Fanart (spnopera): Dark Enough to See the Stars (PG-13, Dean/Cassie)
Title: Dark Enough to See the Stars* (Original prompt: Giuseppe Verdi's Aida)
Artist: cassiopeia7
Pairing(s): Dean/Cassie, unrequited Sam/Dean
Rating: PG-13
Warnings: [Only a spoiler if you are unfamiliar with the opera. :)]Major character death, unhappy endings all around, and massive artistic license taken with astrophysics and black-hole science. (Really, now. If a singularity opened up that close to the planet, EVERYBODY'S going down the rabbit hole.)
Media: Ink, marker, pastel pencil, digital enhancement.
Original prompt: The Egyptians have captured and enslaved Aida, an Ethiopian princess. An Egyptian military commander, Radamès, struggles to choose between his love for her and his loyalty to the Pharaoh. To complicate the story further, the Pharaoh's daughter Amneris is in love with Radamès, although he does not return her feelings.
Summary: Love doesn't always conquer all.
*Title totally stolen borrowed from Ralph Waldo Emerson's "When it is dark enough, you can see the stars."
Artist's note: I tried to be good and use the opera score as my sole arting soundtrack, but while the story translated well to space, sadly, much of the music did not. The playlist reflects this, ranging from the Aida "Prelude" (setting the mood) and "Marchia trionfale," the most famous piece from the opera (Dean's triumphant return from the space wars) . . . to Clay Aiken's stalker classic "Invisible" (oh, hai, jealous!stalker!Sam!), Aida's tomb scene/finale (buried alive in the cold blackness of space) and Adele's "Skyfall," which was perfect for sending Dean and Cassie to their deaths. Have a peek at my special brand of crazy and check out the rather eclectic playlist created to accompany the art. (You think this collection is scary? You oughtta see my iTunes lineup.)
Enjoy! >;D (Detailed notes and thanks are beneath the cut.)
Personal note: This piece is not in any way intended as Sam-bashing -- I love my Sammy!bb. But every operatic tragedy must have a "villain," and poor Sam drew the short straw.
If music be the food of love, play on! :D
Act 1
When goodwill ambassador Cassie Robinson of Giraudeau IV arrives on Lawrence, she is accused of espionage and taken prisoner. Commander Dean Winchester, eldest son of King John and leader of his father's military forces, has secret history with Cassie. Defying orders, he helps her escape.
Sam, secretly in love with Dean and jealous of his brother's relationship with Cassie, follows Dean to the prisoner camp, where he overhears Dean confessing his love for her.
Act 2
A hurt and angry Sam betrays his brother to the King as an enemy collaborator. Treason is punishable by death, and John has no choice but to pass judgment -- Dean is to be launched into a black hole.
Act 3
The day of the launch, a remorseful Sam sneaks into the launch bay and attempts to rescue his brother, but Dean refuses to let Sam risk treason charges (and Dean's fate) and shoves him from the pod just before launch.
Act 4
Onboard the pod, Cassie -- who has elected to die with Dean -- emerges from her hiding place. She and Dean watch the event horizon grow closer as they wait for the end.
Back on Lawrence, a distraught Sam can only watch via viewscreen as his brother's pod is pulled into the singularity.
[Art, opera, and other insanity.]
I had planned to sit this challenge out, but then the evil genius mod posted a prompt I could not resist, and did not know I needed. On the surface, it may seem that I chose Cassie because of her race and Aida's Ethiopian origins, but that's only a part of the reason for her casting. In truth, I waffled between Cassie and Lisa for a ridiculous amount of time before noting that Cassie's pre-season storyline dovetailed wonderfully with Aida's plotine. As Commander Radames is loyal to his Pharaoh, early Dean is equally loyal to John. And while Dean's dalliance with Cassie wasn't treason, he did give up a "miltary secret" of a sort by telling a civilian what he actually did for a living. Finally, had Sam not been away at Stanford, he might well have been envious of the time Dean spent with Cassie, so placing Sam in the role of jealous wanna-be lover Amneris kinda-sorta fits canon and provides a touch of Wincest. ;) Aida was just about perfect for all things Winchesterian. For those who know the opera, there are changes aplenty. Aida!Cassie is not Amneris!Sam's slave, but a political prisoner, the subplot with King Amonsaro (Cassie's father) has been excised, Sam & Dean are brothers (duh), and of course, there's that whole space-war business. :) Many thanks to my beta becc_j who not only refuses to point and giggle at my sad excuses for "art," she points me gently in the proper direction and teaches me things. Thanks to my astronomy guru hugemind who heroically did not laugh her ass off at my juvenile rendition of a singularity, and pointed me towards a truly mind-blowing article on black-hole science. :D Finally, thanks to Wonder Mod thursdaysisters (and evol enabler tebtosca ) without whom there'd be no spnopera.
Banner prototype:
There was always going to be a black hole -- I just had to figure out how to work one into the banner. The typical round
accretion disk just looked like a big circle and lacked the sense of energy and danger I wanted. So . . . GIMP to the rescue,
and now I know how to do the Time Warp. :)
Original accretion disk reference, before digital warping:
There was quite a bit of fiddling snd off-setting and repositioning of said black hole before the Muse was happy.
Original final banner. I liked the purple in that glowing ultaviolet gas-cloud kinda way, but the text was pretty much illegible from any distance of more than a couple of feet from the screen. So I matched the glow and text outline color with the electric blue/turquoise of the stars in the background, and blended the purple with the blue for a more "glowy" effect in the final banner.
/tl;dr boring art crap
My apologies to Cassie for putitng a rather large caboose on her. ;)
One day, my JDM will actually LOOK like JDM. One day . . .
. . . I had plans to draw a space-eye view of the pod being pulled into the black hole, but got lazy. :)
The cool orca-patterned SeaWorld trainer wetsuits were the inspiration for Cassie's uniform.
Artist: cassiopeia7
Pairing(s): Dean/Cassie, unrequited Sam/Dean
Rating: PG-13
Warnings: [Only a spoiler if you are unfamiliar with the opera. :)]Major character death, unhappy endings all around, and massive artistic license taken with astrophysics and black-hole science. (Really, now. If a singularity opened up that close to the planet, EVERYBODY'S going down the rabbit hole.)
Media: Ink, marker, pastel pencil, digital enhancement.
Original prompt: The Egyptians have captured and enslaved Aida, an Ethiopian princess. An Egyptian military commander, Radamès, struggles to choose between his love for her and his loyalty to the Pharaoh. To complicate the story further, the Pharaoh's daughter Amneris is in love with Radamès, although he does not return her feelings.
Summary: Love doesn't always conquer all.
*Title totally stolen borrowed from Ralph Waldo Emerson's "When it is dark enough, you can see the stars."
Artist's note: I tried to be good and use the opera score as my sole arting soundtrack, but while the story translated well to space, sadly, much of the music did not. The playlist reflects this, ranging from the Aida "Prelude" (setting the mood) and "Marchia trionfale," the most famous piece from the opera (Dean's triumphant return from the space wars) . . . to Clay Aiken's stalker classic "Invisible" (oh, hai, jealous!stalker!Sam!), Aida's tomb scene/finale (buried alive in the cold blackness of space) and Adele's "Skyfall," which was perfect for sending Dean and Cassie to their deaths. Have a peek at my special brand of crazy and check out the rather eclectic playlist created to accompany the art. (You think this collection is scary? You oughtta see my iTunes lineup.)
Click to viewEnjoy! >;D (Detailed notes and thanks are beneath the cut.)
Personal note: This piece is not in any way intended as Sam-bashing -- I love my Sammy!bb. But every operatic tragedy must have a "villain," and poor Sam drew the short straw.
If music be the food of love, play on! :D
Act 1
When goodwill ambassador Cassie Robinson of Giraudeau IV arrives on Lawrence, she is accused of espionage and taken prisoner. Commander Dean Winchester, eldest son of King John and leader of his father's military forces, has secret history with Cassie. Defying orders, he helps her escape.
Sam, secretly in love with Dean and jealous of his brother's relationship with Cassie, follows Dean to the prisoner camp, where he overhears Dean confessing his love for her.
Act 2
A hurt and angry Sam betrays his brother to the King as an enemy collaborator. Treason is punishable by death, and John has no choice but to pass judgment -- Dean is to be launched into a black hole.
Act 3
The day of the launch, a remorseful Sam sneaks into the launch bay and attempts to rescue his brother, but Dean refuses to let Sam risk treason charges (and Dean's fate) and shoves him from the pod just before launch.
Act 4
Onboard the pod, Cassie -- who has elected to die with Dean -- emerges from her hiding place. She and Dean watch the event horizon grow closer as they wait for the end.
Back on Lawrence, a distraught Sam can only watch via viewscreen as his brother's pod is pulled into the singularity.
[Art, opera, and other insanity.]
I had planned to sit this challenge out, but then the evil genius mod posted a prompt I could not resist, and did not know I needed. On the surface, it may seem that I chose Cassie because of her race and Aida's Ethiopian origins, but that's only a part of the reason for her casting. In truth, I waffled between Cassie and Lisa for a ridiculous amount of time before noting that Cassie's pre-season storyline dovetailed wonderfully with Aida's plotine. As Commander Radames is loyal to his Pharaoh, early Dean is equally loyal to John. And while Dean's dalliance with Cassie wasn't treason, he did give up a "miltary secret" of a sort by telling a civilian what he actually did for a living. Finally, had Sam not been away at Stanford, he might well have been envious of the time Dean spent with Cassie, so placing Sam in the role of jealous wanna-be lover Amneris kinda-sorta fits canon and provides a touch of Wincest. ;) Aida was just about perfect for all things Winchesterian. For those who know the opera, there are changes aplenty. Aida!Cassie is not Amneris!Sam's slave, but a political prisoner, the subplot with King Amonsaro (Cassie's father) has been excised, Sam & Dean are brothers (duh), and of course, there's that whole space-war business. :) Many thanks to my beta becc_j who not only refuses to point and giggle at my sad excuses for "art," she points me gently in the proper direction and teaches me things. Thanks to my astronomy guru hugemind who heroically did not laugh her ass off at my juvenile rendition of a singularity, and pointed me towards a truly mind-blowing article on black-hole science. :D Finally, thanks to Wonder Mod thursdaysisters (and evol enabler tebtosca ) without whom there'd be no spnopera.
Banner prototype:
There was always going to be a black hole -- I just had to figure out how to work one into the banner. The typical round
accretion disk just looked like a big circle and lacked the sense of energy and danger I wanted. So . . . GIMP to the rescue,
and now I know how to do the Time Warp. :)
Original accretion disk reference, before digital warping:
There was quite a bit of fiddling snd off-setting and repositioning of said black hole before the Muse was happy.
Original final banner. I liked the purple in that glowing ultaviolet gas-cloud kinda way, but the text was pretty much illegible from any distance of more than a couple of feet from the screen. So I matched the glow and text outline color with the electric blue/turquoise of the stars in the background, and blended the purple with the blue for a more "glowy" effect in the final banner.
/tl;dr boring art crap
My apologies to Cassie for putitng a rather large caboose on her. ;)
One day, my JDM will actually LOOK like JDM. One day . . .
. . . I had plans to draw a space-eye view of the pod being pulled into the black hole, but got lazy. :)
The cool orca-patterned SeaWorld trainer wetsuits were the inspiration for Cassie's uniform.