Mars Base Alpha by Colin Doublier

Picture of the Day 19/02/2022 - Painting of several SpaceX Starship launch towers equipped with Mechazilla catch system in front of Mars Base Alpha by French urban artist Colin Doublier. More of his art here.

Elon's latest vision for Mars Base Alpha

During Starship update presentation on Thursday SpaceX CEO and lead designer Elon Musk shared to us SpaceX's latest vision for Mars Base Alpha. Here are some images from the animation.

Part of Mars Base Alpha is covered with a large, transparent dome:

Starships are landing on landing pads some distance away from the base:

Settlers arriving at Mars Base Alpha:

Animation of Starship landing at Mars Base Alpha shared by Elon:

SpaceX Starship update 2022

On February 10th SpaceX CEO and lead designer Elon Musk provided the latest update of SpaceX's Starship architecture. Here are slides and animations from his presentation.

Animation of Starship launch and arrival to Mars Base Alpha [updated on April 2023]:

Full presentation:

Slides from the presentation

Starship specifications:

Super Heavy booster specifications:

Mars Base Alpha animation by Slave Popovski

A short animation with SpaceX's Starship & 6x6 Cybertruck at Mars Base Alpha by former avionics engineer, now CGI artist Slave Popovski (known as pslavi) from Australia.

SpaceX Legacy: episode 1: Manned Mission to Mars

YouTuber iamVisual has started to produce animated short series about the legacy of SpaceX – the leading NewSpace company developing innovative and cost-effective rocket and space technologies, including the first fully and rapidly reusable rocket system – two-stage super heavy-lift Starship rocket. The 1st episode of the series visualizes first human mission to Mars. You can watch it here:

SpaceX Starship next to SLS rolling out of NASA's VAB by James Vaughan

Picture of the Day 25/11/2021 - SpaceX's full stack Starship Super Heavy rolling out of NASA's Vehicle Assembly Building (VAB) next to Space Launch System (SLS) rocket at Kennedy Space Center by American photographer and concept artist James Vaughan. More of his aerospace and defense concept art here.

SpaceX Starship at Mars Base Alpha by Caspar Stanley

SpaceX's Starship standing in front of a geodesic dome at Mars Base Alpha by Danish freelance 3D artist Caspar Stanley. It's quite likely the first crewed Starships sent to Mars and acting as temporary habitats for the first settlers will stay on Mars forever, forming the basis of Mars Base Alpha built around them, as can be seen in SpaceX's own renderings.

Starship spaceport at Mars Base Alpha

A futuristic vision of a Starman walking past spaceport at Mars Base Alpha in 2080 by YouTuber iamVisual. There are several SpaceX Starships and Starman's Tesla Cybertruck parked at the spaceport. We estimate such sight will be possible much sooner – in around 2040.

SpaceX Starship on Mars by Erik Corshammar

SpaceX's Starship standing proud on Mars with astronauts from the first human mission to the Red planet - a vision by Swedish space designer Erik Corshammar (Erc X). More of his art here.

Infographic of SpaceX Starship timeline by Ryan MacDonald

Exoplanet astronomer at Cornell University's Carl Sagan Institute Ryan MacDonald (known on social media as Martian Colonist) has created an infographic of SpaceX's aspirational timeline for Starship's first missions to the Moon and Mars.

We estimate realistically the timeline will slip for a few years with #dearMoon mission happening in 2025, Lunar Starship demo landing in 2026, humans returning to the Moon in 2027, first cargo mission landing on Mars in 2027 and first crew mission landing on Mars in 2031.

Starship Super Heavy launch pads at Mars City

As SpaceX's CEO Elon Musk has acknowledged, eventually Super Heavy booster stages for Starships could be manufactured on Mars as a launch platform for outer Solar system missions. Here is a vision of several Starship Super Heavy (in its 2016 design, then called Interplanetary Transport System) launch pads at Mars City's spaceport by US designer Casey Alexander.

"Mars City" is the name Elon Musk gave to SpaceX's future human colony on Mars (now referred to as "Mars Base Alpha") in some earlier presentations of SpaceX's Mars colonization architecture.

SpaceX Lunar Starship delivering cargo for Artemis Base Camp

SpaceX's Lunar Starship, selected to return humans to the Moon, delivering cargo and crew for NASA's Artemis Base Camp on the Moon's South Pole. Concept artwork created by US 3D artist Nick Henning.

Starman waiting to board a Starship flight

Picture of the Day 14/06/2021 - Starman waiting to board a SpaceX's Starship flight by Swedish space designer Erik Corshammar (Erc X). More of his art here.

A pair of SpaceX cargo Starships on Mars by Bart Caldwell

Picture of the Day 06/05/2021 - a pair of SpaceX's cargo Starships on Mars by American space artist Bart Caldwell, known as Neopork.

SpaceX successfully lands Starship SN15 test vehicle!

Today SpaceX for the first time successfully landed a Starship test vehicle - Starship SN15. In four previous attempts since December 2020 Starship test vehicles successfully performed launch and "skydiver" belly flop maneuver but exploded during the landing attempt (in case of SN8, SN9 and SN11) or soon after (SN10). Here is full footage of today's flight from SpaceX's official livestream.

Starship is the second (spacecraft) stage of the fully reusable two-stage super heavy-lift launch vehicle currently developed by leading NewSpace company SpaceX. The main purpose of building such a large rocket with more than double the power of Saturn V is to enable the colonization of Mars. But Starship will be capable to do a lot of different tasks – to place satellites or space stations in orbit, ferry passengers to space stations or the Moon and even ferry passengers or cargo between any destinations on Earth within an hour.

SpaceX Starship interior concept for 20 to 40 passengers by Paul King

British interior architect / designer Paul King has created his detailed concept of SpaceX's Starship interior layout for 20 (one shift) to 40 (two shifts sharing the same crew pods) passengers. Concept divides the pressurized living space into six 2.5m high levels (here shown from top to bottom).

Level 6 - Flight deck

Level 5 - Crew mess hall

NASA selects SpaceX Lunar Starship to return humans to the Moon

Today NASA announced it has selected SpaceX "to continue development of the first commercial human lander that will safely carry the next two American astronauts to the lunar surface" as part of the Artemis program. A year ago it was announced three contenders were selected to compete for this mission - SpaceX, Blue Origin's led "National Team" and Dynetics - and SpaceX revealed it is working for a lunar optimized Starship. Now we know SpaceX's proposal has won the race. In a milestone-based fixed-price contract SpaceX will be able to receive $2.89 billion to develop the Lunar Starship. The year when SpaceX needs to land humans back to the Moon is not specified yet.

In addition to today's announcement, NASA shared latest official render of SpaceX's Lunar Starship which slightly differs from last year's version:

First humans on Mars

Young Irish 3D artist Matthew Ryan has created a stunning animation of a SpaceX's Starship getting people from Earth to Mars for the first time ever. Here is the final scene with a group of Starmen disembarking from Starship on Mars:

Full animation here:

SpaceX Starship interior concept for 100 passengers by Joseph Lantz

Joseph Lantz has created his concept for the interior layout of SpaceX's 100-passenger Starship (the passenger capacity goal stated by Elon Musk). Therefore this concept isn't meant for the first crew Starships on Mars used as temporary habitats for the first few years (those first Starships will have much smaler crew). The concept divides the pressurized living space into 8 decks (here shown from top to bottom) and follows a common design choice of a central stairway through all the decks.

Deck 8 - Observation

Astronaut relaxing near a SpaceX Starship spaceport

Picture of the Day 30/03/2021 - Astronaut leaning against his Mars rover derived from a retro car near a SpaceX Starship spaceport by American video game concept artist Darren Bacon in collaboration with parody account Bored Elon.