Lex / Cranes / Arian

@illgottencranes

Artsy biologist guy, newly PhD, queer immigrant 🇺🇸->🇳🇴 Limited typing. No genAI. He/him okay, prefer e/em or xe/xyr (any spelling!) 🏳️‍⚧️

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Lex / Cranes / Arian@illgottencranes· 5d

Glossy purple starling (Lamprotornis purpureus) for day 6 of #AvianAugust. I love the character of these birds! Gouache, and I succeeded in being a bit faster this time. 😅 #BirdArt #SciArt #AvianAugust2026 #TraditionalArt

Painting of a glossy purple (and blue and aqua) bird with big yellow-orange eyes and a serious expression.

Lex / Cranes / Arian@illgottencranes· 6d

The shimmer video! #BirdArt #SciArt #AvianAugust

Lex / Cranes / Arian@illgottencranes· 6d

I'm a day late, but I wasn't going to skip this one! My take on a common bronzewing from David's photo selection for #AvianAugust day 4, enjoying the rain. 🩵 Gouache and mica watercolor painting, postcard-sized. Shimmer video below! #BirdArt #SciArt #AvianAugust2026 #TraditionalArt

A painting of a common bronzewing (Phaps chalcoptera), a small dove or pigeon with mainly brown feathers and bright iridescent patches on its wings. The dove in the painting is ruffled up and bathing in the rain. The wing patches are painted with shiny mica pigments and catch the light.

Lex / Cranes / Arian@illgottencranes· 8d

Flame bowerbird (Sericulus ardens) male for #AvianAugust day 3. Practicing with gouache paint, which is supposed to have a MATTE finish, so it is extra annoying that the turquoise is glossy and made this almost impossible to photograph 😬 #BirdArt #SciArt #AvianAugust2026 #TraditionalArt

A bird with a yellow body, red head, and black wings and tail clutches a blue berry while fanning his wing in front of a purple bower. The painting is stylized to be somewhat more geometric than reality.

Lex / Cranes / Arian@illgottencranes· 9d

Succumbed to temptation for #AvianAugust day 2, the rainbow-bearded thornbill (Chalcostigma herrani), going WAY more detailed than planned. 👀 First time using these neon colors! 🌈 Postcard-sized #watercolor. #AvianAugust2026 #BirdArt #SciArt #TraditionalArt #Hummingbird

A watercolour painting of a little hummingbird clinging to a horsetail stem, with complex purple/green/blue colors on the body and a brilliant crest and beard painted in bright rainbow colors. Also utilizing the White Gouache of Insufficient Planning!

Lex / Cranes / Arian@illgottencranes· 10d

Here's the bonus shimmer video of today's #AvianAugust #BirdArt!

Lex / Cranes / Arian@illgottencranes· 10d

Day 1 of #AvianAugust! Today is the northern lapwing ("vipe" in 🇳🇴 ), which has a wonderful crest. Crest is best! Watercolor, 11x11 cm. The wing patch is painted with shimmery mica colors. #AvianAugust2026 #BirdArt #SciArt #TraditionalArt

Watercolour painting of a wading bird with a long cute crest and a shimmery iridescent wing. The northern lapwing, Vanellus vanellus.

Lex / Cranes / Arian@illgottencranes· 20d

The Dragoon Navy Issue, one of the newer ships in @eveonline.com. This is a tanky fit for waiting for solo opponents in a faction warfare plex, then holding them with neuts and tackle: eveworkbench.com/fit/eb280e14... #EVEonline #JustCreators @justabout.com

A screenshot from EVE Online of a Dragoon Navy Issue against a nebula.

Lex / Cranes / Arian@illgottencranes· 22d

I took about a million WIP photos to help spot what changes were needed by changing my view of it; here are just a few of them. Took several long days working in the library, but I got to shelter in the AC during the heatwave and used books to reference O'keeffe's style.

Photo of the initial setup showing a tablet with a screenshot of an Atron for reference, the oil pastels in their box, a book about Georgia O'keeffe's work open to pages showing her jack-in-the-pulpit paintings, and the pad of paper with the Atron sketched lightly in colored pencil.

Photo of the pad of paper on an easel with the green shell of the Atron rendered, with the paper cones used for blending underneath and the closed book of O'keefe's works behind.

Tightly framed photo of the in-progress Atron, with most of the center and right side of the subject rendered.

In-progress photo with the Atron subject mostly completed except for several touch-ups that I did after the background. I also adjust the pod on the right side to be darker on top.

Lex / Cranes / Arian@illgottencranes· 22d

"Forgia O'keeffe's Atron Pilot I" - for a @justabout.com contest to create @eveonline.com fanart in the style of a famous artist. Also a great way to push your creative comfort zone! Oil pastel trying to look like oil paint, on 30x40 paper. #EVEonline #JustCreators @ccpgames.com #SciFiArt

A lusciously smooth oil pastel drawing of an Atron from the game EVE Online, in a style reminiscent of Georgia O'keeffe. The ship is drawn in hues of green, brown, blue, and purple, with focus on the curious glowing aperture at the front of the ship. The background consists of rippling waves of blue-black.

Lex / Cranes / Arian@illgottencranes· Jul 10

Marker sketch study before painting a friend's dog. Trying out this blocky style to focus more on color and also because I think it's cool! Will pack a blockier white paint pen for next time, though. #dogs #dogsky #traditionalart #germanshepherd

Drawing of a dog - a german shepherd - in marker, mainly in purples and oranges, wearing a glowing green ring around his neck.

Lex / Cranes / Arian@illgottencranes· Jul 9

That one's sadly just a description, not a translation. On the other hand this screenshot my SO sent me from Aftenposten has the name translated to «Grev Søppelbøttefjes» (at least for the title)!

Screenshot from Norwegian conservative-leaning newspaper Aftenposten. My hands hurt a bit too much right now to transcribe it, sorry

Lex / Cranes / Arian@illgottencranes· Jul 8

Somewhere in Iceland 🏖️🇮🇸 Trying out watercolor crayons and also practicing my landscapes! I love the texture from the dry-over-wet method. A5-sized Arches paper and Neocolor II crayons, loose reference from photo. #scape #landscape #artsky #traditionalart

A watercolour painting/drawing of the Icelandic highlands, with rocky crags and mountains in the background under a many-layered cloudy sky. Depicted in saturated purples, blues, greens, and yellows. Exact location unclear; there appears to be a glacier in the background but that doesn't entirely narrow it down.

Lex / Cranes / Arian@illgottencranes· Jul 4

Watching and judging 😐 #parrotsky #birb #cockatiel

A white-faced female cockatiel with a bib of starlike pearls sitting on a shelf in front of a blue-grey wall. She is looking straight ahead, relaxed but with a look of slight distaste, and has no visible feet behind her floofskirt.

Lex / Cranes / Arian@illgottencranes· Jul 3

Okay so I have to admit I did make these test swatches (again: I just really enjoy this!), and thought it might be interesting for showing how these colors blend in the medium? I strongly feel that a big collection isn't needed. Using Copics because they're refillable and lasted >10 years

Test swatches of various colors of alcohol markers overlayed. Some combinations are chosen for comparison, not suitability, or to show shading with a more similar hue instead (but this is how you tend to end up needing to buy a lot more specific shades of marker)

Lex / Cranes / Arian@illgottencranes· Jul 1

Oh yeah, I'm a PhD now! I have this knife that proves it 😂

Photo of a decorative knife in front of a printed copy of my PhD thesis. The knife is engraved with my name, degree, department, university, and the current year.

Lex / Cranes / Arian@illgottencranes· Jul 1

The hallway of the hotel we ended up staying in during a surprise roadtrip back to Oslo had a very backrooms feel. Actually, the room didn't initially exist and my mom vanished for a while with the urge to explore... 🤔 Slept great though, under a rolled up projector screen! (Vøringfoss Hotel)

Photo of a stairwell inside of another stairwell, with no connection between them

A hotel hallway with the double stairwell at the end, mismatched chairs, mismatched doors, and three sets of double doors right next to each other. Note that only one set of double doors has a handle and lock, the other two just have blank discs instead.

Lex / Cranes / Arian@illgottencranes· Jun 18

The kind of moulting I'm doing 😂

Photo of a bird with iridescent black feathers (a grackle) everywhere except for its bald head - a kind of unfortunate molting pattern some birds experience

Lex / Cranes / Arian@illgottencranes· Jun 15

Mammal practice! 😅 Inspired by my friend who hides fox doodles in random places. 🧡 Copic marker and white paint pen on A5 paper, limited color palette. Happier with it now that I can't compare it to the reference photo. 😂 #SciArt #traditionalart

A drawing of a red fox running happily through the snow on a bright day.

Lex / Cranes / Arian@illgottencranes· Jun 13

Sketched this in marker over two panels of a sci-fi/fantasy convention, so I had comic books on the mind. 😄 #SciArt #BirdArt #Bird #TraditionalArt

A drawing of a female pale-billed woodpecker, mostly in blue and green and with a bright red head, and no outlines. The bird's alert posture and the radiating lines of the background suggest a moment of immense surprise.

Lex / Cranes / Arian@illgottencranes· Jun 12

Fanart inspired by @naominovik.bsky.social's upcoming "Folly" series, which has a short story in the "Buried Deep" anthology. The mystery of these strange coastal towers has stuck with me! Watercolor and gouache on A5-sized Arches paper. #watercolor #traditionalart #artsky

A painting depicting steep, rocky cliffs meeting a deep blue-green coastline, topped by green vegetation. The central focus is on a tower made of a translucent aqua blue material, catching the light of an evening sky.

Lex / Cranes / Arian@illgottencranes· Jun 7

Turns out even the worm thing is almost definitely inaccurate! www.scientificamerican.com/article/how-...

(In response to the question "Can the condition cause memory loss?")

WHITE: No, it usually doesn’t directly cause much in the way of memory loss. If you do careful psychological tests, you may see some minor [memory] problems, but [this] wouldn’t be a common symptom. If someone has had frequent seizures, however, they can end up with memory loss. People wouldn’t describe brain fog or memory problems. As an aside, those are more typical of mercury poisoning. [Editor’s Note: According to the New York Times, Kennedy has said he also experienced mercury poisoning around the time he had learned of his parasitic infection. Mercury exposure has been linked to central nervous system damage that can cause memory loss and Alzheimer’s disease.]

(Question in bold:) According to the New York Times, Kennedy claimed that the worm that infected him “ate a portion” of his brain. Can tapeworms “eat” brain tissue?

SHARIF: Discussions of eating brains are better left in zombie movies than in legitimate scientific discourse. The parasitic infections that impact the brain do not eat the brain. Now, that doesn’t mean that they cannot damage brain tissue. But that kind of inflammatory language indicates a lack of scientific literacy and is pretty concerning.

Lex / Cranes / Arian@illgottencranes· May 30

A portrait of Banana, one of our adopted budgies from years ago, with banana leaves. This was a tougher one to paint because he was such an undifferentiated yellow floof. 😛 Watercolor pencil and paint, 12x16.5cm on Arches paper. #parrotsky #artsky #painting

Watercolour portrait of a soft yellow male budgie without any stripes, with a pair of green banana leaves behind him and a background of purple shading to teal. There is a halo-like circle of shimmery blue and gold-ish paint behind his head, photographed to show it catching the light.

Lex / Cranes / Arian@illgottencranes· May 29

Sacrifices to the little gods of ADHD; may they take this offering of time and grant me the focus to read with my actual eyes. Today and yesterday's library sketches, including my favorite 🇳🇴 native flower. Marker on paper, loosely referenced from books. #SciArt #sketchbook

A green and blue sketch of, believe it or not, a green lizard, with orange eyes. Extra loosely sketched.

A mostly green marker sketch of two small blue flowers, germander speedwell aka tveskjeggveronika.

Lex / Cranes / Arian@illgottencranes· May 22

I wasn't sure I'd manage something as complex as a hook echo for this storm-themed SKINR contest, but as a tornado nerd, I knew I had to try. Luckily, the Eagle has an extra gradient slot, AND it leads to this weather pun! #EVEonline #JustCreators @eveonline.com @ccpgames.com @justabout.com

A screenshot from the space MMO EVE Online showing the design for a custom skin. The ship shown here, an Eagle, is predominantly green, with a section shading to yellow and culminating in an orange and red spiral. An oval inset on the lower right shows a radar image of a tornadic supercell for reference.

The name of the skin, "Flying Eagle", is a reference to a classic supercell shape with the appearance of outstretched wings and a hooked beak.

Lex / Cranes / Arian@illgottencranes· May 21

A missive from EVE Online's garden hermit of ship fitting: how to fit a Vagabond for solo PvP! The description gives some options to modify it, and you can copy the fit from the alt text. 🩵 #EVEonline #JustCreators @eveonline.com @ccpgames.com @justabout.com

Screenshot of a simulated ship fitting from the spaceship MMO EVE Online, with the following descriptive text:

"Fast and deadly, the Vagabond is a true classic of solo roaming. This fit is a standard loadout and can be modified to suit your needs:

- More cost effective: swap the kinetic shield reinforcer rig for a processor overclocking unit, and you can upgrade your meta and faction modules to T2.
- More powerful: swap your meta modules for faction modules.
- Imperfect fitting skills: upgrade the ancillary current router to T2.
- More damage: swap your EC drones for damage drones, and your damage control for another tracking enhancer.

The selection of drugs in the cargo are cheap and effective - as most solo roamers know, drugs are more cost-effective than bling for upgrading your combat efficacy when you’re going into danger!"

The copy-able fit is:

[Vagabond, Solo]

Gyrostabilizer II
Gyrostabilizer II
Nanofiber Internal Structure II
Fourier Compact Tracking Enhancer
EFFA Compact Assault Damage Control

50MN Cold-Gas Enduring Microwarpdrive
Republic Fleet Large Shield Extender
Dread Guristas Warp Scrambler
X-Large Ancillary Shield Booster

Small Gremlin Compact Energy Neutralizer
220mm Vulcan AutoCannon II
220mm Vulcan AutoCannon II
220mm Vulcan AutoCannon II
220mm Vulcan AutoCannon II
220mm Vulcan AutoCannon II

Medium Kinetic Shield Reinforcer II
Medium Ancillary Current Router I

Hornet EC-300 x5

Barrage M x2400
Hail M x2400
Navy Cap Booster 400 x27
Republic Fleet EMP M x1600
Republic Fleet Fusion M x1600
Republic Fleet Phased Plasma M x1600
Agency 'Pyrolancea' DB3 Dose I x1
Synth Blue Pill Booster x1
Synth Drop Booster x1

Lex / Cranes / Arian@illgottencranes· May 11

A watercolor I was commissioned to paint for a friend's upcoming wedding, to be held in the historic buildings of this art club in Rhode Island 🎊 ~20x28cm on 300gsm paper, referenced from photo & using lightbox tracing for the general outlines. #RhodeIsland #Architecture #Art #Painting #FineArt

Watercolour painting of a historic east coast USA city block glimpsed from a green space across the street on a sunny summer day. Painted in vivid colors of green, blue, yellow, and purple, with no true grey or black pigments used. The four buildings featured belong to the Providence Art Club.

Lex / Cranes / Arian@illgottencranes· May 10

Am streamer birb, have greem screem #cockatiel #parrotsky

A male normal(-ish) grey cocktail sits soggily on the back of a chair, a microphone on a boom arm in the background as well as a hanging green blanket.

...actually all things either for protecting the electronics from bird mischief (like the jeans leg wrapped around the mic arm), or to make it so anyone can ever hear us over the birds

Lex / Cranes / Arian@illgottencranes· May 10

From a paint & sip I went to with my mom. 🦙 Stuck to the general llama subject (unless it's an alpaca??) but my own vision, as a request from my mum since she ends up with all my canvases. Acrylic on canvas, about 2.5 hours, fastest I've ever had to move a brush 😂 #TraditionalArt #art #painting

A long and tall painting of a llama - unless it's an alpaca? - portrait-style of the neck and head, facing forward. The fur is in tones of orange-brown with purple shadow, and the background is done in streaks of green, yellow, and white.

Lex / Cranes / Arian@illgottencranes· Apr 11

Marker drawing of great horned owl, semi-sketch because I did a bare minimum of planning before, shall we say, drawing the rest of the owl? 🦉 #Birds #BirdArt #TraditionalArt