BRINGING TO LIFE THE (IN)FAMOUS PHOTOGRAPH OF LOYS'S APE: A SHUKERNATURE VIDEO(S) OF THE DAY

 

A couple of photo-stills from my two AI-generated video clips of the familiar cropped version of the notorious Ameranthropoides loysi photograph (the centre image here) coming to life (AI photo-stills and videos created by me using Adobe Firefly)

It's been several months since I posted here on ShukerNature a ShukerNature Picture of the Day (click here to access the most recent one), and I have never posted a ShukerNature Video of the Day – until now, that is. Moreover, because I'm a generous kind of guy, I've posted two, not just one, as you can see. But what is their theme, their subject matter? Here's my answer:

Have you ever wondered what would have happened if Loys's ape Ameranthropoides loysi had been genuine, not a hoax, and its fake photograph had come to life? Wonder no longer!

These two video clips were generated for me yesterday by the AI image-generation program Adobe Firefly in response to two separate prompts provided to it by me – one was a detailed verbal description written by me, the other was a visual prompt consisting of the original Ameranthropoides loysi photograph, reproduced below:

Allegedly dating from 1917, this is the less familiar uncropped version of the notorious Loys's ape photograph, revealed several decades later to have been a hoax, featuring the dead body of a pet spider monkey (public domain)

One ever-present, ever-surprising factor that I've encountered numerous times when utilizing various different AI image-generation programs to create the pictures and most of the videos appearing in my pictorial biker/motorcycling-themed blog RebelBikerDude's AI Biker Art, is the sheer unpredictability and often truly surreal nature of their output, in which all manner of unexpected, wholly unprompted visual details are frequently included by the programs in their generated images (bikers anomalously sprouting wings comes readily to mind with my AI biker art blog!). Sure enough, the second video in this present ShukerNature article will be seen to include – albeit only very briefly – some strange large object appearing and disappearing behind the creature's back. What it is is anyone's guess!

To read my comprehensive three-part coverage on ShukerNature of the entire A. loysi photo saga, be sure to click here, here, and here. It also appears as an entire, fully-updated chapter in my book ShukerNature Book 2: Living Gorgons, Bottled Homunculi, And Other Monstous Blog Beasts.

There is also a shorter version in one of my earlier books, Extraordinary Animals Revisited: From Singing Dogs To Serpent Kings, which features a sepia-tinted version of the Loys's ape cropped photo on its front cover:

And which has an unnerving habit of coming to life if not watched closely!

Video created by me using Grok Imagine

 

 

SNEAKING UP ON THE SNAKE CAT

 

The snake cat photograph (© unknown to me, despite in-depth searches made by me online; AI-generated, via person(s) unknown to me – reproduced here on a strictly non-commercial Fair Use basis for educational/review purposes only)

During early March 2023, I noticed a certain, very eyecatching photograph doing the rounds on social media and inciting all manner of speculation as to the creature that it portrayed. As seen above, it is a close-up head-and-shoulders image of a very spectacular cat, ornately adorned with vivid black and yellow markings.

According to claims accompanying this photo, the animal is a South American snake cat, up to 50 cm (20 in) long, weighing as much as 4 kg (9 lb), and allegedly the world's rarest species of wild cat, despite the claims also stating that it exists in a number of different countries, including Colombia, Venezuela, Ecuador, Peru, Bolivia, Guyana, French Guiana, and Suriname.

Within its ostensibly expansive distribution range, this exotic beast reputedly exists only in the most remote, inaccessible Amazon jungle locations, is poorly studied, and was not even photographed in the wild state until 2020. Yet the snake cat is supposedly well known to the indigenous locals, who sometimes even rear and tame cubs to use in keeping their homes free of its venomous serpentine namesakes and other undesirable creatures.

Looking at this single extraordinary photo – my subsequent investigations swiftly revealed that there were no other purported snake cat photos online – I had little doubt that it was a fake, as I had never encountered any information whatsoever of this mysterious mammal, yet I felt certain that such a visually-arresting beast would be extensively (and scientifically) documented online and elsewhere if it were indeed real.

Finally, courtesy of a Mexican article, I discovered the truth. As revealed in a Chihuahua Noticias news report from 14 March 2023 (click here to access it), the snake cat is wholly fictitious, with its unique photo actually being an AI (Artificial Intelligence) creation. Quelle surprise!

Looking again at its distinctive markings, I think it likely that photos of a large and very familiar, wide-ranging species of North American amphibian known as the tiger salamander Ambystoma tigrinum, whose bright yellow and black markings readily recall the snake cat's, may have played a part in this non-existent entity's photographic generation.

 

A tiger salamander (public domain)