CG "Dinosaurs" for Critique, now showing: Finished Triceratops

[Jetoar]

Really nice work  .

[Z-Ray]

Wow, it's been a week since my last post, I kept meaning to comment but wanted something to show first.

@wings Thanks again for providing me with the papers needed to sort out the feet.
@DinoLord I spent several hours  reading through everything on pterosaur.net as well as Mark Witton's book to get an understanding of these strange creatures,
Pterosaur research is in an interesting place, with so many of the current experts being accomplished artists there is a lot of good modern and accurate art available for them,
as compared to say T. rex with the art still being dominated by outdated and erroneous depictions.
@Jetoar Thank you for the kind words.

now onto the business at hand, here's my latest revision of the triceratops.

I had a terrible time trying to reconcile all the different (and supposedly accurate) information available, skeletals with long toes and trackways with none.

Apparently the Pteranodon is accurate enough to pass inspection, and to be honest I was pretty confident with this one.
oddly, it looks like my accurate Dino-art project is going to start with a non dinosaur

[Blade-of-the-Moon]

Sounds very similar to all the issues I've had with my trike..compiling all the data at hand leaves one very confused !

[DinoLord]

Your latest version of the Triceratops looks great. With certain things like ceratopsian feet, it's very hard to know exactly what's right, and you just have to try to get the best approximation you can.

When you get around to texturing the model, keep in mind there's pretty well-preserved skin material for Triceratops out there (from the same specimen that contained evidence of quills as mentioned early on in the thread). Aaron Doyle's drawing of Triceratops shows the details of the skin pretty well.



Notice the scute-like dorsal scales and elongated scales on the belly.

[wings]

...well-preserved skin material for Triceratops out there (from the same specimen that contained evidence of quills as mentioned early on in the thread). Aaron Doyle's drawing of Triceratops shows the details of the skin pretty well.

Just to clarify, the "evidence" we have for Triceratops'quills are these scales which have small protrusions on them. Some scientists think perhaps these (protrusions) served as attachment points for the "quills"; however we haven't yet found an animal with such quill supporting structure so it is more or less just a speculation on whether they have quills or not without solid evidence. Is it essential to have these protrusions to have quills? It is hard to say but (some maybe all) psittacosaurs seem to be having quills without the need of these structures.

[Z-Ray]

@ DinoLord It has been a bit of a mission to work out what was happening with the hands, it was recalling that they are the 'hands' of a quadruped that evolved from a bipedal ancestor (like a lot of dinosaurs but no modern animals that I can think of) that helped me get them working.
I have a map of the Lane skin impressions that I will be working from (as well other artist's reconstructions as reference materials including Aaron Doyle's drawing and Tat Cheung's meat eating Triceratops)

@DinoLord & wings
The Triceratops will be modeled with a skin texture matching what is seen in the Lane imprints but will have a set of speculative bits that can be turned on and off such as the 'Tail-Hawk' in Aaron Doyle's drawing or the more even Quills like in Tat Cheung's. (It can even have both on at once for a super-fancy extra-speculative Tri-porcu-ceratops-a-pine)

Everyone seems to be happy with the Pteranodon and Triceratops so they are moving on to the next artist to have their skin textured and painted. (last chance to speak up.)
and I have another Dinosaur for you to look at.

[tyrantqueen]

Tat Cheung's Triceratops is strongly based on Shane Foulkes' Triceratops model kit

[Z-Ray]

@ tyrantqueen
That is interesting to see, and ties in with comments in your thread on digital art. ( I did start writing a post in that thread, but I got overly wordy and I was starting to ramble and rant so I canned it until I could reply more clearly.)

I have collected a lot of art of the animals for use as reference during the detailing, painting and composing stages,
but I tried to stick to the scientific literature for the sculpting phase to keep things accurate and to minimise making decisions for 'artistic' reasons.
So I have seen Shane Foulkes' Trike model but hadn't made the connection with Tat Cheung's image. (both of which are in my reference files.)

I wanted to be able to show the Forum a completed dinosaur by now but alas, other deadlines have gotten in the way
However I received some good news too, another client expressed interest in the Dinosaur project and the first wave is expanded from 6 images to 8, 6 new + 2 existing JPish retrosaur images.
So I continue to be paid to think about dinosaurs

[brandem]

I do like the parasaurolophus, is it based on the scott Hartman technical at all? The tail seem just a pinch short but I would have to do an overlay to tell you if I was right.

[wings]

Everyone seems to be happy with the Pteranodon and Triceratops so they are moving on to the next artist to have their skin textured and painted. (last chance to speak up.)
and I have another Dinosaur for you to look at.

Probably no hooves on the hands link (the conversation on July 6, 2013). Talking about hands and digits; for the Pteranodon, probably the fingers shouldn't be stacked "vertically".

[Z-Ray]

It's been a while,
Urgent deadlines left me without a lot of time, but now  with all the crocs, gators, orcas, hippos, an octopus and myriad secret projects are out of the way its back to everybodies favorite...Dinosaurs!
Fear not, I haven't been completely idle, and the Triceratops has been finished for use.

I only actualy needed the head for the first use:


But did some quick work on the body to future proof the model.




Once again a big thank you to everybody for helping improve out Trike.

[DinoLord]

Hey there, it's great to see you back again!

The Triceratops is looking great. Have the other ones been finished? Look forward to seeing them!

[Z-Ray]

Howdy All
Sorry I have taken so long to reply.

Here is the actual Tri-Ceratops image, in 3D if you have a pair of Red/Cyan 3D glasses.

I (actually me this time) modified the Triceratops to make the Pachyrhinosaurus.
The Styracosaurus was done by somebody else and they modified the original Triceratops model by mistake while I was off work recovering from a snowboarding accident.
When I returned the work had already been done and the deadline was too close to change it.

I also painted the Parasurolophus (and by "I painted" I mean somebody else painted)


The actual image for this is almost finished as well.

Also close to ready is the Pteranodon and others
Hopefully we should have some more Dinosaurs for you soon.