Blooming Desert Flower and A Space Tourist's Last Ride by a Long Shot
A couple of small concept sketches about how to capture the demise of a wealthy space tourist on his way back to Earth.

Id and Ego Babble

This impulse watercolor didn't leave me sad. I wasn't sure how this would turn out considering I don't know how to paint the masses of thorns. Screw the thorns. That's what I did -- left them out. Is this a well thought out composition? No. Don't care. I enjoyed this even with all its flaws. It was fun. Next time pay more attention to color. I could have warmed the cactus green and cooled the ammo box green a bit better. There's, like, 103 things to keep in my head each time I pick up the brush. Chill. Would it hurt to make friends with a bit more color, vibrancy? That's all I'm saying. I'm scared of color and I don't know why.

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Title

Blooming Desert Flower and A Space Tourist's Last Ride by a Long Shot

Description

The reference image had thick batches of thorns throughout and I'm not sure how to paint those in. Anyway. Bits of progress. And a lucky guy bagged a billionaire. On accident. Because when you sight in a rifle atop a desert ridge amidst blooming cacti, the beautiful scenery can be a distraction. I'll be excited when I can paint such scenes.

Image

600x size: An unplanned hedgehog cactus and box of ammo in watercolor. I wanted to paint a cactus, then added the ammo box. Not a bad attempt.

Date

Thursday, December 04, 2025

Modified

Saturday, February 07, 2026

Previous Versions

A couple of small concept sketches about how to capture the demise of a wealthy space tourist on his way back to Earth.

Id and Ego Babble

This is my second attempt at concept sketches before I jump in. And? I get why this is helpful. It's still difficult to be methodical when all I want to do is make stuff. I'll improve faster with methods. But I want to be awesome NOW! Look. This exercise helped prevent you from spending time on ideas that might not have worked. Yeah, yeah, yeah. The final concept of the cactus and box of bullets is probably more my speed.

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Inspiration

Blooming Desert Flower and A Space Tourist's Last Ride by a Long Shot

ABF Newswire: December 04, 2025

ARIZONA, December 04, 2025 (ABF Newswire) Randy Mazurek didn't expect to bag a billionaire when sighting in his rifle and that's exactly what happened.

According to his own account, Randy, training for an upcoming long range rifle competition, was perched on a ridge with his rifle for target practice. A sudden involuntary sneeze at the exact wrong moment triggered a round to fire off toward the landing sight of a space capsule which had just landed. For the poor billionaire who stepped out of the capsule at the wrong time, a quick death as the bullet ripped through his chest.

"I pick that spot because there's some lovely cacti that I sometimes catch during a bloom. Like today!" Randy shared. "After the shot, I slung my rifle and headed down to the scene. The security detail were obviously startled and had their weapons out and pointed in the general direction of where I was. Thankfully, they didn't see me as a threat."

Dominic Townsend, head of the space tourist company's security, greeted Randy with a grin and commented "you bagged a billionaire."

"Accidentally," Randy replied.

"Yes. Accidentally," reassured Dominic.

The investigation concluded that the death was an accident by stray bullet.

The deceased was an executive for a Silicon Valley surveillance company that recently won a US government defense contract. The company's product is simple: it vacuums up everything already known about you, including your bank transactions, medical records, social media posts, browsing history, location data, and whatever data brokers have been quietly selling about you for years. The data is stored in a searchable dashboard any government analyst can pull up in seconds. No warrant required. Following the news of the executive's death, shares dropped two percent before recovering on reassurances from the board that the existing government contracts would be unaffected.

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