Vance Mulligan Fen

Let's grab tail for mama!

Let's slime on mama!

Aepyentophagus akerkos, also called Actinids!

This is another instalment of creature design! Actinids exist in the same world as Chimers (which I posted a few days ago, go check it out if you haven't seen it!), but are much bigger, standing at around 5ft/152cm tall. There are two types of Actinids, each with complex social and even political structures (I won't get into this until I have art to show for it, so let me know if you are interested and I can draw it!)

Actinids are known to be impatient and rude at times, as they have few natural predators and do not fear much. However, they have a deep curiosity for other intelligent animals, and have been known to copy traits of other species.

Their name is derived from ancient greek! Despite looking like a kiwi, they were actually modelled after giant anteaters and elephant birds! "Aepy" is derived from "Aepyornis" - a genus of elephant bird, and "entophagus" translates to "insect-eater" (a nod to giant anteaters, aka myrmecophages). "Akerkos" translates to "tailless." This is the tailless species of actinids, which are the most common in their world.

Cambaroides recussus - informally known as Chiming Crayfish, or (more frequently) Chimers! I have recently fallen in love with creature design and realised I haven't posted to tumblr in ages...

This little beast was designed as a bell in an underground magical world! I was inspired by the Slipper Lobster, which is the second photo here (i think they are very cute), with the colours more inspired by a mantis shrimp.

Their binomial comes from Latin, with the root of "Cambaroides" being a family of crayfish, and "recussus" being the Latin word for reverberating. Reverberating crayfish!

If you look closely, in the front under the semitranslucent pincers, you can see a long red plate, and a curved stick with a ball at the end. This is inspired by a vibraslap! These are fun percussion instruments that can be shaken and they will produce a vibrating sound. I wanted to go with a less conventional style of bell noise, so I looked through a list of percussion instruments until I found a sound I liked.

"The Question" - A small bird ponders whether or not to eat the delectable glowing berry.

This is one of my explorations into alien form life stages! The berries pictured here are known as Phoeberries ("FEE-berries") They grow in mossy forests close to the ground and do not pollinate. Instead, they rely on their berries' bioluminescent skin and small, swaying tendrils to entice predators to eat them, that they may spread seeds through the fecal matter of those animals.