When Arthur C. Clark and Stanley Kubrick released 2001: A Space Odyssey (ASO), a true bedrock of science fiction cinema was created. Released in April of 1968 - a full 8 months before NASA's Apollo 8 orbited the moon, 2001: ASO was truly a leap in film making. Up until then, science fiction cinema was not taken very seriously and not much effort - or money - was put forth to help tell a great science fiction story. That all changed when Clark and Kubrick collaborated to bring this film to life. With a serious effort in the story, and a great perfectionist at the directorial helm, 2001: ASO used story telling and ground breaking visual fx to a great, albeit slow film. Don't even get me started of that trippy ending. 

As groundbreaking as 2001: ASO was,. . . what really blew me away was 2010: The Year We Make Contact. A more traditionally narrative driven film, 2010: TYWMC, was a solid sequel to it's predecessor. My Pops took me to see this movie, and as a 9 year old, I was amazed at the visual FX of the film, although a "Few" of the FX shots didn't age well, BUT!; Those models. By 1984 - Industrial Light and Magic had some great experience and made some great practical models and it's a great example of visual fx done right prior the CGI.

One thing of note is I have not ready the books, I am simply inspired by the movies. Although I plan to "read" the books via Audiobook. Soon,. . . ish. 

In honor of the 50th Anniversary of 2001: ASO, I've re-imagined a new USS Discovery III to set a course back to EUROPA in the year 2030 - minus the homicidal Operations Computer. My Discovery is slightly larger, faster and most notably, has a centrifugal ring for added crew health and comfort. Many design changes were considered such as solar panels to reflect more modern day tech, but I went with a simpler the better approach to keep the look and feel of the Discovery III. In addition to the habitat ring, the engines were slightly redesigned with bigger, beefier engines, although I don't know how beef with help with the propulsion. As a result, it's a much faster ship; getting to Mars in as little as 60 days, and to the Lucifer system (former Jupiter) in a matter of months. 

I hope you all like my artwork inspired by these Science Fiction classics. Posters and prints will be available soon for all those scifi fans out there. Who knows, I may be inspired to write and make a short film one day. LOL!