You need to pick better places to sleep

Top: Silk/Dart hybrid

Bottom: Hive/Dart hybrid

Dart/Hive hybrid, based on the common picturewing dragonfly

Hive/Silk, based on blue mud daubers

Left: Flash/Silk hybrid

Right: Flash/Dart hybrid

Silk/Hive hybrid, based on the glasswing butterfly. The ref I found might have been a camera error/specific lighting or angle for the wings to turn pink and blue but it happened enough times that was like “hold up, I can use this”

Top: Dart/Hive hybrid

Bottom: Flash/Hive hybrid

And last but not least, the Dart/Leaf hybrid, using my alternate LeafWing design. Oh, there we go, next art I post will be them (even tho I kinda already did).

I got a really good idea, though it’ll take some time to finish. Hopefully you’ll like it!

Also, everyone seemed to really like the AntWings! I wanted to include them here but felt their food magic would often mess up the secondary wings (unless…)

You get to see their capitol city tho right next to the Dart/Leaf’s tail :)

It’s also in my blog banner!

I've had this infographic kicking around for a while and it's one of the better ones I've made. The lines next to the dragons' heads are intentional and show how the sizing works! They measure the Worker's skull and counting how many each dragons' face is long tells you what class they are :)

Our stars are:

Worker class: Eight (formerly/technically known as Worker Q-984) Supermajor class: E-67 (nicknamed "Grumpy" by Eight) Alate class: Alate Atta (not A Bug's Life reference, she's named after the taxonomical genera Atta for leafcutter ants, which is also possibly what the movie character is named after too :) Queen class: Queen Trapjaw (as soon as I created the tribe I knew I needed to name someone after trapjaw ants, and the Queen seemed like a perfect fit!)

If you read the names and are a little confused why some of them have numbers... you can read the book to find out :)

If you don't want to, the short non-spoiler answer is: the AntWings are a big tribe and desperate times call for desperate measures. Instead of individual names that run the risk of running out of unique options, dragonets are assigned number designations. It's a "better" system anyway as you can instantly tell a dragon's age based on their identification; the letter prefix corresponds with their generation and the number is when the individual hatched. There are 1000 dragons in each generation with a new one born each year. In the 50th year of the war the youngest adult generation is Generation Q (7 years old) and the most recently hatched generation is Generation W (1 year old).

So one day I was minding my own business until I got the random idea to try making an ant-based Pantala tribe. No problem, I thought, it would be a fun exercise.

5 years and 3 books later:

SUPERMAJOR (carnivorous diet, soldier build)

WORKER (vegetarian diet, majority population)

From a glance you might have seen these two and been like "what the heck is going on"? Allow me to introduce the main gimmick of the AntWings: depending on what they eat, they grow to different classes!

Part of this gimmick is that, once a dragon is seven years old, they are done physically growing. Workers will stay the same size their whole lives, as will Supermajors, who are three times as large as a Worker.

ALATE (vegetarian diet + LOTS of "Royal Jelly")

Alates are the princess/princes of the tribe. If you guessed any AntWing could be an Alate by their diet alone, you are correct! Dragonets are essentially blank slates that can grow into any class. I haven't formally decided but I would say that within two years the "choice" becomes set in stone and switching diets abruptly might result in undersized wings/dragons that are bigger than they should be. I never considered this because the AntWing tribe during the time of Alate Atta is very... controlled but a way the biology could probably work is that, depending on what diet the dragnets start on, their digestive systems quickly "lock" into it so their brain/body will only recognize that as a food source. Everything else will seem gross/not provide the proper nutrients.

The exception to this is AntWing "Royal Jelly", a special mix mainly consisting of sugar that is used to make Alates and Queens (as a Queen can only be made from an Alate).

And if you read the word "choice" there and wondered if the dragonets get a say... no :D That's a running theme in the story, so I am aware. I am also aware they likely never will have a choice beyond what their parents allow since they would be too young to understand. I never said it was a nice system.

QUEEN (omnivore + Royal Jelly)

The Queen caps this system off with the largest build of all. Four times the size of a Worker, she is the most powerful class with strength to rival a Supermajor's. She would be no match against a horde of them, however, and so her pheromones have the ability to be so strong they are practically mind control. If any Worker or Supermajor smells her fear they would drop everything to protect her. Alates have a weaker version of this ability.

Yes, she has wings, but with how large she is she would probably have a very hard time doing so. She wouldn't always be this size, however, and probably not even by the time she is seven.

This is a symbolic remnant of real queen ants who break their wings off when they find a place to start their colony. The diet system was created with real ant classes in mind, where you will find mostly workers, a good chunk of large soldiers, prince/princesses during mating season and, obviously, the queen herself.

Lastly, as I mentioned earlier, Alates are the only class that can turn into a Queen. The Royal Jelly they eat keeps them open to receiving meat in the event the old Queen dies and a new one has to be made. From there, she would gradually grow until she reaches Queen size.

There is absolutely no science involved in this process, lmao, it's just my silly food magic system. But it sounded fun!

~4 years old / darker scales

lighter, softer scales / < 1 year old

One thing all AntWings share, however, is the fact that they all hatch with soft pale scales. Real ant larvae are like this too, and as they mature they grow proper limbs and hard exoskeletons. To simulate this, dragonets hatch early with softer scales than adult AntWings. It is a gradual process, but by the time they are physically mature their scales are done developing too.

Adults call dragonets 'Softies', which many take as an insult cuz they wanna grow up and stop being called kids, damnit! Technically, Softie can be used affectionately but a lot of the time it is condescending, ironically used by newly mature AntWings to say they are all grown up now, thank you, stop babying me! >:(

(Far right) Many talons are good for multitasking

The other main gimmick for AntWings is six legs! Not only are they crazy strong, they also have an extra set of front legs to lift things with. They can be used individually or synchronized in sets.

Antennae can be used to track and communicate (....FOOD.... THIS WAY...)

AntWings have the best sense of smell of any tribe, Pyrrhia or Pantala, because of their antennae. They can do just about anything with them. Just like how FlashWings can sense a dragon's heart pulse AntWings could tell you how old you are and where you live based on your smell alone. Even if they've never met you!

Supermajors are the soldier class, built for fighting for and protecting their tribe. They have huge tusks, extra armoured scales, a larger build, more fire in their tail organs and - oh yeah, the whole reasons the AntWings exist!

[1] Strong muscles squeeze liquid out hard enough to cramp - so there is none sucked back in

[2] Sometimes, if the muscles are too weak or the liquid is ignited at the wrong time, it can travel back into the organ and explode

When making this tribe I was trying to decide what type of ant to base its abilities on (or if it should even be one). And then I wondered what would Pantala look like - the tribes, the history, the continent itself - if they had access to fire?

And thus the true AntWings were born: strong, six-legged dragons with the ability to shoot fire from their tails. Like the insects they are based on they are hard-working, intelligent, and a force to be reckoned with when they work together. I never sat down and made a proper timeline but lets just say things like scavengers and the Othermind were... dealt with.

[1] The liquid AntWings shoot from their tails is based on fire ants' formic acid spray. I think that's what it's called, it's been a while since I watched AntsCanada (if you know the YT channel, hello!). It is actually two chemicals that, when mixed together and exposed to oxygen, becomes highly flammable. If a spark is introduced to the equation there will be flames.

[2] To keep this ability from being too OP I made the method of using it very painful (so they don't use it willy-nilly, only as a last resort) and technically with the change of permanent disfigurement. If they mess up even once the entire organ can explode and never regrow. This way, AntWings can be dangerous if provoked (with a healthy reason to be certain they want to use their ability in the first place) and flamesilks are not rendered pointless by their existence.

And that's it I hope you liked the manifestation of my teenage ant obsession :D

SYKE rapid fire lore drops: - AntWings have tusks because I didn't want to do splitting jaws but wanted a way to honour ant mandibles. This was the result. Supermajors can do some pretty neat tricks like skewering dragons on them :) - Their spines only go halfway to mimic lion names! - The dark stripe under their eyes is something every AntWing has, so they can see properly on the savannah like cheetahs!

I think these were requested by my sister too? They were a bit easier to make ideas for than the DartWings, but if I remember correctly it took a bit before I realised how I could actually use them.

I looked up images of fireflies, using both adults and larvae as inspiration for the scale patterns. I admit they're not the best in some places (not just because this is a quick sketch) but it's the vibe that counts and they get like 90% of it. I might show the bases I made for the Pantalan tribes after the AntWings so you can get a sense of the colours I used, though I might want to redo them!!!

"Antenna used to sense changes in electric currents"

It took embarrassingly long to arrive to electricity being their thing but I kept being dissatisfied with the FlashWings' main thing. For a long time all they had was their light which didn't have any combat uses (besides communication or distractions like Tsunami in book 2).

I knew they didn't need to be a combat-heavy tribe, that isn't their vibe but I wanted them to have some sort of natural weapon that could keep up with the other tribes. Bugs are so awesome and BUG DRAGONS have to have cool abilities.

So when I landed on incorporating electricity into how their light works... well, let's just say it was a lightbulb moment-

"[referring to the rattle-like growth at the end of the FlashWing's tail] contains a biochemical that glows when stimulated by electric pulses"

Most common colours: Yellow, yellow-green, green Common colours: Red, orange Least common: Blue

"Electric organ at base of tail; interior placement, but can affect others with physical contact"

Yeah, fireflies can glow blue. They're called ghost fireflies! And if any of you read AAA... :)

This was my lightbulb moment. Technically one of two. I liked the idea of FlashWings being as unassuming as RainWings (not as big as the other tribes, not very scary-looking) but very deadly if they have a reason to be via their electric organ. Low pulses simply make the chemical in their tail organs glow but a strong enough pulse can stun or kill dragons if placed correctly.

Leftmost: "Beetle-winged; primary wings are opaque & secondary are transparent resembling beetle carapaces"

Rightmost: "FlashWings were the first to discover how to revive "dead" dragons"

Both of those statements are my loaded guns in this post. That and how FlsshWing tails work/why they evolved them. It's not what you'd expect! That being said, to keep myself from writing a giant essay I'll keep it brief.

In my AU, though it's not mentioned in the current fanfic (I could write another essay on this) "due to the term "beetle-winged" is a term to describe dragons like FlashWings that have a see-through pair of secondary wings. Even if Clearsight could have had enough children to breed her black scales into an entire tribe, the HiveWings and SilkWings are simply too evolutionally/visually different to come from the same tribe. I'll elaborate in a later post but, for now, in this AU BeetleWings were never a thing and instead a term to describe a dragon's looks-.

The second statement could be a story all on its own. Sensing electrical pulses with their antennae lets them do so many things with them, chief among them being sensing brain and heart activity. In the time period AAA is set in a lot of FlashWings are in the medical field and are essentially walking defibrillators. But they do CPR first cuz oxygenated blood shouldn't go to waste!!

A closer example of the term beetle-winged in action.

The left and and two images on the right are all examples of how FlashWings like to keep their tails between themselves and any threats (a trait they share with AntWings). In the top middle is an example of courtship/nuptial flights, something I didn't include in my fanfic but I thought was a nice addition here. This pair has chosen each other, symbolised with their entwined tails :)

"Can fly in any direction, even upside down"

DartWings are actually the third Pantalan fantribe I made. I think. I know my sister requested them, saying she wanted to see me do a tribe based on dragonflies. I didn't think it would be that interesting, but eventually I came up with a design I liked. I wasn't super crazy about them yet, but everything changed when the fanfic ideas attacked.

A public service announcement from me halfway through writing this post: I am yapping too much. Every screenshot I am holding in a rant about all my design/lore choices and while it's funny it WILL bloat this post. So I will try to limit myself to one paragraph per image and channel those essays into fun concept art pieces for you to enjoy instead!!

Alate Atta's Ascension, as a series, has my best worldbuilding but I kinda shot myself in the foot with this post because I wanna TALK ABOUT ALL OF IT AT ONCE.

So I'll write a list and draw art about it instead. I've wanted to do something like that anyway, this is just proper motivation!

"Sturdy, quickly regenerative bones mean most injuries are not debilitating."

A DartWing's wings before and after several wingboxing tournaments. Even in this mutilated state, as long as the membranes aren't too damaged a DartWing can fly reasonably well. The severity of the wing mutilation affects how accurately they fly, though modern tournament rules are quite good at mitigating injuries in the first place.

The next thing that took a while to pin down were the scale patterns. My first version wasn't very good, but one day when I was doodling a character I found a really awesome reference of a hawker dragonfly. Yes, that's right, for those of you that read: Hawker is the reason DartWings look the way they look! I think he was originally even a dragon version of a friend's OC, or his looks /some personality traits were inspired by their OC.

ANYWAY, I really liked the way the blues and greens looked on the hawker dragonfly so I simplified the shapes and stuck them on my dragons. The face was another tough spot and took a few more tries to get right, but I really like what I ended up with.

Once I became serious about including them in the story, it was really important to me that the DartWings visually felt like a part of Pantala. I took the shared traits of HiveWings and SilkWings (beaks and the scales surrounding their eyes) and tried to put my own spin on them. The friend's OC I mentioned inspired the look of the eye scale for Hawker and I liked it so much that I made it canon. The lopsided scale in the middle of the mouth references dragonfly mandibles, and when I was looking at close-up references I noticed some of them had tiny almost-antennas right in front of their eyes. Antennas didn't feel right for DartWings, but they did inspire the weird set of scales that come off their face. I did it for fun and ended up liking the silhouette it gave them, so I made it canon too!

To make this post I opened the first planning doc I made for my fanfic. I dumped and organised in this one and it was so interesting to look back and see what I kept and discarded. For example, one of the DartWings' traits was using their tails as clubs to stun opponents before delivering killing blows with their wings. I honestly should have kept it, as it gives the tail spikes a continued use, and I genuinely don't know why I forgot it haha. But they do have a purpose, one not seen in the fics, which is in the next pic:

"Hatchlings aquatic before metamorphosis [special arm scales] increase surface area for swimming / after 1 year / wing casing [and tail fluke-scales] dry and gills fall off"

DartWings are actually hatched fully aquatic! This is the same with real dragonflies, where they begin as aquatic larvae that hunt in the places they hatch. In my quest to justify my choice I came up with a few reasons that actually shaped a large part of their culture:

1) The shells are thinner. Thinner shells means less time to make and earlier laying times 2) Dragonets hatch before their wings are fully developed. I developed this as a blanket case headcanon for SilkWings too, except where their dragonets climb DartWings' swim. In the water, they have more buoyancy and aren't weighed down before their legs are strong enough to carry their weight. 3) The extended scales on the arms (originally a nod to the spiky look of many dragonfly legs) are used to increase surface area of their limbs for swimming 4) The bone spikes at the end of their tails are a base for large swimming flukes/scales, which remain in adulthood. Again this is where I should have kept the club-use, but forgot! 5) After a year, dragonets climb out of the water to shed. In this state, they are extremely vulnerable, but once their scales are fully dry they can burst out xenomorph-style.

(Technically, there is a way I can fix the tail issue, but no spoilers! >:))

Also I am NOT a scientist, I just like having fun. Half of the time I research and half of the time I'm winging it. Pun INTENDED-

Right: I played with a series of four poses showing DartWings' joy and skill at flight. Obviously, being based on dragonflies, they are the most acrobatic of any WoF tribe or any of my fantribes. SwiftScales are good at tight turns but they can't go in any direction like a DartWing can.

Left: A fun pose with a dragonet showing the attachment of the primary and secondary wings. Primary wings are like HiveWing wings where the membrane goes to where the shoulder joint meets the body. The membranes of the secondary wings are reinforced at the ends and are detached from the body, like a real dragonfly's.

DartWings' wings come in three variations: fully transparent, fully opaque, and any variation in between.

And that's all folks!

Technically not all, but this post would have been 5000 words if I hadn't stopped myself. I saved my rants and I will come back with more lore art on the fun stuff! I'll probably come up with a specific tag to connect all the posts for easy reading.

Otulissa (from Ga'Hoole)

Species: Spotted Owl, Strix occidentalis

Of all the designs I've done, I love Otulissa's the most, probably because it feels the most complete story/character wise. This is her around the time of the end of the series, after she has lost her eye and is all scarred and torn from years of battles. Around the fourth book she has the most startling but heart-wrenching character development, enough to make Soren blink trice. She started out really annoying, always going on about her ancestry and her knowledge. Imagine Hermione with Malfoy's 'my father will hear about this' attitude but it's 'did you know I'm related to this renowned wathertrix from a thousand years ago??'.

The third book also gives her some good development/character moments and it's also the same book the Chaw of Chaws forms. The Ga'Hoole tree encourages working together and watching these six owls actually do that was so cool. Otulissa played a cool part in it and it was the first time we got a hint of her acting like a normal owl.

Otulissa (the WOF version)

Tribe: full SwiftScale

Once again the coincidences work in my favour. In Ga'Hoole, spotted owls are extremely sensitive to pressure changes and the SwiftScale tribe has the best internal compass of all my fantribes. Their gray scales are perfect for any owl adaptation as I can simply mimic their design in greyscale, which as you can see LOOKS AMAZING. Sorry I just really like this design, I can't stop staring at it. SwiftScales also spend days flying over the sea, which fits with the weather interperetation chaw very well.

Ruby (from Ga'Hoole)

Species: Short-eared Owl, Asio flammeus

Ruby is awesome. The Pure Ones try to attack her cuz she's too young to fly? She flies anyway. And then I thought it was so cute how she's an amazing flier and then has 0 brain for academics. It's a typical sporty type of characterisation, but I liked even more how Lasky didn't fall into its trap and make her dumb - she is genuinely smart, just didn't have proper connections to remember things properly. Soren helped her by pointing out what she was reading about in the book compared to what she'd already flown herself and that helped her remember. I think that would give her a very physical memory/learning style, which is awesome.

Ruby (the WOF version)

Tribe: full SkyWing

There was no tribe other than SkyWing for Ruby. Best flier of the tree - fastest flier of the dragon world. Boom. That's literally it. ALSO did I mention her feathers were reddish? Cuz her feathers were reddish, and that's why she's named Ruby! :)

Short-eared owls are so streaky and it was initially hard to translate to a SkyWing until I started thinking of it as making her look like she's covered in flames. Then it was lots of fun.

Fun fact: in the movie, they made Otulissa a short-eared owl, for some reason. Maybe so she'd get the feather 'eyeliner' they have so Soren could moon over her more (which could not be FURTHER from the source material, lmao). Strix Struma was swapped too. Why? No clue, though the owl who Twilight fights in the learning montage reminds me of Ruby's book appearance/flying ability.

Martin (from Ga'Hoole)

Species: Saw Whet Owl, Aegolius acadicus

If I remember correctly, he almost got eaten by a whale once. I think? I cannot remember and the third book is my favoutite. It was the weather chaw's first time going out without Ezylryb, and Poot (in his infinite wisdom) accidentally flew them into a hurricane. Soren almost went crazy when Martin got lost but thankfully he was saved by some seagulls. I don't know where my brain is picking the whale up but the seagulls were definitely a part of it cuz I remember Otulissa being super prim about them and Martin declaring them his new favourite birds. I think. I'm gonna reread it not only to refresh my memory but also because it's so awesome...

Martin, Ruby, Otulissa and Soren are all actually part of the colliering chaw, but they automatically get double-tapped to fly with the weather chaw as well. That makes the chaw of chaws mostly colliering, but it works in their favour during the climax of the 3rd book cuz all of their talents come in super well. It was part rescue-part mystery solving which knowing how my brain works there's no wonder it's my favourite book. Seeing how all of them came together to save the day was so awesome. I might make an art piece about it just so I can yap purely about that arc cuz IT WAS SO AWESOME-

Martin (the WOF version)

Tribe: full PineWing

He was also a very easy choice to make and one of the biggest coincidences of the series. For some reason I always associated his name with the pine martin animal, which with a tribe like the PineWings for inspiration is an obvious parallel. They can have browns and greens, so colour-wise I could stick to a more natural owl palette. PineWings and saw whets are also tiny, which works even more in his favour. Technically, the WOF version should he smaller than Gylfie, but I haven't decided yet. It works fine on its own and I had fun doing two versions of his body ref so you could actually see what was going on. I wanted the side view to be in proportion to Otulissa and Ruby's.

The elf owl was hard to translate into SandWing colours face-wise but the wings were an absolute blast. They have pretty unique patterning on there and turning it into a simplified WOF design was so fun.

And look! She's tiny!!

PineWings are also about the same size as an average human, and for her to properly come across as an elf owl Gylfie has to be super short. If I make Digger smaller than a regular SandWing like Sunny, then it just becomes a thing in this AU that SandWing hybrids are small XD

Gylfie (from Ga'Hoole)

Species: elf owl, Micranthene whitneyi

Miniscule strigiform, enormous words! It doesn't matter if you're ten times her size, Gylfie will stand up for herself without hesitation! Great grays are massive and yet Gylfie has no qualms squaring up to Twilight as soon as she meets him XD. She even uses words he doesn't recognize XD

Her attitude goes beyond just standing up for smaller owls, though. She flies by Soren's side in his quest to reach the Guardians of Ga'Hoole no matter how hard the journey is. Like him, she was snatched by St. Aggies, although her snatching wasn't an accident like Soren's was. She had jumped from her cactus hollow nest and, considering her personality, it makes sense she would want to try flying before she was ready. She actually owns up to it, however, unlike another character, which negatively influences Soren's opinion of them.

She and Soren also have a super deep and beautiful friendship. They've been together since the beginning and quite literally wouldn't have survived without each other. Gylfie, being a desert owl, knew about moon-blinking while Soren caught on to the way St Aggies tried to steal the meaning of their names. They did so much more together and it shows later in the series, where they do a sort of moving meditation to think over plans or times when they almost lose each other. I was sobbing when I thought they were in danger because Lasky wrote their friendship so beautifully.

Gylfie (the WOF version)

Tribes: SandWing/PineWing

Small dragon, big words! As a desert owl I started her design with a SandWing and completed it with the PineWing. It kind of works out because elf owls nest in cactuses and PineWings have quills like cactus spines XD

I didn't want to go too red for her main scale colour, but I think I handled the patterning relatively well. The face was tough since it relies more on colour than structure but I feel like I got her personality better. Dark scales around a SandWing's eyes just looks so cool too. When mixing sand/pine colours I tended to go more grey with the green and it ended up being well-suited for the more grey parts of the elf owl patterning.

Digger's front view is one of the best ones and I think it's because of the eye ridges. Burrowing owls have a very specific glare and oval shape to their face that comes across here even tho there's a bit extra going on in the back.

Digger (from Ga'Hoole)

Species: Burrowing Owl, Speotyto cunicularius

I get three different scientific names when I try to fact check them so either something got shuffled around or something else I don't understand is up. Couldn't dig the correct one up... hehe!

Digger's movie counterpart was done SO DIRTY. They completely changed the entire Band's backstory so you remove some interesting lore like his brothers getting eaten by St Aggies patrols (YEAH. And this happened in the FIRST BO-) so all they were left with was his philosophical nature. But they also did nothing with that and just turned him into comedy relief-

I'm not talking about the movie here I'm talking about the books, dangit.

At first glance Digger's name looks like a very easy solution to name a burrowing owl but Lasky intended it to mean how he tries to dig for the deeper meaning of why things happen/realities of the world. He never settles for things at face value and always looks for more info/tries to come up with a new insight. I also liked how he had trouble flying in a lot of situations before he was trained to compensate for it and how his friends never held it against him and helped him without question. They were my first found family group and they were so sweet with each other :)

Digger (the WoF version)

Tribes: SandWing/BurrowWing

Yet another instance where my fantribes came in handy. Technically, the BurrowWing and SandWings genes combining would make a pretty big dragon but burrowing owls aren't large and I decided to go the Sunny route and make him smaller. Since I do it with Gylfie too I guess in this AU all SandWing hybrids are tiny XD I've got a size comparison with the Band at the end so you can see!

Burrowing owls have awesome patterning and throwing that on a dragon just works so well. I'm a huge sucker for designs like that and Digger's was a lot of fun to play with. There are lots of different types of deserts and this kind of pattern would probably work well with cracked dirt and pebbles rather than just sand.

I looove these eyes. I don't know why, but the very subtle colouring/shading on them just makes them POP somehow and it feels like he's staring in my soul. For this being the closest I could get to a barn owl I think it works more than well enough >:)

Now, lore dump time:

Soren (from Ga'Hoole)

Species: Barn Owl, Tyto alba

He's the first character we're introduced to in the series when he was just a hatchling in his parents' nest. He was such a sweet big brother to Eglantine and, in contrast, the way he gets captured and taken from them was so shocking to younger me that I couldn't put the book down. I think I also just found barn owls super beautiful, or Soren made them beautiful to me. Whatever it was I'm glad it happened because it got me hooked into this super special world.

Soren begins his journey in the place farthest from where he ends up, but he always pushes through with courage and determination. Captured into slavery because your brother tried to murder you? It's ok (not really), just make some friends and learn to fly against all odds so you can get help to put a stop to it :)

He's so full of hope whenever the world tries to crush him and something about that just captivated me. There's one scene with him that, every time I read it, I get chills. It's nothing super special in the grand scheme of things, just him reciting one of the oldest owl legends, but it's the setting that gets me every time: he and his friend Gylfie were caught avoiding moonblinking (a process where owls are mind-controlled by the moon. Yeah, I know) and are tossed into the moon scalding chamber where I assumed they would finally meet their end... I actually thought they would die (not literally, but mentally be fully enslaved) and yet they manage to escape not by hiding or fighting but by keeping their hope alive through the Ga'Hoolian legends. It must sound insane to anyone who hasn't read it but the words to the legend and the way Soren recites them gets me every time.

Big Spoilers Ahead (if you care):

After all of that it's no wonder Lasky chose Soren to be the leader of the Band, Chaw of Chaws, and eventually the Great Tree itself. He never asks for any of it, just comes into it with humbleness and grace and nothing but the desire to defend others' hope. The journey isn't easy but I love to fly it with him every time I come back to re-read.

Soren (the WOF version)

Tribe: Full CaveWing

Oh God I spent way too much time explaining his book version XD

CaveWings were really the only choice. I wanted to keep it all to canon WOF tribes but none of them fit the vibe of a barn owl quite like that fantribe of mine does. It created some problems with the design, like the transparent wings, and it doesn't help any lore adaptations either but that was never the point with this. Just a fun design exercise I ended up taking way too seriously.

If you're wondering why the tip of his snout and whiskers have greyish colouration it's because in the books he's a collier, an owl who flies into forest fires to collect coal for the Great Tree's forge. That doesn't really apply to WOF but I really liked the way the author acknowledged that, yeah, after a lifetime of dealing with embers you'd get some discolouration and scarring. It makes him slightly more real and I loved him even more for it. The random pink and green colours is a part of the CaveWing design - though naturally pale and similar in colour to cave crayfish, healthy CaveWings have tiny splashes of iridescent colouring on their scales like opals.

I had lots of fun trying to translate bird colouration onto a dragon. Whenever I use a reference for a design I feel it always turns out better. I'm also a huge sucker for natural patterns on WOF designs and I might do more sketchy stuff like this in the future (going through a huge art/writing block stage rn, so even when editing this together I felt like I was wrestling with myself).

Anyways, if you just came for the art, that's it, but if you'd like to learn about the characters then boy have I got some lore for you:

Twilight (from Ga'Hoole)

Species: Great Gray Owl, Strix nebulosa

In the Ga'Hoole series Twilight is a student from the (self-proclaimed) Orphan School of Tough Learning. He was snatched from his nest as a hatchling, but broke free and managed to survive on his own until he met Soren and his friend as they escaped from the very institution that had tried to capture him. He was brash and rough at first, which I really liked because it showed he didn't often have company he could talk with, but he also has shockingly kind and gentle moments to contrast. Most of the time he is proud and a bit of a show-off (and with good reason, as he is very skilled and knowledgeable, but he usually tests the Band's patience, lol) but my favourite moments with him was when he subverted his own established character and showed his inner thoughts/kindness, or taught the Band something he knew.

And of course, how can I forget to mention one of my favourite parts of his character: the singing taunts he terrorizes his opponents with! I think I saw a comment on YouTube somewhere that the Ga'Hoole books are basically musicals and Twilight is a huge reason why. Last week's piece came into existence because as I was doodling my fav great gray I wanted an excuse to draw Ga'Hoole armour on a WOF dragon, and well you can't put Twilight in a battle without him singing XD. He had some real bangers too!

He is named Twilight because, if I remember correctly, he hatched at that time between day and night when the light blurs together and most owls have a hard time seeing. Lasky was much more poetic in her description than I, but I can't pull my book out otherwise I'll just retype half of it here. He became good at seeing during this time, but the name also symbolises his place in society - living on the fringes, never truly a full part of it until he found Soren and Gylfie and they brought him back...

RAAAAH I love him so much that what was originally supposed to be a dual post of Twilight and Soren turned into an essay that I had to split them into two posts.... and he isn't even my favourite character!

Twilight (the WOF version)

He was the first Ga'Hoole character I translated into WOF. Why? Can't really remember other than inspiration striking me, but I had lots of fun (if you couldn't already tell by all my yapping, lmao).

I made him a Night/Mud hybrid because I felt that would work as the best translation of a Great Gray. They are HUGE, which is where the MudWing comes in, and they are grey which is where the NightWing comes in. I probably could have gone a lot darker with the grey but then he would he hard to see and I wanted to stick closer to greay gray colours. The Night/Mud combo works well too because their back spines are so similar and I could use those to make his silhouette even larger. Coincidentally making him half NightWing fits his name literally as Twilight would be a cool part of a NightWing name (though it's probably better as a hybrid name, since adding something before or after Twilight could end up being too long) so he fits a little bit even within WOF lore (same cannot be said for Soren, so I improvised XD). The front view at the end is what inspired this whole debacle, I think, where I was trying to challenge myself to use a pose and strategically placed patterns to make him look like an owl from the front. That was fun but my absolute favourite aspect of his design is the wings. Though most of the spots are too big for NightWing star scales it looked too cool in the previous artwork for me to care. The Twilight taunt art was partially an excuse to do the Ga'Hoole armour on a dragon but ALSO an excuse to draw Twilight in flight because I loooove those pictures where great grays have their wings open and slightly tilted open and-

can you tell owls are my favourite animals? XD