Arthropoda(Ar-THROP-a-duh) is located in the Trifid Nebula of the Sagittarius arm of the Milky Way galaxy, one of a handful of Outer System planets discovered by the flurry of Andromeda probes launched during the mid-21st century. Slightly smaller than Earth (6,000 miles in diameter), it is a mineral gift basket but has a climate hostile to humans, with a toxic atmosphere and intense heat.

Most humans agree that sending the Nightcallers there was a stroke of genius, since the bugheads love nothing better than mining and tunneling and were perfectly happy to have their own planet, where they could bask in the heat of three suns and breathe that sweet sulfuric acid and carbon monoxide.

Arthropoda is rich in a number of important minerals not found on Earth, mostly crystal compounds and superconductive ceramics which have revolutionized Earth technology. They are also at the heart of Weevil technology, although the way each world uses these materials is quite different.

The planet has an extremely hard crust and very little free surface water except at the equator, which is banded with extensive swamps and steamy lakes. Most Weevil cities are located in or near "Camp Swampy", as the Great Swamps are called, because as far as Weevils are concerned, the hotter the better!

Beneath the surface, the entire planet is riddled with a treacherous, uncharted network of tunnels and caves known as the Honeycombs. It's worth a Weevils's life to go wandering around down there unguided, although they provide important access in many of the mining operations.

Many of the place names on Arthropoda, as well as the names of its seven moons, reflect the Weevils' high regard for what is considered Earth's Golden Age, the late 20th century. They, like humans, look back on this period as a high point of Earth culture, and aren't ashamed to show it! The names of the seven moons are Truckstop, Mallrat, Marilyn, Ringo, Cheeseburger, Walt, and Apple.

It is the only planet revolving around a pair of binary stars, named Alborak, for the prophet Mohammed's white steed, and Pegasus, the winged horse of Greek myth. A third star, Rosinante, named for Sancho Panza's broken-down nag in the story of Don Quixote, moseys along in an irregular outer orbit, making this a more-or-less three-star system.

While there are cycles of light and dark, there is never what could be called "night" on Arthropoda. When evening comes, the pale green sky turns the color of burnished bronze, and the horizons take on a golden glow. A few stars can be seen, but not many. And in every Weevil city, town, farm and mining camp, when the day's work is done, Weevils sing their cacaphonous and droning songs until daylight comes.

That sounds like a very engaging world!
In the Arthropoda flag, I like the reference to the Gadsden flag ... at least I *think* the motto refers to the Gadsden flag. It might be a little more obvious if you coil the centipede like the snake in the other flag?

That's interesting! It's definitely a reference to the motto but I was unaware that the flag I was thinking of said "Join or die", I kind of mushed them together in my imagination.

The Gadsden flag says "Don't Tread On Me". Ben Franklin's first editorial cartoon ever in a US newspaper said "Join or Die."

Here's a test showing the planet rotating, with two of its seven moons. I don't know which two! I got to playing with spherical decals but I think I'm going to redo this with more-detailed decals eventually.

Looks cool, Gerry!

I like that! Is that displacement or bump?

I'm thinking that planet could benefit from being less perfectly spherical somehow.

Thanks guys! It's a displacement and a color map. Interesting that you say that Robert, because the drawings I've always used of the planet are more squashed and not perfectly spherical. But I want to refine the maps primarily, and figure out how to make it look more like astronomical photography and less like your rocket ship logo. (no offense!) I need to look at some of the videos of planets that are around. But I think having the moons circle it helps a lot.

On the subject of the moons circling, the way I did this was to give the moons a path constraint, constraining them to circular paths that are part of the planet model. But I think I'll change that and have the moons be part of the planet model, give each moon a bone centered inside the planet, and rotate each bone to achieve the orbiting. I think that will give me more control over varying the orbit speeds. Achieving the variation with the path constraints, even with two moons, got a little confusing. On the other hand, I did this test *fairly* quickly.

EDIT: Robert, when you said less spherical, did you mean it in terms of making it more ellipsoid, or "lumpier"?

I figured you were going for a more painterly look rather than astronomical. I was thinking lumpier, like with pieces of papier maché hanging off it.

Oh that's interesting! I'll have to think about it! I was going for the look of my drawings of the planet, where there's an obvious, almost cartoony relief to the surface. I may exaggerate that even more, but I'll take your suggestions into account.

Here's a little fun I had with my planet animation and John Bigboote's flag waving .prj!

Oooo...LOVE the planet and background look! It has a wonderful old film type look.

The coloring of the flag looks too CG, too pure, too bright, in comparison to the background, for my taste. I think it would look more consistent, if the flag colors were desaturated, toned down some so that it didn't look like it came from 2 different animations. Adding some "distress" or cloth texture (bump) might be all that's needed?

But then again, from what I've noticed (from memory) the rest of your animation seems to have very saturated colors. So the brighter flag may suit your animation.

Wow ,that is cool ////looking forward to more!

Thanks for the comments, folks. Nancy, that's a good suggestion, although at the very least I think I would turn off the specularity that John Bogboote had on the original animation. that makes it look like vinyl. But giving the flag more texture somehow isn't a bad idea. I do want some contrast between the "old" look of the planet and the "new" interpretation of the flag though. All still open for adjustment!

Hey nancy, I'm re-rendering the waving flag with a slight, large-scale roughness setting, and reduced the decal strength to 80% and it's looking a lot more natural.