Which Mesozoic dinosaurs have good figures and which don't, according to Sim

[Sim]

I've finished adding Kaiyodo figures and I've also finished colour coding Pachycephalosauria!  I've also added Eikoh and Colorata figures!

[Concavenator]

@Sim What about the Takara Tomy Anchiornis?

[Sim]

I've added the Takara Tomy Anchiornis and a few other figures by Takara Tomy.  I've also finished Ornithischia!

[Sim]

I've finished colour coding all the figures in the list!

[Halichoeres]

Papiliovenator is a new one on me. Butterfly hunter, how whimsical!

[Concavenator]

Meng's Shantungosaurus is now available from AliExpress and eBay, so it can be added to the list.

[Sim]

Thanks, I've now added the Meng Shantungosaurus!

[Sim]

I've been updating the list regularly, now I've just added the Safari Stegouros.

[Concavenator]

I would remove Carnegie's Miragaia from the list. Beautiful figure, of course (like many others that also aren't on the list for accuracy reasons), but it simply happens to have become outdated and it no longer reflects what we believe Miragaia may have looked like. In other words, aesthetics aside, it no longer does a good job at depicting the creature it's meant to represent. And it's not like the change in Miragaia's look is minor, either!

On another note, the manus are wrong (AFAIK, stegosaurs generally only have claws on the 2 innermost manus digits), while Carnegie's Miragaia has 4. Still, this is a minor detail compared to the (current) overall look of the creature, which Carnegie's doesn't reflect.

[Concavenator]

I would also take Kaiyodo's Sinosauropteryx out of the list based on the outdated color scheme.

[Sim]

I've moved the unenlagiines and halszkaraptorines into Dromaeosauridae, as it appears the consensus is that they are dromaeosaurids.  I've also moved the alvarezsauroids into their own section.

The original colouration of the Kaiyodo Sinosauropteryx doesn't look inaccurate to me...  As for Miragaia, my understanding is the skeletal by Ashley Patch is based on undescribed material but I'm not sure how much of it is known.  The Miragaia project has built a different-looking Miragaia skeleton that the Carnegie figure doesn't seem inaccurate to, and again I don't know to what extent the anatomy is known.

[Faelrin]

I agree with @Concavenator, it is outdated (though for the time it was good, as it is even got the stripes right on the one). The paper that showed us it had countershading and the racoon like facial mask, was published in 2017, long after the figure was sculpted, though there was some idea of the coloration much earlier in 2002 (including some extant of the counter shading), and later 2010 (from the coloration section on the wikipedia article).





The Kaiyodo figure comes in two colorations:





Neither of which comes close (with the exception of the above one's striped tail) to the most recent interpretation based on the 2017 paper going in depth about this. The DTC website lists them as having been produced in 2001, a year before there was support for the counter shading. Another website also supports the release being in 2001. 

PNSO's Little Dinosaurs one comes the closest, but doesn't quite do the facial mask right. The newest Animal Heavenly body figure comes closer in that regard, but however is relatively stylized in its proportions.

[Sim]

Thanks for the explanation, I wasn't remembering some details.  I've removed the Kaiyodo and PNSO Sinosauropteryx, now there are no compsognathid figures that do a good job representing a species!

[Concavenator]

As for Miragaia, my understanding is the skeletal by Ashley Patch is based on undescribed material but I'm not sure how much of it is known.  The Miragaia project has built a different-looking Miragaia skeleton that the Carnegie figure doesn't seem inaccurate to, and again I don't know to what extent the anatomy is known.

That's right, Ashley Patch's skeletal was a WIP reconstruction that used undescribed material. I found surprising what you mention about Miragaia Project's skeleton. I remember seeing it in 2022 and I was surprised how, surprisingly, it resembled reconstructions of the animal prior to their very own project's work.  On that sense, as you mention, Carnegie's would look accurate. However, I don't exactly know what the context is behind the photos of that skeleton. Is that really what they've built after their work? A priori, one could assume so, but if that's the case, it differs quite a bit from the WIP reconstruction. Though it could also be argued that, as a WIP, it didn't have to be very accurate. Most reconstructions of Miragaia I've seen recently are based on Patch's, even Miragaia Project's Facebook page reposts artwork based on such reconstruction, like Joschua Knüppe's.

In any case, after reconsidering it, I also think Carnegie's Miragaia can stay on the list, at least for the time being. The manus are probably still wrong, though.

@Faelrin Yeah, that's the nature of this dynamic science. An excellent representation of a certain animal can be made one day and turn out to be very inaccurate shortly after based on new discoveries. This has happened several times already, with Deinocheirus' case being among the most drastic ones. It would kind of suck to not call those excellent (but now outdated) models good, but at the same time, in that context, they literally wouldn't do a good job at representing a certain creature after the release of papers describing further material.

[Sim]

It is with pleasure that I can say I've updated the list with the first good non-mini basal sauropodomorph figure!  It is of course the PNSO 2024 Lufengosaurus!

[CarnotaurusKing]

Regarding those ankylosaurid figures: The Battat Euoplocephalus appears to be Scolosaurus cutleri with the unknown part (the tail club) coming from Anodontosaurus.  It would be better for the tail club to be round as in Scolosaurus thronus, but I'm not sure this should be enough to remove it from the list.  The Favorite Ankylosaurus's head was by Victoria said to be based on Euoplocephalus here, before Euoplocephalus was split: https://dinotoyblog.com/ankylosaurus-soft-model-by-favorite-co-ltd/  Since its tail club comes from Anodontosaurus, and the body armour of Anodontosaurus is unknown, and its head looks possible for Anodontosaurus, the only part that can be definitely identified of this figure comes from Anodontosaurus, I think, so that's why I've classified the Favorite Ankylosaurus as Anodontosaurus.  The Haolonggood Euoplocephalus looks very good, it appears to be the first good modern "Euoplocephalus-like" ankylosaurid figure.  Let me know if you still think the placement on the list of the Battat Euoplocephalus and Favorite Ankylosaurus should be changed, C @CarnotaurusKing.

With the Battat, I guess it depends how big of a deal the different club is to people. Looks like a non-issue so I guess no reason to change it.

I actually didn't see Dr Arbour's reply. With the Favorite Co, the skull, save for the nostrils, looked more Anky-y to me personally. The Anodont skulls Ive seen don't have quite as big horns, and are proportionately a bit shorter and squatter in side view. But these are just my amateur observations.

My bad, no issues with them staying on the list.

[Concavenator]

Eofauna's Tyrannosaurus is now available, so it can be added to the list. Definitely not the first good figure of the animal, and won't be the last, either. 

[Concavenator]

Also, I think Favorite's 2020 Diplodocus are pretty good. Is there anything wrong with them that I'm missing?

[Sim]

I've added the Eofauna Tyrannosaurus and Favorite soft model Diplodocus.  I'm not sure why the latter wasn't included previously, but the vinyl Favorite Diplodocus wasn't included because of how shrink-wrapped its head is.

[Concavenator]

I would remove Battat's Maiasaura. @Flaffy explained why here:

I'm hoping the Haolonggood Maiasaura will have a singular connected crest rather than an errornous two-horned reconstruction.

Correct reconstruction by Olorititan


Skull OTM F138


Incorrect reconstruction by Jake Baarse (for The Isle)

Battat's Maiasaura seems to have a Cryolophosaurus-like crest. I'd say it's more consistent with the "hornlet" approach.

As to why should Maiasaura have a single crest instead of those hornlets, it's based on Horner et al. 2004. Quoting @Halichoeres :

@Jose S.M. the "Hadrosauridae" chapter by Horner, Weishampel and Forster in The Dinosauria says:

"In Maiasaura...the caudal nasals [that is, the posterior part of the nasals] form a transversely oriented crest located dorsal to the orbit...the frontal makes a significant contribution to the crest."

The ellipses are some parts that pertain to its relative Brachylophosaurus.

So it looks like it should be a crest traveling across the eyebrow, not hornlets. I think the common uncertainty about this feature is one of those things that arises from the standard view for diagrams and illustrations being lateral.

"Horned" (inaccurate) Maiasaura depictions seem to be more widespread than the "single crest" (accurate) ones, but just because they're very common doesn't make them accurate.

Wild Past's Maiasaura was right:



And here's to hoping Haolongood will be able to fix the Maiasaura (and the Amargasaurus' neck sail to completely cover the neck spines, since we're at it), because as it is, it seems to go for the inaccurate horn approach. If they leave it like that, I'm afraid it won't be an accurate Maiasaura.

I enquiried Everything Dinosaur about this (and also, asking for HLG's Amargasaurus neck sail to be extended) and they told me those figures might be a bit of a long way from happening, but still planned to be produced this year. Hopefully they will be able to fix them. 

Also tagging V @vampiredesign here just in case.