studiomcah
Art • Books • Writing
Community for science fiction and fantasy author/artist M.C.A. Hogarth.
Interested? Want to learn more about the community?
November 10, 2021
D-Per History, and Updates on Alysha Gorn Book

Spent a big chunk of yesterday pawing through references to D-pers, doing math, and writing their history, which you can find on the wiki here:

https://peltedverse.org/wiki/index.php/D-Pers

I'm pretty sure I didn't make any continuity errors. Feel free to point any out, or ask me to clarify anything, it'll help.

(Most interesting takeaway there: Crispin's problem happened only 20 years before Alysha was born, which means there are people with normal lifespans alive who remember it during the most recent canon.)

Most random page creation recently, because I realized I referred to this offhand in Earthrise and never said another word about it, so...
https://peltedverse.org/wiki/index.php/Crown_Luggage


I found the initial sketch for the cover of Alysha 6, so I'm attaching that... needs a lot of clean-up, but I think it's a good concept, so I'll put that on my to-do list Just In Case.

I'm also trying to figure out what to NAME the book, because it's still labeled in my files as 'Alysha Gorn'. I've been trying to get onto a themed streak with the Alysha books: 'Sword of the Alliance' 'Faith in the Service,' 'In the Line of Duty,' etc. But this one is more exploration/mysterious aliens stuff, not military stuff, so I'm kind of defaulting to Star Trek-like-sounding things:

  • The Sargasso Incident (or The Sargasso Mission)
  • Hijacked! (riffing on really ancient Star Trek novels with that one)
  • Mutiny at Birdsong (stretching with this one)
  • The Killed Worlds (sounds more like horror)

I'm not in love with any of them yet. Suggestions always welcome. Yes, even without your having read the books. Maybe something someone says will combine in my head in a good way, you never know...!

post photo preview
Interested? Want to learn more about the community?
What else you may like…
Videos
Podcasts
Posts
Articles
October 27, 2021
Cursive Practice Video, to Relax

Or at least, I intend it to be relaxing. Hopefully it delivers.
4:22 minutes

Materials:

00:04:27
Overview of the First Oil Paint Experiment

In which I talk about the paper, the paint, and the experience of oils versus gouache. Fun stuff, will do more.

Thank you Locals supporters! Your contribution to my art war chest here is what's powering these experiments and videos. For now I'm keeping them public but I may start doing some subscriber-only videos if you all are interested.💖

00:03:35
Video Review: Oil Painting Papers

My initial review on receipt of the three oil paper products I ordered: the Canson pad, the Rembrandt block, and the Arches single sheets.

00:01:54
November 09, 2021
Alysha Misc

Thanks for your comments yesterday on the business post... all very provocative, in a good way. I'll try to respond to all of them today.

Some Alysha misc now, since I'm gearing up for the results of the Kickstarter!

Petrov is giving away coupon codes for every book in the Alysha series (and has some leftover coupons for Marda and the business book). You can pick those up here (and please do! The books are bought already, someone should use them!) https://twitter.com/PetrovNeutrino/status/1457344535843987461

Our own @JudasComplex sent along a sample of the Faith in the Service audiobook, which I've attached for your delight! I... haven't had a chance to listen to it. Don't ask me about my past week and a half or so. Putting it here will guarantee I get to it.

After hearing the amused comments during the livestream, I went ahead and added all the ship type illustrations I have inked from the 90s to the wiki. Glory in the rampant adorableness of their anthropomorphic stylings! See those ...

Alysha Misc
The Jaguar's Heart 7: We Are Not a Monolith

A little comedy today, at least in the link. Transcript follows.


Hi, all. Welcome to this episode of The Jaguar’s Heart.

A while back I was introduced to a comedy sketch about Cuban coffee by a Mexican comedian, Gabriel Iglesias. ( The sketch begins with him greeting all his fellow Latinos and then backing up to say ‘but we’re all different, aren’t we’ which is a segue into a demonstration of how different Hispanics speak Spanish.

It is hilarious. First, because I am a Spanish speaker and a linguistics hobbyist, and his portrayal of various accents resonated with my experiences in trying to make sense of them myself… Not always easy, since from culture to culture, slang and accent are often totally different (and sometimes grammar! Spaniards use a grammatical construct that has died out in many other Spanish-speaking countries, the plural “you.”)

I also loved it because the Cuban coffee part is real. I grew up with Cubans. I know how we are....

The Jaguar's Heart 7: We Are Not a Monolith
The Jaguar's Heart 6: Hatespeech

One of the most common things I hear (and say) right now is "the asymmetry is the story." Here's one about how none of us are innocent of the sins we hate in others.


Hi, all. Welcome to this week’s episode of The Jaguar’s Heart.

It’s been weeks since the Baen’s Bar incident and I’m still thinking about it... because the longer I do, the more I feel, overwhelmingly, that it’s obvious that the problem is deeper than “this forum was saying stuff that offended us.” We have to back up to the glaring fact that people on opposite sides no longer consider each other human. Nothing I say will matter because the people disagreeing with me don’t think I’m human. They have denied my humanity; they have not bothered to listen to my beliefs, or have fake-listened to them in that way that people do when they’re so ready to prove you wrong that they’re only using your speech to provide talking points for their own ideas.

We have forgotten how to listen.

Increasingly, we have also ...

The Jaguar's Heart 6: Hatespeech
September 09, 2026
Wednesday Share: Blood and Ink

https://mcahogarth.org/gallery/image/141-2025-02-ShameAndCalligrapherMirrored

I found this one in the gallery while scanning and thought 'why haven't I finished this?' and Rabbit left a comment saying 'you should finish this!'

So I thought... I should at least clean up the sketch. I started to today!

Also sorry this was late today, I forgot it was Wednesday because of Monday being a holiday!

post photo preview
September 02, 2026
KH5 Draft is DONE!

https://mcahogarth.org/gallery/image/145-2026-08-ThirukediWithNakked

...so the Wednesday Share today is from the most recent sketchbook, of the time period the book is set in.

And that's all I got because this book took me 2 years to write (if you don't count all the time I spent messing around with ideas for it!) and I am so wrecked. I'm not even going to look at it for another month before starting edits. My projected publication date for this one will be October/November.

I am going to flop. -_-

If you're on the discord, I might do balance cards for people this week, so stop by if you want one!

Oh, and if you've read Counters of Stars and enjoyed it, can you leave a review for it on the store? I would really really appreciate it! No, seriously, the tank is so empty. Hearing 'This was great' will help. 🧡

September 01, 2026
Back in Time Tuesday: Ragna, Contemplative

I found the sketch for this piece while scanning art for the gallery and was reminded how much I liked this piece of Ragna, from Flight of the Godkin Griffin. It was one of the few pieces where I feel like I really nailed the concept of negative space, and made the white around the figure work with her instead of feeling conspicuously empty, as if I couldn't figure out what to put behind her.

This is also one of those pieces where I can talk about the fugitive nature of physical artwork, because not long after I painted it, the original was ruined! I was looking forward to selling it to a very excited buyer when I pulled it out and discovered that some kind of ink had bled all over it.

I still have it, so here's the damage:

I don't even know what caused it! But I was crushed when I discovered it, and unlike a lot of cases where I had a look at damage and thought "I can work with this", this time it just ruined the work for me completely.

Looking at it now after twenty years (!), I think I ...

Freebie Short: Tapa's Adventure

This one was originally published in Raconteur Press's anthology All Will Burn 3, the theme of which was "parents will do anything for their children." Most people went super-serious with that theme. I decided to go slapstick, and set this one in the Peltedverse. It's about the Guardkin, and eventually it will go in the Forecourt collection I'm planning. But for my locals supporters, here's your dose of fun for Friday!

Only for Supporters
To read the rest of this article and access other paid content, you must be a supporter
Read full Article
September 08, 2026
Present Time Tuesday: The First Qenain

Instead of going back in time with an image, I'm going back in time with a practice, which I uncovered while scanning all these sketchbooks: when convention season came 'round, I would try to finish a bunch of artwork to have new things to hang at the shows! And it created such delightful clusters of lovely work that I decided: well, hey, it's convention season again, I should do this thing!

Only for Supporters
To read the rest of this article and access other paid content, you must be a supporter
Read full Article
Nearing 6000 Images!
Gallery Update, August

I have been hard at work on the gallery and it’s time, thus, for an update! And I’m going to do it in stats because everyone loves numbers.

Overall:

  • 56% of the large format books are done

  • 5805 images in the gallery

  • 1897 (33%) have my commentary
    169 are finished pieces!

When I say “large format”, I mean the numbered sketchbooks that are 9x12 or larger. This total doesn’t count the mini-sketchbooks, high school sketchbooks, the remaining conlang notebooks (about 72 more books) or any of the loose artwork. But I figure I’ll jump those bridges when I get to them.

Now, some fun stats:

Top Characters So Far:

  • Me (!) – 267

  • Alysha – 191

  • Zafiil – 104

  • Vasiht’h – 99

  • Distant Song – 83

This probably reflects which books I’ve done so far more than popularity; I’ve done the “back” of the stack and the beginning of the stack but we’re missing large swathes of the middle. I’m curious to see how the character ratios change then… I’m guessing Alysha will remain popular but other characters will start pulling ahead.

Top settings (unsurprisingly):

  • Peltedverse: 1821

  • After this, Kherishdar and Jokka are tied if you count the language work for both.

Surprisingly, 168 pictures from World of Warcraft! So if you’re a gamer, you might want to hit that tag. Fun dark horse: Coracle, with 47 images uploaded so far. Only one book for Coracle, and yet!

Related: Spoiler images, at 53 uploads, comprise .9% of the total in the database right now. This is a good time to mention that when you create an account, all the warning tags are flagged by default so you don’t see those images; you have to manually uncheck them to see spoilers, questionable images, etc. I am here to protect you from accidental book trauma!

  • 194 titles say some form of ‘Probably’, ‘Maybe,’ or ‘I guess’

…which reflects that a lot of these books are decades old and my paper sieve memory does not resurrect my thought process at the time, especially with really loose sketches. Which brings me to:

Notes versus Sketches (and other developmental work):

  • Drawings: 93%

  • Notes: 1.5%

  • Language Notes: 3.8%

  • Maps, Floor plans, and Schematics: 72 images

Notes can be anything from timelines to worldbuilding scribbles to poetry to outlines! More of this resides in the mini-sketchbooks than the larger ones, but it’s fun to see the data I felt I needed a bigger page to explore. Also, it’s fun to see how much time I spend on maps and schematics. If you were ever curious about what items look like, or wanted to “walk through” a floor plan of some place I’ve written about more than once, you can definitely hit the database for that. (So can I! Very important!)

Finally, a ridiculous statistic:

  • 99 pages are sketches of horses

  • Absolute failures (10)

  • Sketches I liked (5)

  • Neutral: 84

I will continue drawing horses until morale improves. Someone else’s, because apparently I am almost never happy with my horse drawings.

When I sit back and think about the fact that I’m about halfway through archiving my art and it’s nearly 6000 images already… how… how many single people have 6000 useful images online in one place? What I’m doing is wild if I look at it too closely. So I don’t, I’m just gonna keep going. XD

Go make an account and have fun browsing!

Read full Article
See More
Available on mobile and TV devices
google store google store app store app store
google store google store app tv store app tv store amazon store amazon store roku store roku store
Powered by Locals