’re as bad as they sound), which deal with even more extreme environmental adapations and diversification of human form than those seen in the Deathworld books (pretty much the only change in Deathworld is that everybody looks like Arnold Schwarzenegger). There’s a fascinating scene in Planet of the Damned with a couple of spacemen who are mechanics from an extreme high-gravity planet. Harrison describes them as being so squashed down, so squat and compact, that they scuttle around like crabs! I just thought that was the coolest thing ever, and I flashed on it when ~spinery mentioned some of those more “compacted” traits.

Even the guy at bottom-left doesn’t fully capture the “crab-like” feel I ideally wanted. I also couldn’t quite figure out how far forward his spine should be compressed, so I gave him a vest and/or backpack and left it purposely ambiguous where his body ends and his equipment begins. He’s drinking a carbonated but nonalcoholic beverage—he’s working right now.

Bottom-right shows what bottom-left would look like in some sort of powered exoskeletal “fighting suit,” ala Starship Troopers. Again, I was inspired by a sublime quote from a Deathworld story: Harrison described a Deathworlder’s spacesuit as looking “more like a tank than a spacesuit.” That’s it, that told me everything I needed to know. I’ve been trying and failing to depict it ever since.

I think it would be interesting if the 2GMC troopers were assigned specific tasks based on body type and planet of origin—gravity levels, atmospheric density and O2 levels, etc. Obviously such drastic morphological changes as seen in the middle and bottom designs would necessarily be the result of genetic modification rather than natural selection. I guess they *could* emerge over time, but I’m thinking of the 2GMC scenario being set within the next thousand years or so, early in humanity’s expansion into the galaxy, which wouldn’t allow sufficient time for evolution to take its course. In fact, I’m thinking that even Harrison’s double-gravity Deathworlders would need *some* degree of genetic tweaking…It would be nearly impossible for anybody to constantly carry around twice their own (terrestrial) body weight and remain functional for any sustained duration, let alone perform the Deathworlders’ superheroic feats of athleticism and endurance. Even if born to that environment, there are limits to the human body’s ability to adapt—survival on Earth simply hasn’t required us to meet such extreme demands.

Done while listening to Blind Guardian and the Demons & Wizards cover of “Immigrant Song,” as if you couldn’t tell. Whew—it was almost too much testosterone even for me! I’m totally washed out…Time to consume more bovine growth hormone.

Description
A lot of text, because this is more about the concept than the art!

The muscular hyper-masculinity of the Viking penguins got me thinking about Harry Harrison’s Deathworld again, and brought me full circle back to an idea from my early college days (highly derivative of Deathworld and Harrison’s other gritty space opera sci-fi) for a specialized branch of elite galactic troopers called the Double Gravity Marine Corps (abbreviated as 2GMC). The idea was this elite martial organization consisting of individuals recruited from high-gravity planets and given the best of the best in terms of weapons and training, blah blah blah, we’ve heard all that space marine crap before. But I still think it’s an idea with a lot of fun visual potential for those who can’t get enough testosterone-soaked space war action.

The two guys at top represent something close to Harrison’s stereotypical chauvinist Hellenic/Teutonic ideal. My original image for the 2GMC marines was of something even more muscular and just generally heavier, more massive; I’ll have to draw those later. The gun with the cable on it held by the guy at top left is derivative of the Deathworlders’ powered forearm holsters. This lethal machine accelerates its gun into the wearer’s hand via hydraulic cable when sensors detect the “hand ready to receive gun” position of the wrist tendons. Also, though it’s apropos of nothing, I just think fatigue pants look way cooler bloused, as U.S. Marines wear them, rather than loose the way soldiers do. I don’t know why. *shrug*

The guy in the middle is the revised version I’m leaning towards for the 2GMC troopers. This variant takes advantage of lengthened limb bones, especially in the forearms, to provide leverage over raw power, yielding a chimp-like arm design. This was partially inspired by a high-gravity character from Steve Perry’s “Stellar Ranger” series, which is another great piece of guilty space opera goodness/badness. Once I started working on this guy, I thought it would be interesting if he also had much more prehensile toes, maybe to the point where he would wear specialized “gloves” on his feet and use them more like hands. It seems handy for zero-G as much as high-G, and I like the fact that it gives him an almost gorilla-like appearance. (Note the “monkey wrench” by his feet. I should have given him a banana.)

The guys on the bottom were inspired by ~spinery’s comment on the (Viking) Penguin Action Studies ([link] ). His facinating list of likely adaptations to high gravity reminded me of yet another Harrison series, the Planet of the Damned books (they’re as bad as they sound), which deal with even more extreme environmental adapations and diversification of human form than those seen in the Deathworld books (pretty much the only change in Deathworld is that everybody looks like Arnold Schwarzenegger). There’s a fascinating scene in Planet of the Damned with a couple of spacemen who are mechanics from an extreme high-gravity planet. Harrison describes them as being so squashed down, so squat and compact, that they scuttle around like crabs! I just thought that was the coolest thing ever, and I flashed on it when ~spinery mentioned some of those more “compacted” traits.

Even the guy at bottom-left doesn’t fully capture the “crab-like” feel I ideally wanted. I also couldn’t quite figure out how far forward his spine should be compressed, so I gave him a vest and/or backpack and left it purposely ambiguous where his body ends and his equipment begins. He’s drinking a carbonated but nonalcoholic beverage—he’s working right now.

Bottom-right shows what bottom-left would look like in some sort of powered exoskeletal “fighting suit,” ala Starship Troopers. Again, I was inspired by a sublime quote from a Deathworld story: Harrison described a Deathworlder’s spacesuit as looking “more like a tank than a spacesuit.” That’s it, that told me everything I needed to know. I’ve been trying and failing to depict it ever since.

I think it would be interesting if the 2GMC troopers were assigned specific tasks based on body type and planet of origin—gravity levels, atmospheric density and O2 levels, etc. Obviously such drastic morphological changes as seen in the middle and bottom designs would necessarily be the result of genetic modification rather than natural selection. I guess they *could* emerge over time, but I’m thinking of the 2GMC scenario being set within the next thousand years or so, early in humanity’s expansion into the galaxy, which wouldn’t allow sufficient time for evolution to take its course. In fact, I’m thinking that even Harrison’s double-gravity Deathworlders would need *some* degree of genetic tweaking…It would be nearly impossible for anybody to constantly carry around twice their own (terrestrial) body weight and remain functional for any sustained duration, let alone perform the Deathworlders’ superheroic feats of athleticism and endurance. Even if born to that environment, there are limits to the human body’s ability to adapt—survival on Earth simply hasn’t required us to meet such extreme demands.

Done while listening to Blind Guardian and the Demons & Wizards cover of “Immigrant Song,” as if you couldn’t tell. Whew—it was almost too much testosterone even for me! I’m totally washed out…Time to consume more bovine growth hormone.