seen from Pakistan
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seen from Malaysia
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seen from Bosnia & Herzegovina
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Wow, these covers! Look at all the details!
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Look at the little beaded mulefa that I designed and made! The lack of diamond bauplan in the TV show was my single biggest beef with the art design. I'm very pleased to present the version of them that lived in my head when I read the books in middle school.
It is made up of 11/0 Miyuki seed beads, 30-gauge wire, and two red jasper beads for the seed-pod wheels.
MULEFA REIMAGINED
First of all, I want to give a disclaimer: I have not read the original series of books to which this race belongs (His Dark Materials). I see the mulefa as a detached idea of animals without spine with a trunk that resemble modern herbivores like antelopes and move on seed wheels, which I wanted to make "more realistic" without the dive into more details of the original lore.
I decided to draw my own interpretation of this race, as mulefa are most often depicted with the same anatomy as vertebrates, although they should not have a spine or such.
So, in my interpretation, the mulefa could have descended from an octopus-like ancestor that uses a similar locomotion, but with one difference — it comes from bivalve locomotion, that is, compression of the flaps to create a jerk. In addition to the flaps, the creature has six main tentacles, which have a cartilaginous base of a "neck", "skull" and claws for preparing food, and additional, longer and narrower tentacles, "arms", convergent in function to the squid's tentacles and located on a separate "flap", not connected to the rest. On the skull of each tentacle there is a primitive pair of eyes and, in fact, the fleshy process itself, which extends far enough from the cartilaginous base. The jaws have a radula and a separate, longer tooth. The main brain is located inside the body between the valves. The head, tail, and limbs of the mulef are homologous to the tentacles of the ancestor, and the body consists of flaps, respectively. The base of the long tentacles grows to the posterior flap, which eventually divides the body into two segments with a subspecific junction. The "hands" of the mulef have the function of pushing off from the road surface and, consequently, acceleration/deceleration. All of the limbs of the mulef lost one of the jaws and eyes, while the other became the basis for a finger with a claw — with the exception of the head, in which they remained jaws and eyes, actually. The brain in the body has become secondary to the head center, plus the centers have been preserved in the limbs — this allows zalef (singular mulef) to automate the movement process and "not think while driving."
6 years after I designed my first cover, and illustrating each chapter of Northern Lights, I've finally designed one for the Amber Spyglass. I've been trying for basically this whole time to work out a design that I liked, with so many failed attempts. Where the first had leaned heavily into Art Nouveau, and then the Subtle Knife was very much inspired by Art Deco, I felt stuck trying to find a style that worked. I only had a break through when I looked instead to other book covers, and found one that felt like it had elements of both styles. And finally, here we are.
I had a lot of key details that I wanted to include. No Name, the Gallevespians and their Dragonflies (even at a3 size they were so tiny that their faces took multiple attempts to get right, especially Tialys). The Clouded Mountain was difficult to get right too. I really like the symbolism of the bench separating Lyra and Will, cutting off the edges of their sections, and that their daemons are separated from them by the lines of their sections.
If you notice behind the bench, the bushes are filled with the red berries that they feed to each other, showing how close their moment of connection is to their moment of final separation. I really wanted a scene from the mulefa world too, and to try and show the hugeness of the wheel trees.
I wanted Roger and the other ghosts to stand out from everything else, hence their cold, dark look with everything else warm and inkeeping. The exception being the crowds of ghosts as they climb up towards the opening to become part of the universes again.
The side borders have little icon-like nods to moments and items, the locket of Lyra's hair, the powder that Ama uses to wake her, and the bats (the scene with the monkey and the bat left a huge impression on me as a kid). The angel, Father Gomez' beetle daemon, and the Arctic Fox that speaks with the cliff-ghasts.
I am incredibly proud of the work and sheer amount of love that I put into this piece. 6 years of intention and I finally have something that I truly love. Well worth the wait.
Having watched Project Hail Mary, I think I can safely say I just love good, truly alien aliens and stories about first contact with them. Which is very clearly why I also love the Mulefa parts of HDM.
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Day 5: Binoculars
His Dark Materials
The Mulefa
Surely there are other spec bio nerds that grew up on the books incensed about how miserably they did the mulefa in His Dark Materials, right??? I know I'm late to the game here but my god what an unbelievable disappointment
