Celestial Surface: A texture born from trash. A technique born from frustration.
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This is one of my oldest “asteroid textures,” created in 1995—long before SDL InnerSpace had a name. It’s never been used in any work, but it’s stayed with me for decades. Why? Because it was a moment of discovery.
I was deep in a series of planetary images, struggling to create a plausible surface texture. Everything felt too deliberate, too artificial. In a moment of irritation, I opened a “test document”—a trash page filled with circles, splashes, lens flares, and random shapes—and applied an emboss filter. No expectations. Just a click.
And this emerged.
It was an aha moment. A revelation that textures don’t always need to be built—they can be found. This accidental creation didn’t make it into the series I was working on, but it shaped the technique I used for all the textures that did. It taught me to save my trash, to recycle chaos into form. And it’s why you’ll find impasto-like “artistic renditions” in SDL InnerSpace too—because sometimes, a filter on a forgotten scrap is all it takes.
This piece is a tribute to that moment. To the accidents that become methods. To the trash that can become treasure.
Nothing AI-generated. No synthetic spirit here. Just human-crafted space nostalgia.
