#Friend-shaped

[marlynnofmany]

Friend-shaped

“She’ll want to pet it,” said a smug voice from the next room. “Humans will pet anything.”

“Even spiky things?” asked the skeptical voice that I recognized as Zhee. “I’ve never had a human want to pet me, and this thing is much worse.”

As curious as I was to see our newest cargo and judge for myself, I first had to finish setting out food for the animals in the next bay. I lugged in bags of dried pellets and fish jerky as the door slid shut behind me, cutting off the sound of Zhee insisting to the delivery person that there was no way under several suns that I would want to touch this new mystery animal. We’d see about that.

I stashed the pellets in the appropriate closet and pulled out a sheet of jerky for each of the three fangy monstrosities that twined around each other, trying to hypnotize me through the bars. I ignored the moving pattern of stripes that probably worked on prey from their world. Working quickly, I set the sheets down on the floor outside the cage, spaced as far apart as possible, then used a gravity wand to lift them through the bars without losing a finger. Left one, right, one, then the middle, to keep the beasties from all jumping on the same treat.

A chorus of happy growls and chewing noises filled the air. Success. I put away the gravity wand and reflected that I absolutely would have liked to scritch all three terrifying predators on the head, but I valued life and limb too much for that.

On to the next room! The doors opened and closed in quick succession. I passed other people loading and uploading various crates, but I only had eyes for the terrarium that looked like it was made of force fields instead of glass. Or maybe some room-temperature version of hard water, given that the person chatting with Zhee was a Waterwill. They had some pretty bizarre tech.

“Ah, here’s the human!” the Waterwill said happily, her voice burbly and vaguely female. “What do you think of your newest live cargo?” She extended what passed for an arm from her column-of-goo body. Beside her, Zhee spread purple pincher arms in a silent display of “ta-dah.”

Inside the tank I saw rocks, sand, a puddle of algae, and the ugliest little ball of snot and spikes that I had ever encountered. Protruding eyes struggled to focus on me like a wall-eyed Chihuahua that had rolled through the most unfortunate of trash piles.

“Wow,” I said, bending down for a closer look. “That’s an animal, all right.”

The Waterwill bobbed up and down. “And is it not, as you say, cutesy-wootsy?”

Zhee made various clicks and taps that were probably skepticism. I couldn’t blame him.

“Well,” I said, struggling for a tactful answer, “It sure is a little one. Looks a bit scared.”

“They always get twitchy when they’re moved around before egg-laying,” the Waterwill said with a dismissive wobble. “It’ll settle down when everybody stops walking by. It’s non-toxic. Maybe once it’s calm—”

The rest of her sentence was cut off by loud snarls from next door, carrying through the hall while both doors were open at the same time. It sounded like a brief squabble over fish jerky, no cause for alarm.

For me, anyway. The animal in the terrarium made a piercing squeak and tried to burrow under the rock, its spines growing visibly longer and flinging droplets of moisture as it trembled violently.

“Oh, that’s bad,” said the Waterwill, all cheer gone. “It could sour the eggs. Everybody be quiet! Move slowly!” She waved two armlets at the other people carrying boxes, who did as she asked.

Zhee was making a whistle that was probably a curse in his own language, or maybe someone else’s. “We’ll get blamed for egg troubles. Would dim light help? I’ll hit the controls.” He moved off on quiet bug legs.

“What else helps?” I asked. “Wait, there’s a manual for this, right?” Without waiting for a response, I unfolded a screen from my pocket and looked for the newest files. There it was. Easily searchable, too.

While I spent a moment on that, the room dimmed and quieted into a soothing nighttime. The other crewmates grabbed the remaining crates, left, and shut the door. I heard someone say to leave oncoming boxes in the hallway for the moment.

“It’s still stressed,” the Waterwill said. “We should have brought another one to soothe it!”

“Hang on, I found the sound files,” I said. “Here’s the soothing one.” At the press of a button, a brief gurgle played, then cut off. “That’s it?”

The animal turned toward me, then back to the rock. No change.

I asked the Waterwill, “I don’t suppose you can make that sound?” When she hesitated, I tried myself. Hard to do without any water around to gargle, but I managed an awkward warble in the back of my throat.

The animal’s shivering stilled.

“Keep doing that!” the Waterwill said with an urgent wave.

I did, feeling silly. But the animal liked it. The trembling ended, and the spines started to retract. When I paused for breath, the creature held perfectly still, then when I started again, the spines continued shortening. After a few moments, it was a slimy ball of green with eyes that stuck out, and soon enough those finally closed. When they opened again, they weren’t bulging any more.

A head lifted from the goo, with a cute little face that chirped curiously.

“Aw, look at you,” I said to it. “All calm and happy.”

It oozed over towards me, moving much like Waterwills did, without any legs. It nuzzled a hatch that I hadn’t noticed in the side of the tank.

“You said it’s non-toxic, right?” I asked, not waiting for a response. I’d skimmed the manual. The hatch opened easily for me to stick my hand in and stroke the slimy little head. It purred like a babbling brook.

“Told you,” said a voice behind me.

Zhee hissed.

I turned to see him handing over credits with a displeased tilt to his antennae. “Did you just lose a bet?” I laughed.

Zhee threw his pincher arms into the air. “It was covered in spikes! No fair changing shape like that.”

“Well, if we’re going to be fair,” I said. “I would have sacrificed a hairbrush to pet it through the spikes, if it liked that kind of thing.”

“Of course you would,” Zhee muttered.

“Righto,” the Waterwill said as she stuck the credits into a wallet pouch that floated among her other miscellaneous bits. “I can see it’s in good care here. Guess I’ll be off.”

I gave the creature one last stroke, then eased my hand out and closed the hatch, waiting to make sure it stayed calm. When it settled back into goo, I stood and joined the other two in soft-footing our way to the door. “I’ll keep an eye on it,” I promised.

“And a hand,” Zhee grumbled.

“I’ve petted worse,” I told him.

“I’m sure you have,” he said. “And I don’t want to hear about it.”

~~~

The ongoing backstory adventures of the main character of this book. More to come!

#my writing #the Token Human #humans are weird #humans will pet anything #things that like to be petted #friend-shaped #pack bonding #humans are space orcs #haso #hfy #eiad #aliens #science fiction

[yourfaveisfriendshaped]

GLaDOS from Portal?

GLaDOS is friend-shaped!

#Fake pride flag #Your fave is #Friend shaped #Friend-shaped #Your fave is friend-shaped #Your fave is friend shaped #GLaDOS #Portal #GLaDOS is friend-shaped #GLaDOS is friend shaped

[markscherz]

What is the best toad you have ever seen? (doesnt have to be one you saw irl, just the best toad in your opinion).

Look, there are 647 toad species in 53 genera, and I have seen many of them, some of which are truly glorious. So it is hard for me to say that any one is the best I have ever seen. But to just choose one group for the sake of argument:

I am a huge fan of animals evolving mittens instead of fingers, like what we see in bolitoglossid salamanders and the web-footed sand gecko, Pachydactylus rangei. In toads, the arboreal African genus Nectophryne have done this gloriously. And they're also exceptionally cute for true bufonids.

[src]

[src]

[src]

#toad #toads #animals #frog #frogs #friend-shaped #the internet is really really great (for frogs) #I've got a fast connection so I don't have to wait (for frogs) #there's always some new site (for frogs) #I browse all day and night (for frogs) #it's like I'm browsing at the speed of light (for frogs!) #Nectophryne #Bufonidae #Nectophryne afra #Nectophryne batesii #these things are totally crazy #they're some of the smallest toads in the world #and have a really strong miniaturisation syndrome #and I am a sucker for miniaturised frogs #as you know #these toads have the hands that apple originally designed its hockey puck mouse for

[michirikapchiyyy]

BROOO I JUST STUMBLED UPON YOUR BOLG AND YOUR ART LOOKS LIKE A FRUIT GUMMY I WANNA EAT SO BE /VPOS

i really like the ones you do of marx and magolor :}

THANK U SMMM WAAAHHH 💖💕💖

#they are fun to draw #friend-shaped #michi's askbox #michi's art pile

[tiny-waving-snail]

Hey guys, look! The fairy showed up at my door!!

#fairy or walrus #but seriously #what kind of moth is this? #friend-shaped #moth #so pretty! #great way to end the day.

[bouncyballcitadel]

not me finishing the demo and coming to find out more about riley only to learn he isn't a RO?! 😭 it's too late your honor I already love him

Never say never 😉

#citadelwip #riley saunders #friend-shaped #...RO-shaped???

[mishimakitan]

~ Potentially useful JP fact ~

Once upon a time (300+ years ago, before modern science), Japanese people thought the echoes you hear on mountains and canyons were made by this friend-shaped creature that looks like it's shrugging (¯\_(ツ)_/¯) named Yamabiko (山彦 or 幽谷響).

Yamabiko isn't typically known to be malicious or harmful, but people thought the delayed echoes (e.g. when you yell atop a mountain, your voice echoes back) heard on mountains, canyons, and valleys was this little furry creature's fault.

More info: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yamabiko_(folklore) Nowadays in Japanese, when people say "yamabiko" it is usually about the mountain echo phenomenon or Yamabiko (JR East bullet train name) depending on the context. Source 1: https://kotobank.jp/word/%E5%B1%B1%E5%BD%A6-144298 Source 2: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yamabiko

#potentially useful jp fact #japanese #yokai #cryptid #friend-shaped

[trustmy-rage]

i took pictures of the capybaras i saw today :)

#and in case i don't see ya #friend-shaped

[mr-geargrinder]

The Kirbo Project

Around the start of June, I started toying with blender to make a little Kirby to print and eventually cast. Unsurprisingly, Kirby is a pretty easy guy to sculpt! I still spent a few weeks on and off tweaking and fine tuning different details. Gave me a good excuse to mess with some modifiers and learn a few new tricks.

Unsurprisingly, Kirby printed just fine. I was even able to make him hollow and print him with minimal supports.

Being a lil friend-shaped orb means that Kirby is naturally very 3d print friendly. Even the small, very minor details like his cheeks printed just fine. But I couldn’t just print a single kirby that just stands there!

In between working on the cyclops cat and the rupee, both of which gave me a lot of problems, I kept going back and making different styles of kirbos. Few minor adjusts, slide some parts around, rotate this and that, and new poses popped into existence!

In order to avoid the problems I had with previous projects, I printed these guys solid to avoid getting any resin trapped inside that might cause cure inhibition while molding. I also used the same technique I came up with for the cyclops cat and added an extended foot to every model for a few reasons. 

1) It avoids any warping or spreading from printing the base layers, meaning the actually bottom of the sculpt won’t be distorted by the printing process.

2) it adds more space for the silicone to fill in. The thicker the silicone mold is, the more durable the mold will be. In retrospect, I could have made them a little taller.

3) It creates a natural pour spout on the mold to overfill a bit so the bases of each casting can be sanded down without taking anything away from the figure itself. This extra pour space also gives air bubbles a place to go so fewer bubbles get stuck in the casting.

The 3 basic poses printed perfectly on the first try. The tippy-toe star kirbo printed with a droopy butt, so I had to reprint him.

It only took minimal sanding and clean up to get the kirbo squad ready. 

Within the same day, I sanded, washed, clear coated, and then molded all 8.

The molding process was a little stressful. I’d been dealing with silicone cure inhibition, which can be a costly mistake to have, and these guy would need half a kit of silicone to fill all 8 molds. 

The clear coat was the first line of defense. Then, I superglued each figure to a cardboard base. The superglue was meant to create an airtight seat with the bottoms so they wouldn’t seep any chemicals that might mess with the silicone. And as a final bit of insurance, they got a heaping helping of inhibit-x, which can be pretty pricey, but it saves me from wasting tons of time and silicone. Hard to say for sure if it works when I did so many other steps to avoid curing problems, but the molds came out fine and that’s all that matters!!!

The molds gave me a little difficulty when opening each one. The star kirbos had to be broken from their bases... But otherwise, they came out great! 

I was able to cast a ton of kirbos right away. Each mold works great and there’s no air bubble or demolding problems. Only the star kirbo needs extra time to cure, because the base is pretty thin and stays kinda soft and flexible for a few hours after leaving the mold.

The plan now is to knock out as many sets as I can before the con and sell them in blind bags at Anime Midwest 2022!

#gear-art #long #wip #process #3d printing #3d art #resin art #resin casting #mold making #kirbo #kirby #friend-shaped

[secretspecialname]

Ya im in shape. In shape of a friend.

#secretspecialpost #friend-shaped

[yourfaveisfriendshaped]

What about Randy (the Wobbledog)?

Randy is friend-shaped!

#Fake pride flag #Your fave is #Friend shaped #Friend-shaped #Your fave is friend-shaped #Your fave is friend shaped #Randy #Wobbledogs #Randy is friend-shaped #Randy is friend shaped

[jupitergames-if]

“6’9 creepy little freak” you say?? 👀

i do say!! they could end up taller, we'll see how good my self-control is

here's a WIP of their character portrait!! 😊

#friend-shaped #thanks for the ask!! #asks #anon asks #itnitd

[ermakeys]

🐹 shaped like a friend

FRIEND-SHAPED 🐹🥰

#ct-7567 #thank youuuu #friend-shaped #friend-shaped hamster

[thestuffedalligator]

So usually when an imaginary friend is a real thing in a story, it’s either a demon or a ghost or some supernatural boogeyman that probably wants to eat the kid they’ve befriended (Mama, a couple of the Paranormal Activity movies), or “imaginary friends” are just treated as a real thing in the setting, and if a child just thinks hard enough they can manifest a friend into existence (Foster’s Home for Imaginary Friends, Happy).

And somewhere in the middle is an area where the imaginary friend in question is real and they are supernatural, but they aren’t malevolent, and they aren’t entirely honest about what they are. Like maybe they’re a fairy or a god or some kind of boggle from mythology, but they just got caught by a six year old and they don’t have time to get into it, so they just go “…Yes. I’m your imaginary friend. We haven’t met. How do you do.” And then they stick around because they do love this kid, and if you’re a boggle from mythology in the modern day good food is really hard to come by.

And at some level. That’s what I think Hobbes is.

#imaginary friends #calvin and hobbes #hobbes lives in some kind of level of existence calvin isn’t aware of #but fundamentally calvin doesn’t seem to care #to calvin hobbes is a particularly well spoken and occasionally insufferable friend who happens to be shaped like a tiger #and who he loves to the very bottom of his soul #all of which is true and so hobbes isn’t in a rush to correct him #10k #20k

[candlebel]

I'd love a human sized plushie/ragdoll of either Sun or Moon, I would take it with me everywhere.

#I need one </3 #a giant doll to hug all day 💕 #friend-shaped

[a-random-goblin]

EVERYONE LOOK AT THIS IT'S A LITTLE FRIEND

#gecko #reptile #adorable #tiny #tiny friend #fish scale gecko #geck #squishy #squishy lil dude #Geckolepis #friend shaped