Science fiction has a good rep for awe-inspiring visuals, whether that’s massive space stations, giant Ringworlds, space elevators, or Dyson spheres. They’re a staple of giant space operas and big-budget movies, and now, there’s a full-color book collecting all of the different types of mega structures in science fiction.
Megastructures: The Visual Encyclopedia is written by Neil Blevins, and is now up on Kickstarter, where it’s more than doubled its funding goal.
Blevins is a concept artist who’s worked for places like Pixar and Monolith Studios, and who Kickstarted an illustrated science fiction story about a man and his robot called The Story of Inc back in 2017.
Megastructures, he says, is “part science book, part inspirational artbook,” and it’ll feature 120 pages of everything from space elevators to Ringworlds, to Rungworlds(?), to Alderson Disks, and plenty more. Each section will include some scientific background on each structure (i.e. impossible or not?), along with the art.
The book will feature a number of illustrations from Blevins, as well as art from some other artists: Col Price, Andy Proctor, Jeremy Cook, Ken Fairclough and Jullius Granada. The project is currently funding, and for $35, you’ll get a regular edition of the book, which is expected to ship by March 2022. (Given that this is a crowdfunding effort, expect that these dates can slip or change with little notice.) He’s also selling a premium edition ($40), bundled with copies of The Story of Inc ($50), additional prints, image files, or multiple copies at higher price points.
Possibly worth it for Rungworld alone. Ahhhh the days we would linger over brandy on the Rungworld…
