#specposium

[theantiazdarcho]

The Lancetfish is a species that looks like it comes straight out of a realistic fantasy world building project.

[jfs-worldbuilding-and-art]

Specposium's Spectember day 30: Your favourite spec critter!

I like many spec projects but one that i like the most is @iguanodont Birgworld here on Tumblr. The birgs are simply so charismatic and nice to draw so i used this as an exercise with gouache, i like it, in the middle of the process i hated it but it came out nicely after the lineart. Not sure about birg's color variety tho.

This was a nice spectember challenge and it was a good exercise at spec and art, looking forward for the next one. Back to the normal posts now.

[draconesmundi]

Specposium

Me and my friend @raptorcivilization are running the Speculative Evolution Symposium, or Specposium, again this year on July the 1st and July the 2nd - if you would like to attend please fill in this form by June 21st!

[o-craven-canto]

The first day of SpecPosium 2023 is here, starting at 13.55 today! (UTC, I’m not sure if it takes into account daylight saving time or not EDIT it doesn’t, it starts at 14.55 Greenwich summer time and 15.55 Italian summer time) If you can’t make it in time or don’t have Discord, the full recording will be uploaded on YouTube in a few days/weeks: here are the recordings for 2021 and 2022.

And here’s this year abstract list

At 16.10 UTC I’m giving a talk too:

Speculative Biology in the Classroom Concavenator corcovatus

We are experimenting with speculative biology as a didactic tool for actual biology: as part of this year's zoology course at our university, we had our students design imaginary organisms in order to test and improve their understanding of animal physiology and evolution. This was a very small-scale trial, but a very promising one.

[danbensen]

The creatures of my alien planet Junction and how to turn speculative biology into a story. https://youtu.be/dByLI0K4u4U?t=3675

https://docs.google.com/presentation/d/1WTaG42lbuF9Ii8liJFgqgCrVDpIk_J1NybBe1UQ7-6I/edit?usp=sharing

Many thanks to @draconesmundi​, @raptorcivilization, and everyone at Specposium

[statecryptids]

REVIEW: Astrovitae magazine Issue 2

Astrovitae is a magazine devoted to creators in the speculative fiction subgenre of speculative biology. Though people have imagined fantastic beasts and beings since the beginning of our species, speculative biology  focuses on developing organisms using our current knowledge of biology, ecology, physics, geology and other sciences. Though even within these limits there is a wide spectrum, as some creators may work with strict hard science rules while others prefer to design fantastic beasts closer to myth and folklore.

This second issue of Astrovitae shows significant refinement from the already impressive first issue.   There is a new section on speculative biology news featuring interviews, YouTube videos, Kickstarters, and new projects.. It’s a good way to keep abreast of the bewildering variety of speculative projects out there. This issue also features the first of a regular book review column, beginning with Christian Cline’s The Teeming Universe.

Collaborative projects are the focus of issue two, with articles on the online Discord-based Specposium convention, the Project Sil Discord, and a preview of Almost Real magazine. The latter showcases the Keraunoplast, fascinating slime mold-like organism that feeds directly on electricity and can actually bond with old space junk to form cybernetic life forms. This issue came out in September 2021, and it’s fascinating to see how the imposed quarantine of the Covid pandemic and the subsequent burst of more online communication through Discord, Instagram and other social media has led to the birth of so many new speculative biology projects.

Hyperlinks embedded in the Pdf pages are a really useful feature. Readers can click an article’s byline to go to the creator’s website or other social media. Clicking the section heading will also take one back to the table of contents.

As with the previous issue, Astrovitae #2 is divided into several sections: Captivating Worlds, with overviews of large world-building projects; Artist Spotlight, which looks at the creators themselves and their bodies of work as a whole; and Creature Compendium: which zooms in on individual organisms.

 Captivating Worlds begins with an in-depth look at the natural history of Mathijs Megens’ Amethyst Beach Shield, a chemosynthetic armored organism.

The next entry, Domenic Pennetta’s Project Perditus is a survey of a world that resembles Earth in the early Paleozoic, with creatures that will feel familiar to many paleo-enthusiasts, while still retaining their own alien-ness.

The Alternate Cenozoic Project by Thien Anh Nguyen is a what-if about an earth where the large dinosaurs were not killed off by an impact form space, following in the tradition of works such as Dougal Dixon’s The New Dinosaurs, and the Speculative Dinosaur Project.

Sea Serpents of the Arthechocene by Alejandro Martínez Fluxá is set in the future after human-caused mass extinctions. With all the large pinnipeds and cetaceans gone, sea snakes evolve to fill the niche of large oceanic predators and filter-feeders, becoming the long, whale-like tiamats.

Evan Proctor’s Before Planet Feni is primarily an outline of the dominant species on the titular planet, as well as some background about the planet’s explorers. Hopefully there will be more to come in this work.

The World of Nijin-Konai by Lorenzo Battilani is a hard science look at a primarily aquatic alien world, delving into microbiology and genetics with a radiation resistant enzyme and redundant genes that allow the planet’s organisms to adapt to the lethal UV radiation of their native star.  Battilani also discusses the complex neurological, metabolism and anatomy of his creature in minute detail that could have come from a college biology textbook.

  Artist Spotlight features an article by YouTube creator Biblaridion detailing how their channel grew from a tutorial on concepts in evolutionary biology to a detailed study of a fictional world. 

Reinhard Gutzat offers a meditation on the sometimes rocky intersection of creativity and biological accuracy during an artist’s development process.

 Artist Sibilla Pepi offers a look at their design process as they develop a feathered wyvern based on the biology of real-life birds.

Creature Compendium showcases individual speculative creatures in the manner of pages taken from a field guide and includes a giant diving beetle, an alien tadpole, a balloon-like organisms that lives in the atmosphere of a gas planet, and more.

The authors write with the enthusiasm and vernacular of seasoned biologists well versed in scientific nomenclature. Their creatures are given unique taxonomic names and anatomical terms, adding greatly to their believability. These complex names can get a bit overwhelming, however, leading to what one might call “textbook burnout”.  Sometimes I found it necessary to go back and reread articles to fully absorb all the names. This terminology might turn off a reader with a scientific background, but the imaginative variety on display should hold most interests. This is a minor critique, though, and the magazine overall is a professional-quality publication that would be at home in any library shelf. I am particularly pleased to see more projects focusing on the hypothetical evolution of Earthly creatures.

Astrovitae issue 2 is vailable both as a free downloadable PDF from the magazine’s website and as a virtual book that one can flip through on Yumpu.com

[the-darkest-0f-stars]

Youre make a map of Planet Anser??

Yup! I'm actually currently in the process of doing so in order to better explain things during Specposium 2024, as I plan to apply to present this year.

[on-beyond-holocene]

A reminder that the Specposium starts tomorrow! If you’re interested, come on in and join the Discord server.

Also, I apologize for not being very active here recently. I’ve been preoccupied with other things, including work and organizing the Specposium. And my tablet died.

[raptorcivilization]

@north-wyrm​ and I are proud to announce Specposium 2021! The Specposium is an informal online speculative biology conference. As we envision it, the Specposium will host presentations on topics relating to speculative biology: showcases of your own projects, reviews of existing projects, history of the field, fundamentals of biology and earth science that can be applied to speculative scenarios, and more. We will also ideally be hosting watch parties of movies and/or TV programs that incorporate spec. Registration and/or presenting is free and open to anyone with an interest in speculative biology!

The Specposium is tentatively scheduled for July 31-August 1. Submission closes July 12, and registration closes the day before the event. More information, including registration and submission forms, can be found on the Specposium official website or our Discord server. Spread the word!

[theantiazdarcho]

The Takin is such a whimsical herbivore, like God commissioned Dr. Seuss for this one.

[theantiazdarcho]

Fun fact:

Hyenas, if kept in cold climates, will grow shaggy coats in the winter

[theantiazdarcho]

D&D genuinely is such a fucking plight on Fantasy Media and Mythology discussion.

For example:

There is NO difference between these creatures when it comes from history.

[theantiazdarcho]

After seeing the cave lion from Prehistoric Kingdom I really think creatures that went extinct in the late Pleistocene/Holocene are actually kind of underrated in general paleo media (Excluding mammoths and Neanderthals)

And the Prehistoric Kingdom Panthera Spelaea, or cave lion (oh my gosh why is is so prettyyyy)

[theantiazdarcho]

I absolutely adore VikasRao’s project “Draconology” on DeviantArt.

Some of the greatest speculative evolution fantasy designs out there.

He goes in depth of the dragons anatomy and evolution

[theantiazdarcho]

I love the genre of cryptids that aren’t grand, mysterious, or would change how we see certain groups of creatures, but the kinds that are just somewhat normal animals or silly guys.

For example:

The elephant dung bat is a cryptid from Kenya described as a small silver and brown bat. It's notable for its habit of roosting in dried elephant dung

[theantiazdarcho]

Anyone know about this strange red mist that seeps from the ground? I’ve started to seen some strange wildlife now…