First Snow

At first glance I thought this was a pretty neat sci-fi image. The composition is very good, and the artist know how to guide your eyes thru his visuals. An overall feeling of emptiness (the bare rocks and no sign of life anywhere), loneliness (am I stuck on this planet? Who left me there?) and unwelcoming atmosphere (the mountains look icy and cold) is the first thing I register.
But then, as your eyes go exploring you notice a small beacon on top of the the most prominent mountain. There is life after all! Perhaps I am not stuck here anyway? Perhaps I live here...I may even be on a trip exploring this planet?
I always love when an artwork tells more than just the apparent story, and this one does so very well.
But the single detail that sucked me into this image, was the small planet or moon situated between "my" planet, and the large Earth-like planet in the back.
That globe makes the whole picture 3-dimensional, believable and lifelike.
The only hickup I have are the distant white mountains and their surrounding white "glow", atmosphere or mist.
They look like they don´t really belong.
Other than that, this is a great piece of artwork that looks like an image pulled out of the NASA archives 2167 A.D.