I missed a couple of walker Wednesdays there, so here’s a lovely bit of Lego fan art. It’s one of the German scout walkers from Chapter 18 of Leviathan:

Cool, huh? It’s by Jonathen Haney.

It makes me stupidly happy that this piece is roughly the same scale as the Lego Stormwalker I showed you here back in January, because they both use the same-size little Lego peoples! So they could, like, fight each other.

I have much more Leviathan fan art waiting to get shown, so here are a couple of bonus pieces. WARNING, some have been ganked from the internets without permission!

Here’s Deryn, as drawn by Deviant Art’s Comicker Girl:

In terms of composition, these are taken pretty much straight from the book, which makes it kind of interesting to see how the two drawing styles differ. I like how all the clothing details pop in this version.

Here’s Alek and Deryn, by Deviant Art’s Polymath13:

I assume this is Chapter 35, where Alek tells Deryn how his parents met. The funny thing is, Keith and I had considered illustrating this scene. But it got very tricky, emotion-wise, which is why we went with the more abstract pocket watch image. It’s great to see someone draw this sort of missing scene.

And now for you Midnighters fans, this is a lovely piece by giuly chan, a little ariel kissing between Jonathan and Jessica:

Make sure to click here for a bigger version.

Many of you didn’t know much about steampunk before reading Leviathan. So I should salute you for your bravery (and faith in me as a writer), because you forged ahead and read it anyway. Yay, you.

But even now, some of you possibly don’t realize how big steampunk is. It has books and bands and games, along with a huge visual culture of jewelry shops, clothing stores, mad inventors, sculptors, and artists. Enough to fill a museum.

Um, literally. Below is a video from the Oxford Museum of the History of Science, which is currently hosting a steampunk exhibition that looks positively awesome.

For all you in the UK, it’s on until February 21. If I could make it, I would totally be there.

Enjoy here, or head over to YouTube to see it in slightly larger form.

Hey, and there are more videos from the show here.

It’s Saturday here in Australia, but it’s always time for Fan Art Friday! Especially when we have such awesome Leviathan-inspired art.

Check out this beautiful Lego Stormwalker from Sam Hinz:

Yes, that’s Alek, Volger, and Klopp (left to right) hanging out at the bottom of the picture.

And now some more glorious views:

And here, for reference, is Keith’s original version:

Okay, that was awesome. Lego Leviathan, anyone?

First thing:
A few months ago we installed a Forum here on the Westerblog, and people have been gradually populating the threads. But it was recently suggested to me that we have a meet-up, where new people can sign on and be guaranteed a big group of online welcomers.

This sounds awesome to me, so I am announcing the first WesterForum Meet-Up. In fact, I’ll be joining in the discussions if possible.

Here are the times and dates, depending on where you are in the world:

(Update: The western US/Canada time was wrong; now it’s right.)

USA/Canada
Saturday, January 9th, 2010
7PM Eastern/4PM Western

Australia
Sunday, January 10th, 2010
11AM Eastern/8AM Western

Europe
Sunday, January 10th, 2010
1AM CET/Midnight UK, GMT

(Okay, I admit that this time sucks for Europe. Next time we’ll do better for the fans there. Sorry.)

The meet-up doesn’t have an end-time, and of course the Forum is always open, so feel free to start a little early, and we’ll see how long it goes.

How do you get there? Click FORUM on the big menu at the top of this site. Then sign up so you can use the forums. It’s EASY!

Hope to see you all there!

Second thing:
I’ve been finding some amazing Leviathan fan art on Deviant Art. Check this out, from Dante-D:

This is wicked cool, seeing Deryn and Tazza hanging out together, and in a style that’s so different from Keith’s, while still capturing the same characters.

And here’s Count Volger, from Konira Thax, also on Deviant Art.

Also a totally different style, but still rocking the character.

A quick request: I don’t have a Deviant Art account, so I couldn’t message these two artistes and tell them I was ganking their stuff. Could someone please forward my thanks, and mention this post? Cheers.

Keep the Leviathan fan art coming, and see you at the Meet-Up!