Papillae

Often, in movies and stories, monsters are portrayed as fast moving creatures that live in inhospitable places at the end of the earth. They attack humans only when we stray into their spooky mist-filled realms. Inevitably, they end up picking off human trespassers for food or sport until only the strongest humans remain, then the monster is brutally hunted down. Any monster with an inkling of intelligence would soon observe that this is no way to live. They would quickly discern our propensity for sedentary behaviour and try to adapt to take advantage of us when we are at our most vulnerable.

Papillae is one such creature. Although it lacks prehensile limbs, Papillae’s long muscular tongue is more than enough to help it catch humans and domesticated animals. Its tongue takes the form of an arm chair, awaiting a tired individual to come along and slump within its warm folds. This tongue holds aloft the Papillae’s small body and large mouth. When its victim is sufficiently relaxed, it drops from above giving the now-denizen of its stomach no time to react. This tactic could make Papillae a feared hunter… Of course if we simply looked up before flopping into the chair then its hunting strategy would fail… but humans are notorious for not looking up.

The model was created in Blender. Despite its height and bulk I believe that the printed model will balance, and a cursory play in MeshMixer seems to confirm this. However, the model is set up to easily be altered with a basic rig to ensure that balance is achieved if I have not quite got this right.