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PeteriDish — alien sketch dump
#alien #animal #biology #concept #creature #critter #drawing #extraterrestrial #fi #sci #scifi #worldbuilding #zoology #xenobiology
Published: 2014-12-31 08:56:17 +0000 UTC; Views: 1080; Favourites: 30; Downloads: 0
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Description
Decidedly cluttered, although the focal point here is a large aquatic predator with large semiretractable pseudojaws and a retractable "periscope" with eyes and a nostril. It is - again - an attempt to keep an old concept alive. This creature represents a very unique group of animals, at least in the context of my latest update of the project (with each update, most of the previous work flies out of the window, just so you know, this is how i work XD) and it is just an experiment at this point, I will need more time to determine whether they can become canon.
for a nostalgia trip, these two concepts were the main infuence:
Mesognatha: Crocodiligyrinus paludosus
Alien Sketch Dump 4
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Comments: 20
Y U SO GODDAMN GOOD?! AAAaaaarrrgg... You make my stuff look like potatoes....
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look at my older stuff, practise makes perfect! (not implying i have reached perfection, still got a long way to go 
besides, your stuff is good! don't beat yourself up!
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Ah, good 'ol fashioned nightmare fuel. Neat design here, can't wait to see what you do with that armor!
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nightmare fuel? wait for my next upload, then!
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These are really awesome! I love the new body plan
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thanks! the idea here is that the rostrum is fused from two (at least) bones in the creatures i've illustrated so far, sometimes fused with each other forming a false head, sometimes fused to the braincase as well, but here they are separate, forming a set of pseudojaws. the true jaws are find on the inside of this newly formed pre-oral cavity, reminiscent of a lamprey-esque toothplate-lined esophagus leading into the chest at the base each of the pseudo-jaws.
now the question is if such an arrangement (with the actual skull/braincase being supported on a stalk/neck, because originally, the "neck" was supposed to be supporting the rostrum, the skull was supposed to be in the shoulder area. the question also is whether the main brain is located in the "periscope" (which would lead to an extremely dim-witted creature), or whether there are only optic nerves/ganglia in there, leading to the main brain located in the chest. (which still doesn't mean the main brain is a big structure anyway, and the creature may still be a mere impulse-driven simpleton, although that is a minor issue in comparison with resolving the very different neck-braincase position in each of these groups. can these animals concievably share much of the previous anatomy while being so unlike their relatives in this respect? I am having trouble imagining how this arrangement evolved. :/
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I propose the following:
The brain is located near the eyes.
If the eyes sit on top of a periscope, like it is the case with the river wyrms, there is a ganglion in said periscope for quick processing of the arriving stimuli… this signal is then sent to the main brain for further processing and evaluating. The main brain then decides on an action to react to these stimuli. If the stimulus suggests an immediate threat however, the signal is not sent to the main brain but the ganglion initiates an instant reaction to said threat… like a reflex...
If the animal’s rostrum sits on top of a neck, it is equipped with a ganglion to process the incoming stimuli of the different sensory organs… the further processing would basically be the same as I have already described above
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right. that makes sense!
the main issue is how to resolve the following:
one group has a "rostrum" sitting on a neck which leads to a skull near the bulk of the body, the other group has skull on the neck instead, with the bones that make up the rostrum in a completely different place, basically hugging the true jaws from the outside.
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Eh, I wouldn’t worry too much about that…
there could be two different types of animals that are only very distantly related to one another: 'the rostrum-necks' and the 'skull-necks'…. there could have been a common ancestor some million years ago but they evolved into two very different kinds of animals pretty early on...
I reckon the necks don’t actually contain any actual bones anyways, right? To me they look more like muscular trunks that are supported by cartilaginous structures at most…
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you are right, let's go with that explanation
and yeah, I was actually about to say I am not even sure whether there are bones in there... XD they were undoubtedly inspired by elephant trunks, but still there could, or even should be some sort of support on the inside... there'd definitely be a ton of space saved if the "necks" were more like trunks than necks though... hmmm.... (processing...) something to think about!
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well they would probably just hang down most of the time without any support I reckon...
maybe there's a cartilaginous rod inside that is held upwards by a special ligament or something like that
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Welcomekep going man dont stop
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i don't know if i can promise you that, but it sure feels great to be back in the game!
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You are definatly in the game man
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