Papi-Anon's Paleoart

[WarrenJB]

Nice.

I keep rubbing my eyes in amazement when I see Andrewsarchus' zygomatic arches. You'd think McDonalds could make it their mascot.

[BlueKrono]

UPDATE!!

Teeth are more or less done. Only so much I could make out of the few images of the underside of the jaw, but all in all I'm satisfied for now. The STL model checks out on Shapeways for regular nylon, premium nylon, frosted ultra & extreme, HP nylon, and Hi-Def Acrylate so that's music to my ears (and much cheaper than the old 3D scan mesh file I had printed a year ago). After some touching up of details here and there I'll move on next to my idea of the lower jaw. One model of the complete skull will be fixed and another modified for hinged jaw articulation.

I presume you were going for the 45 million year old fossil skull rather than a skull as it would have appeared contemporarily? Otherwise I would think the teeth would be sharper. This is a great reproduction of the AMNH specimen.

[Papi-Anon]

Well, Shapeways has dimensional minimums for thin/pointed pieces, so some teeth are as sharp as they can be. I was actually going for a blunt-tooth, bone-crunching scavenger look for the teeth.

So it's more like a 'what Andy's skull would have looked if it was less warped by the preservation process.

[Papi-Anon]

UPDATE! Brought the front teeth inward more so there's less of a gap in the front. Lower Jaw in-progress, though kinda boxy in the rear. I tried to base it on others' designs both drawn and sculpted and I want to avoid making the teeth for the lower jaw until I have the jaw itself finalized.

I should also note that this is the articulated design with a working hinge-jaw and a ball-socket at the back of the cranium. Once the lower jaw is complete I'll start to work on the three mounted speculative skeletons it'll attach to: classic mesonychid, entelodontid, and the middle-of-the-road design that will be a mix of the two while still whippomorph-like.

[Papi-Anon]

FINALLY got the lower jaw looking like I wanted it to (redid the design with simpler surface-texture) and just added the teeth.

I was going for a mix of mesonychid and entelodontid dentation for the overall layout, and all in all I like the end result. Now to get it printed and to start on the 3 skeletons, mesonychid layout first!

[BlueKrono]

A lot of time and thought you've put into this. I'm surprised you're going to make not only both hypothesized body types for the skeleton but a third intermediate as well.

[Papi-Anon]

Happy New Year everyone! Back from vacation and I've got the first post-cranial part of my Andrewsarchus skeleton designed! Also tweaked the lower jaw and some teeth too, but the main thing is the newest part: the neck!

[ZoPteryx]

Nice detail on those verts, it's looking great!

[BlueKrono]

Awesome! Out of curiosity, what's that skeleton of in the picture?

[Papi-Anon]

Nice detail on those verts, it's looking great!

Thanks! I was worried my detailing wouldn't be accurate enough, since thete's only so many detailed pics of mesonychid neck bones.

Awesome! Out of curiosity, what's that skeleton of in the picture?

Sinonyx, according to google. I chose that particular mesonychid due to it's skull shape as well as the superficial similarities Sinonyx has with some of the archeocetes (Andrewsarchus's actual relatives).

[Papi-Anon]

UPDATE!!



Started working on the spine and ribs. The ribcage is still very WIP in the shape and contours, but the spine is mostly done (need to add a socket to the end vertebra). I decided to go for a more power-driven design for Andy with a proportionally deeper and wider chest than Sinonyx had, leaning more towards the robust build of a predator relying mostly on its size to steal kills from smaller predators but capable of ambushing prey when need be.

[Papi-Anon]

UPDATE!

Got the chest finished (might make a few tweaks) and will be getting it printed soon.

I ultimately gave Andy here a proportionally more robust and deeper chest than Sinonyx but the plan is to still make it a digitigrade hunter in the mesonychid interpretation as seen in my sig and in WWB.

Looking at it now, is it just me or are the neck bones too narrow-looking?

[Halichoeres]

Andrewsarchus is only known from a skull, right? I'm curious what you based the neck vertebrae on. I would expect something as large-headed as Andrewsarchus to have large neural spines on the cervical vertebrae. However, I suppose if all the work of holding and moving the head is done by muscles anchored to the thoracic vertebrae (like in a bison) maybe they wouldn't need to be so big and the size you have here is fine.

[Papi-Anon]

Andrewsarchus is only known from a skull, right? I'm curious what you based the neck vertebrae on. I would expect something as large-headed as Andrewsarchus to have large neural spines on the cervical vertebrae. However, I suppose if all the work of holding and moving the head is done by muscles anchored to the thoracic vertebrae (like in a bison) maybe they wouldn't need to be so big and the size you have here is fine.

Well, I was basically just scaling up Sinonyx's skeleton for this, hence the the layout. Keep in mind this is based on the now largely-debunked mesonychid reconstruction Andrewsarchus was long portrayed as having, and so anatomical accuracy will be up for debate on many things pending any post-cranial material to ever be discovered.

[BlueKrono]

I would also tend more toward thicker cervical vertebrae just based on how massive the head it's connected to is. Alas, it looks like I shall have to wait for my hooved Andrewsarchus. 😭

[Papi-Anon]

UPDATE!




I've been meaning to finish the Giganto skull for some time, and now I'm back on track with that project! Unlike my previous design that was based on the resin 1:1 scale skull sold by Bone Clones, Inc., this new design is based on a mix of gorilla and orangutan features with some creative licensing here and there. I opted for a smaller braincase purely for the fact that I didn't want this to look like a Sasquatch skull or too much like an extant orangutan. Part of me would like to think Gigantopithecus was as smart as modern gorillas (or close), but the more conservative side of my thinking would rate Giganto being smart for a mammal but lagging behind compared to the non-human extant great apes. Until we find any new cranial material (if ever), it's anyone's guess.

Link to the Bone Clones, Inc. Gigantopithecus skull:
https://boneclones.com/product/gigantopithecus-blacki-skull-and-jaw-reconstruction-BC-140

[Papi-Anon]

Real-World Update!

Shapeways prints arrived today, so here's some actual 3D art!

1:12 Scale Andrewsarchus Articulated Skeleton Progress (Mesonychid reconstruction)


images upload

Andy's neck and chest arrived and fit just right. Might scale up the neck vertebrae a tad even if proportionally they're the same as Sinonyx (the base design for this reconstruction). Then again, even entelodonts had relatively the same proportioned neck bones.


1:12 Scale Gigantopithecus Skull


images upload

images upload

Giganto has an articulated jaw the same design as Andrewsarchus above has, so it has no issues. This looks so much better than the epoxy one I made previously, I think.

[Papi-Anon]

Updates!

Tried out a print of a living Gigantopithecus head for a potential restoration figure. I need to add the long shaggy hair for texture in the CAD sculpt, but I'm pretty pleased with how this turned out. Obviously I went for a male Giganto based on its extant cousin's dominant males.












Also got Andrewsarchus's arms printed with only one hiccup in the design that has now been corrected in the CAD file. Andy is now roughly 50% printed at this point.

[ZoPteryx]

This is a really cool project!  Do you plan on reproducing these to sell at some point?

[Papi-Anon]

This is a really cool project!  Do you plan on reproducing these to sell at some point?

Sorry for the late reply!

Yes, the plan is to actually sell these via Shapeways, though I might make an Etsy account to sell assembled ones too. I've been busy with other projects with my AADD (Artist's Attention Deficit Disorder) so only a a few new things have been designed for Andy since the last post (mainly the four paws).

In the meantime, here's yet another project that is sapping time and attention from Andy and Giganto!






So it's really basic in sculpt, but I was interested in doing something more basal in the evolutionary family tree and decided on good ol' Tiktaalik. The interesting part of this design is that the ball-socket joints are a different design than I've been using. Instead of flexible sockets with solid ball ends I'm going to use ball ends that are flexible (long relief-cuts to allow flexing) with solid sockets. I did a test print a month ago of two sections of Tiktaalik here to just see if the concept would work, and it did, though it needed a few tweaks. Since Tiktaalik here is about 80% done it will end up being the first of my paleo-figs to be printed in entirety! Woo-hoo!