Lophliiosaurs

These guys are anglerfish pliosaurs; their name is a play on the anglerfish order name (Lophiiformes) and that of the pliosaur suborder/family. An alternate name I considered for this piece was "Anglers of Dagon," as these were loosely inspired by the H.P. Lovecraft short story Dagon. Without giving away too much of the plot, a sailor lost at sea awakes from a fever dream to find himself stranded on a vast and desolate island, apparently upthrust from the ocean floor and littered with all manner of bizarre deep-sea life--including supposedly extinct prehistoric organisms. Although these latter aren't described in any great detail, I was fascinated by the idea that air-breathing prehistoric marine animals like plesiosaurs could have survived undetected all this time in the ocean depths. The only (outrageously unscientific) explanation I could come up with is that they would have evolved into water-breathers in the intervening eons (or "aeons," as Lovecraft would surely say). This seemed another idea rife with possibilities, and I started combining the characteristics of plesiosaurs and deep-sea benthic fish. This anglerfish design was one of the results.

I prefer the guy on top to the one on the bottom. Obviously Mr. Top has some "great white whale" in him, while Mr. Bottom is more stereotypically fish-like. I kind of pictured the coloration similar to the Weedy Fish Lizard, although much more subdued. You know, countershading for a change.

I can see these guys as decorative friezes or bas relief on the door of some cyclopean submarine temple...Can't you?