Your Favorite Artwork(s) of Your Favorite Fossil Species

[Concavenator]

H @HD-man Big fan of Prehistoric Planet's Austroraptor. Looking forward to see it in action!  Hopefully the series will get to spread its name, it's a very interesting species.



Zhenyuanlong by Jed Taylor.

[Concavenator]

Stegosaurs by Mario Lanzas.

[Concavenator]

Shunosaurus jiangyiensis by Zach Robinson.

[Concavenator]

Zanabazar by Lucas Attwell.

[Stegotyranno420]

Thought this was very funny
Zuul vs Spectrovenator by Poharex on DA

[Halichoeres]

For a second I was like, 'why Spectrovenator, of all theropods' and then I was like, 'oh, duh.'

[Faelrin]

@Stegotyranno420 That is definitely one of the funniest takes I've seen on both of those yet. Zuul was expected but wouldn't have thought of adding the latter lol. Thanks for sharing.

[Concavenator]

Iguanodon by Gabriel Ugueto.

[Stegotyranno420]

Not sure if controversial opinions are accepted here, but for some reason, I was never extremely fond of Ugueto's work.
Just seems off to me.

[Bread]

Not sure if controversial opinions are accepted here, but for some reason, I was never extremely fond of Ugueto's work.
Just seems off to me.

Very controversial indeed. Since he's grown to be a well-known paleoartist and has a huge involvement in Prehistoric Planet.

Art is subjective afterall, but I am curious what you mean by "off"

[Stegotyranno420]

Not sure if controversial opinions are accepted here, but for some reason, I was never extremely fond of Ugueto's work.
Just seems off to me.

Very controversial indeed. Since he's grown to be a well-known paleoartist and has a huge involvement in Prehistoric Planet.

Art is subjective afterall, but I am curious what you mean by "off"

His art always seems fuzzy(not the integument) , wierdly textured, plain and kind of boring in ny opinion. I feel like his art is a bit overated/oversaturated. His art is everywhere I see, in books, museums, Prehistoric Planet (I like their updated versions of the designs as well).
Just my opinion

[HD-man]

His art always seems fuzzy(not the integument) , wierdly textured, plain and kind of boring in ny opinion. I feel like his art is a bit overated/oversaturated. His art is everywhere I see, in books, museums, Prehistoric Planet (I like their updated versions of the designs as well).

No worries, I think I get what you're saying.

Time for Ornitholestes hermanni!

PNSO's is probably my favorite:

To add to the above quote, while Bujard's Ornitholestes isn't my favorite, I did dream that my family had a similar-looking pet (I.e. W/a "spotted coat of furry feathers": https://paleopetshop.com/2020/03/01/critter-of-the-month-ornitholestes-2/ ). In my dream back in July, he wouldn't come in on his own, so I had to carry him in (like this: https://jurassicpark.fandom.com/wiki/Junior?file=Cradlecarry.png ):

Moving on, it's Dromaeosaurus albertensis next!

I especially like Fred Wierum's & BotM's, though I'm surprised PhP's didn't make the cut:

To add to the above quote, PhP's Dromaeosaurus is my favorite for 3 main reasons: 1) To quote Naish/Barrett, "While fox-sized Dromaeosaurus is the namesake member of Dromaeosauridae, it's far from the most familiar member of its group", so it's nice to see PhP give it more attention w/their depiction; 2) Aesthetically, said depiction reminds me of Bonadonna's female Deinonychus ( https://dinotoyblog.com/forum/index.php?topic=10177.msg316852#msg316852 ), but less ground hornbill-ish & more holarctic magpie-ish (which makes sense, given their respective environments); 3) Behaviorally, said depiction reminds me of Harris's hawks (I.e. After hunting small game alone all winter, they greet each other & go hunting big game together; See the Stevens quote).

Quoting Stevens ( https://web.archive.org/web/20170611181659/http://www.nytimes.com/1993/01/19/science/rabbits-beware-some-birds-of-prey-hunt-in-packs.html ):

Raptors may use coordinated tactics only when solitary hunting does not provide enough food or is too difficult. Harris's hawks, for instance, use them only in winter, when a shortage of smaller quarry like small birds forces them to go after bigger game like jack rabbits, which are several times the size of a hawk.
Dr. Ellis and his colleagues speculate that when raptors hunt alone, they will not even try to capture prey that they know can be captured only through teamwork; it is not worth the expenditure of energy. But bigger game or the quicker capture resulting from group efforts can make the expenditure worthwhile.

[Concavenator]

Maiasaura by Andrey Atuchin.

[HD-man]

Utahraptor by @paleo_sauce.

Nice! If I had to pick a favorite, it'd probably be Witton's:

Besides loving Witton's style for reasons discussed elsewhere ( https://www.deviantart.com/jd-man/journal/SD-Good-Semi-good-and-Bad-Dino-Sources-4-800236863 ), I love how awesome-yet-scary his Utahraptor is. It feels like being approached by a grizzly (or better yet, a grizzly-sized "bird of prey gone wrong": http://web.archive.org/web/20180809090943/http://www.nhm.ac.uk/discover/velociraptor-facts.html ).

My other favorite Utahraptor is Lanzas's in "Cretaceous Cruise": I love the WWD aesthetic, partly b/c of nostalgia, & partly b/c the leopard-like camouflage makes sense for Utahraptor's semi-arid environment (See "5.4.2. Weathering", page 12: https://sci-hub.ru/https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0031018209002132 ); Lanzas's is my favorite example, partly b/c of his style ( https://www.tumblr.com/mariolanzas/678608200470298625 ), & partly b/c the ostrich-like feathering makes sense for Utahraptor's semi-arid environment.

[Stegotyranno420]

Utahraptor by @paleo_sauce.

to be honest, not that much of a fan for this artist either. Similar reasons to Ugueto

[Concavenator]

Aquilolamna by Oscar Sanisidro.

[Concavenator]

Amargasaurus by Chris Masna.

[Halichoeres]

Yeah, also along those lines: anything by Emiliano Troco.

[JohannesB]

Painterly and to a certain extent impressionistic, the works by Douglas Henderson impress me the most. I just love his style. (No overload of detail, for example.) His dinosaurs have a nimble and graceful feel to them. His use of color and contrast is magnificent in my view. I have no favorite fossil species (but I do love sauropods and hadrosaurs), and maybe a bit outside the scope of this thread, I just posted these. I hope you don't mind.

[oscars_dinos]

Not sure if controversial opinions are accepted here, but for some reason, I was never extremely fond of Ugueto's work.
Just seems off to me.

I actually agree, I will say his work has gotten MUCH better in recent years, seeing him grow as an artist has been nice, still does things I wouldn't do in my own art (I like to be more detailed and gestural) but he has gotten better