For the Oniaka control tower, I thought it would be cool to have a two-tiered structure, where the top half has views out to space above the dome to monitor external goings-on. Below that is the lower half, which angles down to monitor things inside the dome. Inside the lower half, the main control arm can rotate along a central axis to give it full 360-degree access to the various stations ringing the control room.
I’d love to take credit for the cool translation balloons, but I can’t. I saw it used in another comic, Tech Jacket (written by Robert Kirkman), and I thought it was a really elegant way of conveying both an alien tongue and the translation.
That is a cool translation trick.