I sat down to process orders today and made a stunning discovery.

An order from Chile was unusual enough—I ship to Australia and the UK and Canada all the time, but other international destinations are more rare.  My interest was piqued immediately, but when I clicked the order to start printing shipping labels and such, I was absolutely floored.

The Gemini Observatory is one of the most important observatories working today.  They hold the honor of taking the first image of a directly observable exoplanet. They produce images you have almost certainly marveled at, and the chances that their images made up some of my reference material during the creation of the Deep Map Pilots illustrations are very high.  My father is a science fiction novelist and my grandfather was a NASA engineer.  This is, personally and professionally, huge.

I just told Warren.  He said, and I quote, “That is INCREDIBLE.”

They ordered complete sets of both the photos and the postcards, but they’re going to be getting a lot more than that.  I owe them big.  We all do.  And the fact that they like my art enough to buy it, well.  I’m sorry, there seems to be some stardust in my eye.

EDIT: I also got an order from someone at MIT.  Honestly, this makes it all worthwhile.