Thursday, October 16, 2014

Weak Bones

The partial skeleton of Saltopus is mostly gone at this point. The skeleton was not that great to begin with actually. The original material consists of a partial vertebral column, pelvic girdle (which contained an ancestral two vertebrae and not the novel trait of four), and partial remains of both the fore and hind limbs. The skull, unfortunately, is completely missing from the holotype. That material, also, is the only known material to date. The majority of that material was originally preserved as casts (or impressions) in the sandstone of the Lossiemouth Quarries.

Big animals with small ears

Some recent Dino practice and study starting with some skeletal paintovers from Museum fossils that I visited.  
Log in - Log Out , Digital Painting over Torosaur skeleton

Painting overlaid onto photo of Torosaur at Milwaukee Public Museum

"Jane" Digital study over Tyrannosaur fossil

Jane fossil from Carnegie Museum in Pittsburgh

This is a Sculpey head study of a hadrosaur

Hank the Hadrosaur - Sculpey and Acrylic

Would you like some dewlap with that?

.. and this below was based on some toy dinosaurs by Papo.

T-rex vs. Ankylosaurus ver. 1 - Cretaceous Standoff - digital painting
And a second version with a more chicken like Tyrannosaur demonstrating his primary bite weapon . 

T-rex vs. Ankylosaurus ver.2 - Cretaceous Decapitation - digital painting

Sunday, October 12, 2014

Tachiraptor admirabilis: New Carnivorous Dinosaur Unearthed in Venezuela

Paleontologist Dr Oliver Rauhut of the Ludwig-Maximilians-University in Munich, Germany, and his colleagues have described a new dinosaur genus and species that lived in what is now Venezuela during the earliest part of the Jurassic period, about 201 million years ago.
Tachiraptor admirabilis attacking a herd of plant-eating Laquintasaura venezuelae. Image credit: © Maurílio Oliveira / PaleoArt.

The newly-discovered dinosaur is a small bipedal theropod, with an estimated body length slightly over 1.5 meters.
It belongs to a sister group of Averostra, a large clade of theropod dinosaurs that is known primarily from the Middle Jurassic.
The paleontologists found only two fossilized bones of the new dinosaur in the La Quinta Formation, about 4 km northwest of the town of La Grita in Táchira, Venezuela.
They named the new genus and species – Tachiraptor admirabilis.
Tachiraptor admirabilis fossilized bones. Image credit: Max C. Langer et al.
Tachiraptor admirabilis fossilized bones. Image credit: Max C. Langer et al.
“The genus name tachiraptor derives from Táchira and raptor (Latin for thief), in reference to the probable predatory habits of the animal,” the team explained in a paper published in the journal Royal Society Open Science.
“The specific name admirabilis honors Simon Bolivar’s ‘Admirable Campaign,’ in which the town of La Grita played a strategic role.”
Tachiraptor admirabilis probably preyed upon any smaller creature it could catch, including a recently discovered plant-eating dinosaur called Laquintasaura venezuelae.

Wednesday, April 18, 2012

Dromaeosaurus

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The Dromaeosaurus name actually means "Running Lizard". Many Fossil remains have been found in Alberta, Canada, and Montana, USA but there has never been a full body and head found together. There have been remains such as a head, limb, teeth, ribs, and other various body parts scattered along the dinosaur fossil hotspots of the two regions.


It was first discovered by a man named Barnum Brown in 1914 along the Red Deer River. Later on many fossil teeth have been found of the Dromaeosaurus. Scientists could only guess that this dinosaur may have had an attitude to attack other dinosaurs that were much bigger. The Dromaeosaurus was actually the size of a dog from the main finding by Mr. Barnum.

The Dromaeosaurus was from the Theropoda group. It was thought to be a heavily feathered dinosaur. Dromaeosaurus actually had a lot in common was the Tyrannosaurus, though. It had a very strong build with powerful legs. Not only that but it also had a very thick skull and powerful jaws. Even with the fact that there have not been many fossil findings of this dinosaur it actually is named after its own group "Dromaeosauridae". Those in the same group had much in common and where considered very bird like.

Thursday, March 29, 2012