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@ruby-seadragon

[Icon Description: a drawing from an old map that shows a red sea serpent attacking a ship. End icon description.]
[Background Description: a photograph showing a school of fish swimming underwater. End background description.]

Now that Hytale is here, I'm reminiscing about these shark-inspired mob design ideas I sketched out five years ago.

An attempt to diversify our idea of sharks in games, moving beyond the old stereotypes of aggressive mobs without depth! 🦈✨

For #AppreciateADragonDay :

Ferdinand Bauer (Austrian, 1760-1826)

Weedy Sea Dragon (Phyllopteryx taeniolatus), watercolor, 1801-5

This illustration depicts a male & female. Can you tell which is which? See ALT & below for the answer!

The male is the previous image is the one on the right. Like their cousins the sea horses, male sea dragons are the ones who carry the eggs…but instead of a proper pouch, they are kept tucked under the tail!

some fishe studies pt 1 orbicular batfish juvenile || rainbowfish

[ID: Two realistic digital paintings, both done on flat, dark backgrounds, painted with vibrant colors. The first one is of two orbicular batfish. The one on the left is seen from the side while the one on the right is seen from the front. The second is of a rainbowfish, seen from the side. End ID]

#61 Coronate Medusa, or Atolla jelly is part of the crown jellyfish order. They live 1000-4000 meters down in the deep ocean and flash bioluminescent lights when threatened.

Image description: digital art showing an Atolla Jellyfish swimming. The background is blue. end Image description

Part 2 of the marine cabinet of curiosities

Image description: linocut prints.

left: a red vampire squid (Vampyroteuthis infernalis), text underneath reads: "Vampyrotheuthis".

right: a yellow amalocaris, text underneath reads: "Anomalocaris" end Image description

Inktober day 11- Southern elephant seal

Image description: art showing a male southern elephant seal at the beach, with its mouth open and its tail raised, a penguin stands behind the seal and looks at it. end Image description

Inktober day 30- Crabeater seal

Image description: art showing an adult female crabeater seal and a cub crabeater seal on an ice float, the cub is drinking from the mother. end Image description

[ID: a digital drawing of a hammerhead shark swimming up and to the left on a blue ocean background. End.]

Hammerhead shark! Distinctive for its weird-ass head, referred to as a cephalofoil - a wide flattened bow-shaped plane that makes the shark more hydrodynamic, and able to move quickly. Like other sharks they utilize electrosensory pores called ampullae of Lorenzini - the wide head gives them a wider range for sensing prey.

Meet the Caribbean reef octopus (Octopus briareus)! This reef-inhabiting cephalopod lives in warm shallow waters, spanning southern Florida to the Caribbean, through to South America’s northern coast. It’s distinguished by its eye-catching blue coloring, but this master of disguise can change its looks in an instant. Like other octopuses, it uses pigmented cells in its skin, called chromatophores, to alter its appearance. When confronted by a foe, such as a shark, it may emit a cloud of unpleasant-tasting ink to deter its enemy from further pursuit.

Photo: Christian Long, CC BY-NC 4.0, iNaturalist

"Friends outside of Minnesota please read. I'm sharing a post written by a personal friend and medical doctor: Friends outside MN, you need to know what is happening here. Everyone knows that ICE shot and killed a woman here on Wednesday. But that’s not the only thing that’s going on:

  • ICE agents are cruising areas with immigrant-owned businesses, and kidnapping patrons and employees alike. Yesterday they abducted two US citizen employees at a suburban Target, one who was begging them to allow him to go get his passport to show them.
  • ICE is going door to door in immigrant-heavy neighborhoods, asking residents where their immigrant neighbors live. Read that again. If it sounds like something out of your high school history textbook, that’s because it is.
  • ICE is targeting schools and school buses. They pepper sprayed teenagers and abducted two school staff members at the high school up the street from me on Wednesday. Police are literally escorting school buses to ensure children can get to school and home safely. The Minneapolis Public Schools have moved to virtual learning for the next 4 weeks because it’s unsafe for children or teachers to physically come to school.
  • They are targeting hospitals and clinics. Patients are scared and are cancelling their appointments or just not showing up. Kids are missing their checkups and vaccines, folks aren’t getting their cancer care, etc.
  • They are smashing windows in cars and homes.
  • ICE is increasingly picking up Native Americans—again, targeting folks based on skin color alone.
  • They are arresting and beating legal observers. A friend of a friend had her arm broken yesterday. Folks are showing up at local hospitals, brought in in ICE custody, with severe injuries that are absolutely inconsistent with mechanism of injury reported by ICE. (Think: patient appears to have been beaten unconscious, while ICE agent says he slipped and fell.) I can’t emphasize enough that these ICE agents do not have warrants. There are 2,000+ agents here and they are simply hunting for anyone that’s not white. It doesn’t matter if you’re a citizen or a green card holder, they will kidnap you first and ask questions later. But the community is fighting back.
  • Protests are happening every day.
  • Community groups have been leading know-your-rights sessions for months, often to packed venues.
  • Whistles are being distributed by the thousands, carried on keychains and worn on coat zippers, always at the ready to be blown in warning if ICE is spotted.
  • Drivers are following ICE vehicles, blaring their horns in warning.
  • Businesses are locking their doors even while open to keep employees and customers safe. As I type this, I’m standing guard at the locked door of our neighborhood burrito joint while I wait for my takeout order, so the employees can focus on their jobs. The place is packed with neighbors supporting this small business.
  • Anti-ICE signs are posted everywhere. The community is making it crystal clear that ICE is not welcome here.
  • Parents and neighbors are standing guard outside schools, organizing carpools, and escorting kids to and from school on foot.
  • Parents of kids in Spanish-immersion daycare (there are a LOT of these daycares here!) are keeping their kids home so the teachers don’t have to take the risk of coming to work.
  • Churches and community groups are holding fundraisers to buy and deliver groceries to families who don’t feel safe leaving home.
  • Mutual aid money is going out to folks who can’t make rent because they can’t work or because a breadwinner was abducted, or who need a warm place to stay after their home’s windows were smashed. THAT is what is happening here. This fight is ongoing and it’s horrifying to watch. But we are not backing down. To my friends in other cities and states, don’t think for a minute that this won’t happen in your town. It will. Be ready. Learn from us, as we have learned from Portland and Chicago and New York. Fight back. Don’t let us get to the last line of Martin Niemoller’s poem.” -Grant Boulanger

Here's an AP news brief with a little more info. It's limited in the way major news outlets are right now but provides context that supports the personal account shared.

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