Jea never imagined that skipping chores to wile away the days listening to her grandmother Oba’s crazy stories would be rewarded. But when her life is shattered by an unbelievable catastrophe, Jea realises that Oba has been preparing her for something all along: surviving the end of the world.
I write and illustrate the sci-fi webcomic The Constant Star together with co-creator Steve Moody. Based on a story concept by Steve, the comic is inspired by the epic fantasies of our childhoods: The Dark Crystal, Labyrinth, The Neverending Story. For me, it has been an opportunity to play with the medium, incorporating animation, sound, and interactivity into the reader’s experience.
Read The Constant Star online now.
The story begins in an idyllic village, suspended by ancient machinery over a desolate desert wasteland. Jea is on the hunt for her grandmother Oba, although she she has a pretty good idea where she’ll have to go…
The village was designed to look like bracket fungus — new growths on an ancient and decrepit structure. I sketched over a hundred unique house designs for the settlement (check them out here, here and here).
Jea’s first stop is the Windnets: an aerial fishery suspended off the side of the village, where workers harvest delicious airborne critters from the clouds.
One of the highlights of the comic for me is updating the landing page animation as the story takes us to new places.
Jea inevitably makes her way down to the surface — a vast, flat desert called the Kut — and hikes to the nearby mountains in search of Oba:
The panels of the comic are full of interesting critters, both on land and in the air. From the elusive Mantilouse that scurries about the rocks at the foot of the mountain, to the chameleon-like Raincloud Trout that seems to have fallen in step with Jea, the world of The Constant Star is teeming with life.
In the shadows of the mountain, Jea enters the vast, mysterious ruins of the Orrery — Oba’s secret hideaway workshop, where the elderly matriarch spends her days decoding the mysteries of the universe.
Growing up on a steady diet of James Gurney, Hans Jenssen, and Stephen Biesty, I can’t let a worldbuilding project go by without creating a giant cross-section illustration. Here’s a look into the bowels of the Orrery.
Summoned back to the village, Jea finds herself waylaid by a sudden change of weather…
While the comic is designed to work as a traditional printed graphic novel, occasionally a page will leap to life with animation and sound design.
Splash pages are experienced interactively as parallax sliders (check out the Chapter Two title page here)
The comic is regularly updated, so keep checking ConstantStar.ca and sign up to the mailing list for updates.