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On Anthro Anatomy
11 years ago
This just bothers me but I'm going to outline what my deal is and why being a pedant doesn't usually help all the time with me.
Anthros have a mix of human and animal traits.
Technically, for aesthetic purposes, there are SPECIFIC traits that they possess in order to blend between human and animal pleasingly.
A lot on non-furries who joke about what they think furries must be into, for example, don't seem to grasp that it's usually the face that's #1 importance. Now, I completely understand there are people who actually go for something completely different, but my experience seems to indicate that if the animal face isn't on the character, it's up in the air whether it's furry or else some kind of fey/elf (especially if you keep the ears, have a lower half animal like a satyr, etc) If it's an alien, especially an alien based on a particular property, well then that's an alien.
These things might have crossover with furry but they themselves are not, I don't think--but they DO have the very similar goals of crossing the human with the nonhuman because that is awesome.
(In short, I don't think it should be too much of a stretch to circumscribe a specific demographic that frames this the way I do--almost any given icon you highlight on this site is some variation of a given animal face, so that's where we're starting)
After this, we've established that the person has animal features. We have a kind of idea of purity to this too--unless a character is specifically a hybrid, then the animal features are derived from a single species.
. . . unless we have an idea of biological purity, in which case, any addition to a given species needs to make concrete biological (or even evolutionary) sense, even if they depart from the original intention.
Or, god forbid, we think both of these are compatible 100% of the time.
So, on the topic of say, my character Adrian, who you may realize simultaneously has breasts and pouch teats, will tend to kick off some people who say that it's redundant to do so, that Adrian shouldn't have breasts at all if she's going to have pouch teats.
Really.
It's kinda/sorta the same track of complaining whether or not anthro reptiles should have breasts or not, because "mammal" means "mammary" and I took high school biology you dummies, I know exactly what I'm doing.
The thing is, like I took pains to establish at the beginning of this essay,the basic presumption of anthro is a blending of human and animal traits, and humans ARE mammals.
Whether or not Adrian is reproductively marsupial doesn't itself mean that her entire reproductive system is exactly the same as a kangaroo, because that's not the POINT.
Yes, it's annoying when people call a character a kangaroo and give them canine feet because those things are not from kangaroos--but it does not subsequently follow that anyone is BARRED from developing a kangaroo character with humanlike hands without having to be called out "You know, kangaroos don't have human hands"
If I were going to draw a kangaroo, I'd draw a kangaroo. I'm not drawing a kangaroo, I am drawing an anthro kangaroo, a human-kangaroo hybrid that begins and ends where I believe the physical traits make the most sense for what I'm attempting to accomplish with them (telling a human story with anthro characters, usually). Sometimes the purpose is to make biological sense, other times it's only for the aesthetics.
I appreciate the anatomy lessons, I'm always on the lookout for new things to integrate in the future. I just also think it's perfectly acceptable to ignore those things, especially when the "error" is on the side of human.
It doesn't always have to make literal sense, otherwise everyone would be stuck having to justify the biology of all of their fantastic creatures.
Anthros have a mix of human and animal traits.
Technically, for aesthetic purposes, there are SPECIFIC traits that they possess in order to blend between human and animal pleasingly.
A lot on non-furries who joke about what they think furries must be into, for example, don't seem to grasp that it's usually the face that's #1 importance. Now, I completely understand there are people who actually go for something completely different, but my experience seems to indicate that if the animal face isn't on the character, it's up in the air whether it's furry or else some kind of fey/elf (especially if you keep the ears, have a lower half animal like a satyr, etc) If it's an alien, especially an alien based on a particular property, well then that's an alien.
These things might have crossover with furry but they themselves are not, I don't think--but they DO have the very similar goals of crossing the human with the nonhuman because that is awesome.
(In short, I don't think it should be too much of a stretch to circumscribe a specific demographic that frames this the way I do--almost any given icon you highlight on this site is some variation of a given animal face, so that's where we're starting)
After this, we've established that the person has animal features. We have a kind of idea of purity to this too--unless a character is specifically a hybrid, then the animal features are derived from a single species.
. . . unless we have an idea of biological purity, in which case, any addition to a given species needs to make concrete biological (or even evolutionary) sense, even if they depart from the original intention.
Or, god forbid, we think both of these are compatible 100% of the time.
So, on the topic of say, my character Adrian, who you may realize simultaneously has breasts and pouch teats, will tend to kick off some people who say that it's redundant to do so, that Adrian shouldn't have breasts at all if she's going to have pouch teats.
Really.
It's kinda/sorta the same track of complaining whether or not anthro reptiles should have breasts or not, because "mammal" means "mammary" and I took high school biology you dummies, I know exactly what I'm doing.
The thing is, like I took pains to establish at the beginning of this essay,the basic presumption of anthro is a blending of human and animal traits, and humans ARE mammals.
Whether or not Adrian is reproductively marsupial doesn't itself mean that her entire reproductive system is exactly the same as a kangaroo, because that's not the POINT.
Yes, it's annoying when people call a character a kangaroo and give them canine feet because those things are not from kangaroos--but it does not subsequently follow that anyone is BARRED from developing a kangaroo character with humanlike hands without having to be called out "You know, kangaroos don't have human hands"
If I were going to draw a kangaroo, I'd draw a kangaroo. I'm not drawing a kangaroo, I am drawing an anthro kangaroo, a human-kangaroo hybrid that begins and ends where I believe the physical traits make the most sense for what I'm attempting to accomplish with them (telling a human story with anthro characters, usually). Sometimes the purpose is to make biological sense, other times it's only for the aesthetics.
I appreciate the anatomy lessons, I'm always on the lookout for new things to integrate in the future. I just also think it's perfectly acceptable to ignore those things, especially when the "error" is on the side of human.
It doesn't always have to make literal sense, otherwise everyone would be stuck having to justify the biology of all of their fantastic creatures.
Technically, there is a "sense" to it in that certain realistic consequences are not considered/deliberately ignored in order to attain the outcome. Whether or not you, as the viewer, can decouple the realistic consequences from the fantasy you see depends entirely on your personality. "Suspension of disbelief" is different for different people, which is why not EVERYONE IN THE WORLD immediately understands/latches onto/praises unto high heavens any given fetish art.
And given the noses a good amount of furries would end up with, you wouldn't have to put your face in the armpit in order to smell it.
They still have a muzzle appropriate for their dietary preferences, but they are no longer capable of flight (having gained enough mass in the conversion to bipedal locomotion that wings cannot support the weight).
Besides, you're telling a story, not giving an anatomy lesson. I personally like the different direction you've taken with their builds, but honestly I think you can make a good story regardless of what the vehicles of that story are.
Seriously, as individuals engaged in the creative process, as long as we aren't creating for someone else, then the only controlling factor is whether we wanted it that way or not. All arguments to the contrary are simply other individuals attempting to force what *they* want on to the creator. They prefer that a character look a certain way, act a certain way, have a certain biology, but they know full well that "I want" isn't a valid argument, and unlikely to sway the creator, so they couch it as "that's wrong!", and then cherry-pick facts so that the resulting character would suit their fancy.
My suggestion to such individuals is generally "learn to create for yourself and the make what you want, how you want." with varying degrees of tact or lack there-of.
Well, it's because we only really need a few certain kinds of details in order to recognize something as "a person", and everything else is just convincing details. Anthro is primarily a fun way of playing around with that. And for some people it doesn't work, and for other people it does. Trying to impose other details beyond that is usually not necessary, because tastes and dealbreakers just plain differ.
http://www.readerslane.com/wp-conte.....%CC%81bria.png
http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikiped....._Tarragona.jpg
http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikiped.....27Igualada.JPG
Across the 100,000+ creators of the Furry Fandom, you're not always going to get interconsistency. :)
Let's remind ourselfs of how many ridable giant animals we see in vidego-games and cartoons? birds dont have bones strong enough to be chocobos, riding a enourmous lizard? too close to the ground to be rideable.
I undestanded what you said and even do it at some levels (reptiles with hair)... but i didnt catch your point... is this a rant about characters that are and arent of an specifical race? or about how ppl cant get over the fact we need no science to justify why were drawing a... dunno, a blue dog character with deer horns?
The thing with anthro is usually that we're making things up as we go along and everyone starts with their own set of basic assumptions--some peoples' may be more intentional than others, but that doesn't necessarily make them "wrong"; biological reality isn't the ONLY way something can be developed and presented consistently.
Just aint gonna make an enourmous reply if dont have anything meaningful to share.
Thank you for clearing it up.
I had one person, complain about a picture of a Bowser like character to be "not perfect", since he had a human penis. - Since we all know that fictional turtle/dragon hybrids that are even more altered to fit an anthro form have a specific type of non human genitalia!
I find it extremely redundant and annoying that people keep bringing up any kind of anatomy issues, when at the same time, they have no problem with neon colored furcoats and other things that are just as part of fiction as the design of anatomy.
Female genitals tend to be completely overlooked in this department anyhow, though I have seen a few people complain in the interests of equality, it's certainly not as widespread/accepted a thing as whether anthros should have exotic male parts--virtually all the time, without going into deliberate race creation, the female counterpart is going to have entirely humanlike anatomy there.
Not meaning of course to justify, just that people would sooner look to the base animal and what they do in our nature, as opposed to thinking beyond it. It is my love though of culture, people, why, how's, and so on. So I prefer to love to wonder the reason for the anatomy, child rearing, what words, phrases, and technology they would make due to anatomy. It's all so interesting. @_@
Yes, it's all there to backfill a reason for "this character has breasts" but even without that reason given it shouldn't be too hard to invent justifications. I mean, we're humans, we invent stupid justifications for things literally all the time.
Also, I always love when you post journals like this xD Great insight.
Another is how some people go through great pains to develop elaborate genetalia for their character based on their respective animals, when, in anthro terms, it would be completely unnecessary because they stand on two legs and they wouldn't need to have sex in funky ways. Debating that point is sort of moot though because it falls upon 'lol furries', and their wish fulfillment. Just sort of funny cause I remember someone saying they don't like human anatomy on furry characters in that respect. Yet, It definitely makes more sense for an anthro reptile to have boobs for aesthetic purposes than this. Not only is it truly blending human/animal traits but it serves to differenciate between sexes more easily so that the viewer can identify.
Most other stuff, while we all have our preferences, are mostly aesthetic, like the look of hands and feet, number of fingers/toes, etc.. You could easily reason for it. OH! I will mention though I find it funny when people give characters toothpick feet on a digitgrade anthro character. I just picture them falling over all the time or walking funny. XD
I don't find it normal, I find it weird and unsettling. Puffy lips look painful to me. If I were to pin down a lip preference, it'd be thin and sharp, and if I wanted color to them it'd be dark, and hey what do you know, that's usually how I draw them.
So when it comes to animal face, I also don't prefer an exact animal head stapled onto a human body, though when done for specific purposes this can be interesting. We usually go for adding human eyes and expression, because this is what we're drawn to in people, in humans specifically. We alter the mouth-shape so that they can make human mouth expressions, eyebrows so they can have eye expressions. A sloped muzzle is sometimes turned more upright near the forehead (though the muzzle is kept in place of the nose, because I don't think human noses are that important to a lot of us either in terms of beauty, much like the lips or ears)
People USUALLY accept that for ungulate characters that their eyes aren't going to be placed facing outward, because the point isn't to recreate an ungulate head--it's to make the ungulate head look relatable in a human sort of way. When it comes to other anatomy bits though . . .
"Why does your cow have an udder if she has boobs too?"
"Why is your female hyena not basically a shemale?"
"Why are your kangaroo's balls UNDER his dick?"
And a personal favorite...
"An ape fursona, are you even trying?"
Having the big game universe bible can be great if you're dealing with the demographic that loves number-crunching and bolt-counting, but yeah, the average person isn't going to want to be overwhelmed with technical and biological rules when they're probably looking for fantasy escapism with a compelling narrative.
Even settings with lots of numbers like D&D are intended to be fun/big/sprawling/moddable first and consistent in anything not specifically in the game rules dead last. Any attempt to rationalize the biology/economics of a setting with 90% predators will end up with a weird, entirely reframing-everything-we-know rationalization, or just a big shrug.
Celebrate the variety, don't bemoan it.
Now in many cases, adding human traits to something gives essentially the same result as creating a mix-and-match species out of different traits. That's why I do agree with the essence of your statement: arguing whether or not a given anatomy makes sense is really not the point of the exercise. And really, the scale of anthropomorphism is sliding - there literally is no human feature that cannot be added, up to the point where you have added them all and the something is now effectively a complete human for all intents and puposes. There is no order of operations either (nobody says the face must be the last thing altered, or tits can't appear until the original species is no longer easily recognizable).
I simply think that many people who argue these points are not really aware of the dictionary definition of anthropomorphism in the first place. Instead, they have an idea in their head of how things "should be done correctly", and they'll base their commentary off of that subjective idea. Because obviously, anyone who does it different doesn't "get it".
There's some semblance of verisimilitude, but it can be as deep or as shallow as anyone needs it to be for their purposes. And nobody HAS to hold to a vaguely-defined "house style" anyhow.
The furry aesthetic comes with it a certain kind of "house style" that's not really a house style at all because everyone can ultimately do damn well what they please, but it's sort of like the solidification that all genres go through--it's not REALLY the furry aesthetic unless your female hyena characters have pseudopenises, because that's what we all somehow collectively decided is the dividing line (genitals? Really?) or some nonesense like that.
In reality, we've made no such bargain with no such collective, and I don't like being beholden to someone else's reality when I'm specifically crafting my own for me.
I certainly wouldn't like to like to remain in a situation that says furry is defined by costume sex any more than I would that says to be a furry means you're a pedophile/zoophile; those kind of presumptions are dangerous especially when suddenly that's what furries are 'known' for and outsiders are like 'he's a furry, he shouldn't be allowed anywhere near x' and things tend to snowball from there.
I'm sorry if my attempt to wring out what the basic things that furries themselves tend to associate with the term ends up exclusionary because that's not my intention; I just didn't want to get bogged down in the extraneous details or asides about how such-and-such artist created dragon-kirin-satyrs and my arguments don't apply THERE, when I'm only talking about this one realm/style that is more specific than what the broader fandom encompasses.
Because it IS a thing that crops up within the style of specifically blending one species of animal with a human--I am commenting on that, specifically, and not the other things. Likewise, it's the thing that most fandom people call to mind when they think of "furry" and it's usually what they MEAN.
If that is broadened from the definition I gave, then that's fine, but even if it is then I'd still like to be able to have a term instead of saying "The broadly common furry style where you have singular species crossover with humans, usually but not necessarily starting with the face and adding details from there" (And even that doesn't cover EVERYTHING)
If it's just a painting then, well it's art. If it's a story though, THEN you start picking it apart because how the hell does this even exist?!
Though I really only care about my own characters, if I'm reading a comic about these talking animals, I won't question how they're able to walk... until I start doing it myself. XD
And given that the same scale problem has been applied to the scientific accuracy of dragons, I'm fairly certain precise physics are going to take a back seat no matter what. If you're going to impose very strict physical accuracy, well, you can't get there from here.
In City of Heroes, several people had dragon characters based on western dragons, and the females were clearly female in shape. When I made a dragon to interact with them, I made an eastern dragon. Her human form was clearly female, but her dragon form was built using the male model, and I put in her description that she could be easily mistaken for male by those that met her first in that form. I also had a female character that turned into a flat chested werewolf. It was good for a few laughs that I never would have had if I had let myself stay hung-up about those details.
But I don't think it's necessary for all Thylacine characters, it's just the "kind" of consistency I decided to go with in this setting.
So more realistic riding of canines and felines (or any other creature) might need to "beef up" the feral's body. That of course would come from selective breeding. The body would be more square (height and length) to handle a rider. The legs thicker and straighter. Saddles may or may not be used. Maybe a riding harness if a saddle would not work. Now Timmie wouldn't use a saddle, he is too much a daredevil and insists on bareback.
Personally I feel your style of anthro for many species is right.
And besides The more important part in the story of even comics is the characters identities, and that their appearances should go second. And that's coming from an actual writer (Well wannabe writer, I haven't even seen a editor or publishor yet) who has himself working on 6 stories.
The only thing that ever bothers me (and only minimally) is when someone draws a creature with plantigrade feet but only has pads on the toes and ball of the foot, but the heel is just covered in fur. That needs protection too!
Personally, I would give a bipedal anthro rabbit pads....or more like have the entire bottom of the foot be one big pad, or at least have some sort of tough velvety covering, because of the matter of size and weight. But it really just a matter of style.
That said, I have seen some people get quite bent out of shape about any depiction of rabbits with pads...
Or drawing bat faces the wrong way. I think I've even seen a Tumblr page devoted to ranting about people drawing anthro deer the wrong way.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Adrian
As for marsupials with breasts, an argument could be made that, since the pouch is akin to an external womb, there would come a point in the baby's development equivalent to a placental's newborn – too big and cumbersome to use the womb/pouch, but not grown enough to accept a diet of solid foods. Thus, like placental babies, breasts outside the pouch would be plausible. And that's more thinking than placental eye candy on an opossum really needed, methinks.
Lol. Personally, I like keeping an element of realism with designs but at the end of the day, it's all more or less pretend so making too big of a deal just seems silly of people.
It's why I have returned to you numerous times for raccoon drawings -- because your raccoon faces actually look like raccoon faces, not just miscellaneous canine face with raccoon mask slapped on and BLAM, done (what I affectionately refer to as dog-face-syndrome.) l3
In short, draw what you like. I like anthro roos.
That's why I don't feel like a pervert for having a fursona with six nipples. :P (Not to mention you can't see any of them anyway. Yay fur!)
http://www.furaffinity.net/view/3252379/
Species that have paws would have the evolutionary advantage as paws are very close to hands. So I envision a furries' paw to be a evolutionary combining of both the human and the animal traits. The furry has animal paw pads and has developed a thumb and it's digits have grown out some over it's animal brethren, but it remains a paw and it has not turned into a human hand.
I also agree with the thought that the furry must look like what species it is. The human face with animal ears doesn't cut for me. But at the very same time I do believe the furry will have evolved into having limited abilities to better show emotions with their face that what a natural can ever do and that would come from both a slight redesigning of their eyes and mouth
As has been discussed, yes, anything goes if you want it to be, but for me, I too see the inherent limitations on the furry versions of any hoofed species. Feet can remain the same, no problem there, they simply walk upright, but how, if you use the keeping it real-world logic I'm using, could a cow furry function in "real life"? Or as another example, think of the massive feet of an elephant. My personal opinion and only my personal opinion, I simply don't think evolution would go to that massive and an extreme of changing the fundamental animal.
However, in knowing that there is great thought and belief and even some fossil evidence that today's birds were yesterday's dinosaurs, I do realize I could be wrong in my assumptions there.
A small lol for that.
For sci-fi approach, three alternatives:
- The wordy explanation: Females blahblah artropic principle blahblahblah hibridization blahblah vestigial remmanents blahblah
- The short one: So Kirk has something to do with his hand during foreplay.
And the simpler and most satisfactory one: The Bradbury Defense
Some people might find the annoying because I always point things that I think are “out of place”, sometimes because I’d like the artist to explain why he did things that way, other times because I think I might contribute by giving an opinion.
On the other hand, sometimes having something not going according to expectations makes things interesting...
But I'm not really sure I can get on board with drawing a male kangaroo's junk upside down. I'm tried it and it's just way too awkward for me. The arguments I hear now are STILL frequently about genitals and whether or not you have to be animal-accurate and I'm like... dude just let people draw genitals of their preference. It's clearly more fun for them one way than the other and I'd prefer people did the thing that's more fun for them. There's room for everybody.
(Though I would like people to at least KNOW that they're drawing canine paws on literally every creature. If that's their preference then whatever, but the variety is important in the efforts against the Doggening of all species)
Regarding animal anatomy, if one research on the net there are lots of interesting shapes of genitalia, some more flashy or interesting than others. Then again, people can like their characters with an animal or a human penis, if up to each one. I’m trying to make an enciclopedia of animal penises or “Dicktionary” so people can choose their characters to have one or on other type of anatomy.