If You See This Post You Have To Say Happy Birthday To My Lizard

Finally got around to finishing this houugh... it was a lot of work but I really like the end result!! Naturally, I'll try my best to list some of the thoughts I have in mind for these guys below. Long post ahead!

These lizards are intended to be ALMOST fully arthropod-like but due to my lack of understanding of bug anatomy and creative liberties, they are in that gray spec bio area so don't take any inconsistencies too seriously (or rather, fuck logic, and accept them how I describe them regardless)

Inspirations: - my lesser detailed lizard design - my friend's slugcats - wasps for the head contours, various insects for the exoskeleton guidelines, caterpillars, various stylistic slugcats across the #rainworld tag - the burning need for something more detailed and cool in my drawing vocabulary

The actual meat of the post; extra facts: - Lizards are related to slugcats (in my au, if you wanna call it that?) or at least the very early version of them. This idea is borrowed from this post and in my au, lizards evolve a similar tail to a slugcat's to aid in propelling themselves through tight spaces, acting as a 5th limb. - Similar to my old vulture post, lizards share a similar lifecycle. The majority of the larval stage is spent underground and in tight spots, far from their main predator. Lizard larva will undergo pupation similar to how beetles do, leaving behind broken cavities in pipes where carnivorous plants favor to take root. Additionally to the vulture's terrible parental drive, they often mistake their own larva for lizard hatchlings. - A lizard's skin is leathery and retains moisture for quite a while. Some lizards have a thicker layered mantle than others, allowing them to take punctures to the abdomen and still recover. - Not pictured, but will be described, are a few outliers to the standard lizard body plan. Caramels have muscular hind legs akin to a grasshopper but this means their legs cannot slot together and thus they have a wider leg splay than other species. Eels and salamanders are not lizards but lizard mimics. Yellow lizards' antennae attach to a hump on the snout rather than the rear of the head as seen here. Cyan lizards' mantles are more square shaped due to their leap drums on either side of their bodies and have a 3rd mantle that runs the length of their tail and caps the tailtip. - Cyan lizard's organs are called leap drums and act similarly to our lungs. They are a ring of muscle which contracts and acts as a spring loaded mechanism to propel the creature via combustion through a mysterious chemical process. Because the color of debris left behind during a leap share the same color as the lizard, perhaps they are discarded scales, formerly in place to protect the cavities housing the explosion. - They have similar organs to vertebrates within their abdomen, probably surrounded by cartilage. (not that important, I haven't thought that much about this) - (More may be added later as I remember)

Heartbreak

alt version:

It’s sad Mato hours! Inspired and based on this fantastic fic that made me cry 🥲

(but don’t worry, I plan to make a lil continuation in which some bit of comfort ensues)

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Thank you, Snoop Logg...

i put “All I Want for Christmas is You” through a MIDI converter, and then back through an mp3 converter

the result is this garbage

inspiration #230: hine mizushima

i learned about a stupid looking bird today and i cant stop laughing

its called a crested satinbird (cnemophilus macgregorii)

"We all want a way out. However, your particular... ... Rotundness, might well imply how little you seem to care. A little animal ignorantly accepting it's existence."

why does the roblox front page always look like this

my favorite subtle detail in rain world is the paws and hands and such

they’re consistent. most paws have 3 digits; slugcats most obviously of all, but lizards and scavengers have 3 fingers too. even iterator puppets have 3. It’s the closest thing we have to a taxonomic order of vertebrates, and we know there’s vertebrates here because one of the dialogues for white pearls is something about a skeleton.

My sources

Survivor/Monk cutscene art, specifically the one where surv is falling and reaching up

Lizard/scavenger sprites (lizards may have a dewclaw or thumb that’s usually hidden but their feet have at least 2 large toes)

LttM dream art (the one where she’s reading pearls specifically)