Cambrian critters are actually spaceships, their battles where epic.

Here an Anomalocaris cruiser is attacked by the hit and run tactics of an Opabinia.

the anomalocaris

Doing some more black paper cutouts, so behold Animalocaris and Bambiraptor! These guys took about an hour and an hour and a half respectively for sketching, drawing and cutting. Cut with a scalpel out of black craft paper, every cutout I do is one single piece!

Do you know any ancient sea creatures that you really like, like any specific trilobites or dickinsonia or the famous animalocaris

This world has lived for billions of years, and through out the ages the ocean was filled to the brim with a whole plethora of sea creatures. To the Cambrian Explosion to the age of the dinosaurs, countless species “rules” the oceans. Forgive my sketches here, they could never encapsulate the true glory and scale of these creatures.

One creature that may seem familiar is the Macroscaphite, belonging to the extinct subclass of Cephalopods named Ammonoidea. You may know them better as the common name of “ammonite”. One may be familiar with the modern day Nautilus and assume that it is a long lasting member of this subclass due to their striking similarities, but ammonite were actually closer related to the subclass Coleoidea. This is the group of shell-less cephalopods such as octopi and squid.

Back in the day many ammonites had rather absurd shells, not just the polite little spiral you may sea in many textbooks. Some where cones spiraling up in the most ridiculous manner, some possessed dangerous ridges and spikes, others… well, as you can see with Macroscaphite… I cannot even begin to describe what this shape reminds me of. It is somewhere between a trombone, a paper clip, and a slide whistle. It is as if they all came together and had an abyssal child together, how beautiful.

Sacabambaspis is a mouthful of a name, which is funny to conchsider when you remember that it is a jawless genus of fish. “But Mary,” you say, “how can this fish eat without a jaw?” For this you can look to living examples such as lampreys and hagfish. These specimen can latch onto larger animals like a suction cup. Adult lampreys are parasitic in nature, scraping a “tongue” against their host for a good mouthful of meat. This does not kill the host, that would be bad for the parasite, but it is rather uncomfortable to say the least. I’m saying this from experience. Not enough is known about Sacabambaspis as a whole to say if it was a parasite itself. It is likely that it employed a similar sucking motion to collect food.

As for the Archelon… What a magnificent creature it is, no? The largest documented turtle to swim the seas. Approximately 15ft from head to tail, this reptile would’ve been taller than I am! Can you imagine that? Someone larger than me? There are the boss cogs, yes, but outside of that bunch there aren’t many who rival me in size. Much like the living leatherback sea turtle, Archelon would’ve had a leathery shell, or carapace, unlike other hard shelled turtles. Who knows what prehistoric jellyfish or squid this beast may have consumed. It is hard to imagine such a large fortress of an animal to be contested in its oceans, but during its life the Archelon would’ve shared its waters with large marine reptiles such as the mosasaur.

[The Deep Diver sighs, shutting her notebook and tucking it into a comically small pocket on her suit.]

If only I could have the chance to meet these creatures, even if it is only for a moment… oh well. No reason to dwell in the past, to have suck silly dreams swimming around in my helmet.

my sanity is on it's last legs. i was trying to make animalocaris ascii art, checking out what looked best and...

LOOOK AT IT!!!

IT'S ABOMINABLE

@staff

why must perfection be always so close, but never reached

So um I came up with this concept while chatting with friends and I thought I'd also share it here for my fellow paleozoic fans !

Thats it ! Basically mixing cowboys and lovely cambrian creatures !

I really love trilobites ! And also cowboys.

Some wild Animalocaris riding because why not.

Honestly this is just an excuse to indulge in my two favourite style of drawing : scientific illustration, and silly comics !

Also : landscapes studies

Isn't that such a lovely sight ?

my spanish teacher has assigned us to write a weekly blog entry on any topic of our choosing and i decided to use my first one to infodump about the cambrian explosion

every once in a while i get a notification telling me that someone commented on a youtube video i posted like 7 years ago

the video is a 10 second clip from an episode of invader zim and it's the most viewed anything ive ever posted on any social media. this is my legacy.