Orcas

hi, it's another different anon, wondering if we could get more black winged cats? Thanks!!

Black fins, blue mountains, pink skies (Orcas in Norway) by Koen Hoekemeijer

I feel like often what younger therians mean when they say ‘therians still identify as human’ is actually ‘therians understand we live in a human society and must function within our human body, despite our being not human.

Despite who we are, we still live in a society of humans. Unless you have (with all hope and luck) moved of the grid and into nature and live amongst the animals, we will have to preform human tasks in order to survive. That is just simply a given for any person within a human body, human or not.

We understand we must pay taxes. We understand we must go to work and school. We understand we must care for our human bodies despite how incorrect they may be. We understand that we will interact with humans, and doing so typically requires us to preform human.

What they have yet to understand is the point is to be as animalistic as possible. If I get stabbed, I’m not just going to lick my wounds and bleed out. I’m going to get in my human car and take my human bleeding to the human hospital so they can fix me as they would a human. We can still preform human and we understand we must. However that does not mean we cannot act as animalistic as possible. Everything I have just listed above can probably be altered a little bit to most accommodate for us. We can wear a tail and go outside in nature with our laptop when we do our taxes. Those who can work can find jobs that are closely related to their kins. At school you can find likeminded people, develop a safe group for everyone to express their animal nature when not doing work. We can draw paws on our feet. We can bark. We can go on rollercoaster and try so hard to pretend we are flying. We can do human things in animalistic nature, and that is ok, and that is the goal.

We are not human, we are whatever creature we say we are. It was not our choice to live in this human world. If we could pick I know most of us would choose differently. But we do live in this world. And we will respect that, but we will also live as truly to ourselves while doing so. And that cannot be stopped.

‘Therians don’t identify as animals’ I feel is young therians trying to say what I just said. In their attempt to do, make antis understand this, they said something extremely incorrect and extremely bad for furthering our normalization in society.

Side note: this, both my claim and what the younger therians think, also leaves people who DONT understand all these things in the dark, with no representation, or love and acceptance towards them and their lived experience. I need to understand their perspectives a bit more before I can make any conclusions on where they fit in this conversation. All I knows is this leaves them out, and they should not be left out.

Plz add on with any additional thoughts/comments or any points I was incorrect on and need to be re-educated. But also plz be nice I’m very sensitive to criticism.

I’m sure this isn’t an uncommon sentiment, but I find that, even as a wild, non-domesticated animal, I am (somewhat) glad to have experienced human society.

Don’t get me wrong, I would have loved to be born like my theriform counterparts. I would have loved living as a bird, surviving as one. It pains me that I do not. I long for the anatomy that was never granted to me and the life I feel I was destined for.

But human society has given me knowledge. I might not know how the world looks with shades of UV, but I’m aware of the electromagnetic spectrum. I might not have a hooked beak to tear into my food, but I’ve learnt how muscles work. I would do so much for the chance to fly with my own wings, but at least I know how an airfoil can generate lift. I am able to read books, visit Natural History museums, access the wondrous internet. Human society has satiated my curiosity, stoked it even, and I enjoy knowing what we’ve managed to puzzle out from our world.

It’s also granted me relationships, with both humans and otherwise. One wouldn’t expect a kestrel to wind up with a vulpix, but alas, I love my girlfriend so, so much. My best friend is equally important to me; I don’t think I’d be as happy going to school without her. I also have the internet — those I’ve conversed on here, on Discord. It’s amazing how I’ve managed to meet others with experiences similar to mine! Kestrels are mostly solitary birds, and while I’d have been happy with that life, I do not regret knowing these wonderful people.

As right as it’d feel, living the way a non-human should, there’s a degree of privilege that comes with appearing human-like. It is a misfortune that I, an avian, have found myself in, but it is not the worst fate that could befall me. Not with what it has brought to me.

I can sympathise with the want to separate yourself from it all, and to exist as you were meant to, but there are some things I know I will miss.

if i could purr i think that would fix me entirely

Bro switched to eco mode

Keiko breaching in Iceland

Let’s Draw Wings

I’ve gotten the question/request of how I draw wings lots and lots so I’ve decided to make a dedicated post!

Now…I’m no master, but I have found a way that I like to draw wings that’s efficient for me. There three main points: 

References

Simplification

Texture Management

First of all - References

My favorite wing reference of all time is this post by Jenn on Twitter. I have both the images saved but I use the Wing Shapes one, below, alllllll the time. Like for real all the time!

I also keep pretty extensive collections of wing photo reference. When I’m having trouble, I’ll trace a few or do studies to get back into the swing of things. Here are links to my Pinterest boards:

Broadwing Reference (passive soaring and high-speed)

Longwing Reference (active soaring)

Shortwing Reference (elliptical and hovering)

Secondly - Simplification

When I sketch wings, I simplify Jenn’s diagram even further -

For me, the key to drawing wings is simplifying the wing down - from the structure to the feathers - the goal for me is to be able to draw them quickly and have the proper information conveyed. It needs to look like a wing in the base sketch. If it doesn’t, no amount of rendering and extra feathers will help. I like to break the wing into the three main moving parts. The orange is one part, then the purple contains two main chunks feathers that you can group together and move as their own parts. 

On top of that, I like to think of wings like a sheet of paper. They can bend and fold in on themselves, with the orange meaty bits anchoring everything together. 

Lastly - Texture

I like to call wings “texture monsters”. Feathers are hard to manage and can easily make wings look over-busy and muddy. Just like before, I break the wing into chunks so I can spend less time drawing the wing and it’s feathers:

Then you can put it all together and push things further -

So yeah this is how I throw wings together! The wings I draw aren’t super technical or detailed, but I what matters for me is that they look and feel like believable wings at a glance -

~ Larn

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just watched Arrival with my family i think im insane now (/pos)

Cat