Loon's "Art" (Needs Improvement)

[ZoPteryx]

These are great!  I especially like the way you "flesh out" the skeletons before adding the integument; I've never taken the time to do that in my drawings, perhaps I should.    Do you use specific references for the musculature when you add it?

It's really hard to answer that one, honestly. Non-avian Dinosaur muscle is often very hard to find good photographic material on, and it really is an "animal-to-animal" kind of thing. There are some easily available references online, picture-wise, but, I tend to use modern birds as a reference, as well as a bit of crocodile, for more distantly related to bird dinos. Hope that helps.

It does help, thanks!    And your new illustrations are looking great!

[Loon]

Pinacosaurus grangeri final version, with osteoderms.

[Cloud the Dinosaur King]

Pinacosaurus grangeri final version, with osteoderms.

Pinacosaurus also had osteoderms on it's arms and legs.

[Loon]

Pinacosaurus also had osteoderms on it's arms and legs.

I looked for some info on the osteoderms on the limbs, all I can find is this mount. Could any one please point me in the direction of some more information on the limb osteoderms?

[BlueKrono]

Halichoeres and I were discussing it on another thread, but I can't remember which one. Hopefully he sees this; he's a pretty knowledgable individual.

[Halichoeres]

Yep, we were talking about it in my collection thread. I'm definitely no expert on ankylosaurs, but from what I could find that mount is possibly a chimaera, the skull being Saichania and the postcranial skeleton possibly but not definitely referable to Pinacosaurus (Arbour & Currie 2013: Cretaceous Research 46:24). Another paper (Burns et al 2015: J of Paleontology 89:168) describes Pinacosaurus postcranial remains, but I don't actually know what it says because it's behind a paywall and my university doesn't subscribe.

[Cloud the Dinosaur King]

Pinacosaurus also had osteoderms on it's arms and legs.

I looked for some info on the osteoderms on the limbs, all I can find is this mount. Could any one please point me in the direction of some more information on the limb osteoderms?

Here are what the limb osteoderms would look like:

[BlueKrono]

Hehe, the expression on that Anky reminds me of a goat.

[Loon]

I updated the pinacosaurus with the osteoderms visible on the chimera skeleton' front limbs; I only placed them on the front, because both the mount and John Conway's art depict them on the front limbs. I still have to modify them, but this is just to get a rough idea of placement and shape. Are these more correct?

[Halichoeres]

I think that looks good, depending on the inferred function. I was able to get a pdf of the Burns et al paper (If anyone wants it, pm me your email address for a pdf). The paper doesn't reconstruct the osteoderms, but the authors reaffirm the opinion that the specimen above (MPC 100/1305) is referable to Pinacosaurus, and thus so are the osteoderms. The arrangement of the osteoderms is hard. They might be weight-bearing, in which case they would probably be closely set in a sort of pavement. If they're strictly armor, then they could be more scattered. Happy to be corrected by someone more knowledgeable than I am about thyreophorans.

[Loon]

Oh my god! I started working on two new dinos, and haven't finished the others yet, I'm shocked! Well, here are the beginnings of two ornithi...ornithiscelidians....ornithoscelidans....

Both are based off Scott Hartman's skeletals.

First up the classic ornithiscian, Tricertops, horridus specifically.



Now, the feathered tyrant reptile, Yutyrannus huali:

[Loon]

Been a while, and I've decided to update my Carnotaurus "study." As per the usual, I based the skeleton off of Scott Hartman's skeletal, so all credit goes to him. I've spent I bit more time studying the caudofemural muscles in the tail, as well as the neck muscles of large theropods. I also focused more on understanding how the skin and muscles work with each other, which hopefully makes this guy look a bit more real. I've been going for a sort of bird/crocodile look to the head and neck, and I think it looks decent. So here it is, as usual, all criticism is appreciated.

[Rathalosaurus]

This is extremely well done. I'd maybe make the legs a bit less skinny, but that is just from my point of view. Also, what's up with the other pictures? They don't seem to work for me.

[WarrenJB]

Excellent.

This is extremely well done. I'd maybe make the legs a bit less skinny, but that is just from my point of view.

Carnotaurus always amused me. Blunt, rounded impression from the skull, and long skinny legs. It was like the dinosaurian Doctor Robotnik.

Also, what's up with the other pictures? They don't seem to work for me.

Ditto. I'm guessing... photobucket?

One other thing, not so much criticism as comment...

I've been going for a sort of bird/crocodile look to the head and neck

The lines and textures at the corner of the mouth remind me a bit of the prominent adductor mandibulae externus bulge at the back of the jaw of crocodylians. Is that intentional?
If so: I used to do that myself, with theropod drawings, but started wondering how appropriate it was. Problem being that crocodylian jugals curve way up, leaving a gap for the muscle to protrude through, and theropod jugals generally curve way down. In theropod skulls with closed mouths the jugal often overlaps the surangular, leaving a bit less than no space, so to speak.
Mind you, with recent discussions about theropod oral tissue, and the possibility/probability that the jaws and teeth didn't clamp down on eachother to that full extent, there might be more leeway. It's something I might look at again.

[Loon]

If so: I used to do that myself, with theropod drawings, but started wondering how appropriate it was. Problem being that crocodylian jugals curve way up, leaving a gap for the muscle to protrude through, and theropod jugals generally curve way down. In theropod skulls with closed mouths the jugal often overlaps the surangular, leaving a bit less than no space, so to speak.
Mind you, with recent discussions about theropod oral tissue, and the possibility/probability that the jaws and teeth didn't clamp down on eachother to that full extent, there might be more leeway. It's something I might look at again.

Which model analogue do you think would be best as inspiration? Maybe some carnivorous lizards?

[Loon]

For some reason I wanted to draw a Megalosaurus, but I ended up doing a Torvosaurus, so yeah... This guy is Torvosaurus gurneyi, since that was the only one for which I could find a decent skeletal drawing.

Credit: Scott Hartman

The muscle was based off of several other Theropod muscle reconstructions, primarily Scott Hartman's Allosaurus, modified of course to fit the Torvosaurus.


And, the final result:

The "color" scheme is based on a Spiny Tailed Iguana, as are the small, speculative, spines on it's back. The skin is based off the usual mixture of bird and crocodilian features. This time, I added some wrinkles on the neck and underbelly based on Komodo Dragons.

[Reptilia]

Somehow skinny but very, very cool nonetheless.

[WarrenJB]

Sorry for the late reply.

Which model analogue do you think would be best as inspiration? Maybe some carnivorous lizards?

For the last while I've been thinking of modern birds, starting with accipitrids - especially the soft tissue shown on featherless vulture heads. With most birds I've looked at, the corner of the mouth doesn't seem to go much further back than the anteroposterior midpoint of the eye, if it reaches that far, which would seem to roughly match up with the downward kink of the jugal in the non-avian theropods. So that led me to the highly scientific conclusion of 'good enough'.
But like I say, that's been thrown up in the air with recent soft-tissue studies and ideas, especially Mark Witton's blog posts. So tl;dr: yeah, carnivorous lizards might be almost as good.

Nice work on the torvosaur.

[Loon]

Got a new drawing tablet, so I decided to test it out a bit. One of these tests resulted in this Deinocheirus(slightly based on the safari figure on my desk). It's nothing special, but, I've never really done "digital art", so don't kill me completely.

[Loon]

Just read Dinotopia: The World Beneath, and became really interested in Giganotosaurus as a result, so I did some research on the animal and started to study its anatomy:
The Skeleton is based on/modified from Scott Hartman's reconstruction