august beasts
august beasts
august beasts is a queer-affirming science fantasy creature design zine for all ages.
I started august beasts as a throwback to a childhood spent learning about creatures of this world and imagining new ones. As a child, I was enthralled by cryptozoology- particularly the idea of shy creatures living just out of reach, in that ever-changing margin between imagination and reality. There is truth to this: though evidence for popular cryptids like Sasquatch is ambiguous, discoveries of new species in flesh and fossil happen to this day. And if rare, vulnerable creatures can survive so long in peace- so perhaps can similar folk.
I based the Atlas Shark on Devonian cartilaginous fish Stethacanthus and Akmoniston, which are recognizable for the spiny anvil-shaped dorsal fin present in some specimens. Atlas Sharks can live for thousands of years, by which point they are large enough to support entire island ecosystems. Like whale sharks and basking sharks, they are filter-feeders, living on plankton and shoals of small fish. Atlas Sharks born male and transition to female as they mature.
Atlas Shark
Image Description: A sperm whale dives as a colossal bioluminescent shark glides through a nighttime sea, her broad anvil-shaped dorsal fin a forested island.
Ceratorns are large, heavily built oviraptorids convergently evolved with ceratopsian dinosaurs, with a narrow, deep bill for snipping tough vegetation, a casque modified to a horn, and a broad fan of tail feathers rather resembling the bony shield at the back of the ceratopsian skull.
Image description: A large, strongly built oviraptorid dinosaur strides by a lake. It has a deep square bill, a large fan of tail feathers, and a casque (keratinous crest) modified into a large horn on its head.
Ceratorn
Royal Stromjaeger
Royal Stromjaegers (below), are fish-eating dromaeosaurs like Halszkaraptor and Austroraptor, adapted to swimming and wading in rivers and lakes . Unlike other dromaeosaurs, their rostrum is tipped with a bill, rather like the toothed marine bird Hesperornis.
Image description: A pair of large dromaeosaurs stride out of a lake onto a horsetail-covered bank. They have long legs and narrow heads with small needle-sharp teeth.
Smoldering Fury
The first vision I had of a Smoldering Fury was a dromaeosaur (Velociraptor and kin) of soot-black smoke, with red-and-orange feather-flames and white-hot sparks for teeth and claws. Though I keep that version in mind, the iteration here is more animalistic, based on Utahraptor and Dakotaraptor. Like the djinn, those fire-beings of Arabian myth, Smoldering Furies are powerful yet vulnerable.
Image Description: A family of dromaeosaur firebirds, plumage wreathed in flame, tend a nest. Two chicks produce their first flames as they emerge. Two male parents look on with pride as a larger female gazes off page.