ART Evolved's Galleries...

In theory the Forest Gallery is supposed to go up in 2ish weeks, and yet we haven't formally talked about at all... Oops

I sincerely apologize to any people really excited about this potential theme. I didn't mean to kill this gallery with neglect. Hopefully my excuse of moving to Hong Kong at the start of September (with 4 days notice) and jumping into a full time teaching position the day after arriving is sufficient excuse (Peter Bond has an equally valid excuse of acquiring his own full time teaching gig a week later!).

These delays may sadly be the new status quo on ART Evolved. We have been trying to juggle this site with our new heavy duty work loads, but sadly the work takes priority.

Now I don't bring this up to say ART Evolved is finished (far from it). Nor are we planning to pack in the galleries anytime soon.

I just see this as a great chance to discuss people's thoughts on how we've been running the galleries the past 3 years, and whether we wanted to shift the timing or frequency of them. (I note for example at least two of our previous November galleries had severe delays and schedule disruptions).

Do you think ART Evolved should stick to the six galleries every two months. Or should we make it four galleries every three months? Should we simply reschedule a few galleries to less busy times of the year?

In the immediate future we have two options. One we could carry on with a forest themed gallery, and simply push the due date to later. OR we could drop it, and go for the special end of year gallery Bond and myself came up with in the spring (your only hint is Dinosaurs and feathers... :P)

Shonisaurus Modern Skeleton

Just bringing a discussion thread out of the comment sections and to everyone's attention (though do be sure to read through the comment sections here on ART Evolved, you'd be surprised the great stuff that comes up in them!).

In relation to Peter's fantastic summary of Ichthyosaurs in art post, commenter Neil brings up the excellent point that the huge Ichthyosaurs Shonisaurus is not as fat and deep chested as is typically reconstructed. This than raises the question what does it look like?

As I've been starting work on my own Shonisaurus, I thought I'd share the answer rather than leave the point nebulous. As I've managed to get my hands on the solution.

This is the modern take on Shonisaurus' skeleton, I believe by the Royal Tyrrell Museum's resident artist Donna Sloan (but I could be wrong). I acquired it from a plaque accompanying the fossils on display at the Tyrrell, and photoshoped it into this current form (the diagram itself is unmodified, I just removed it from the photo).

The only difference (as already well said by Neil) between this and the old skool model is the number of forward ribs. The old model was missing several and thus the chest started towards the middle of what we see in this diagram.

Hope that is a help to your Shonisaurus fans out there. Though hopefully we see a few other species than just this behemoth. Happy arting everyone!

Reconstructing Ichthyosaurs

Welcome to Grade 1:

"Alright students, what does an ichthyosaur look like?" 

"They look like dolphins!"  "Whales, like whales!"  "Yeah FISH!!!"  "SHAAARKS!"  "Ooo ooo, Mr. Bond, oooo???!"

"Yes, Billy?"

"Miga!  They look like Miga!"  "YEAH!!! MIGA!!!"  "MIGAMIGAMIGAAAAA!!!!"

"Settle down CHILDREN! CHILDREN! Ugh..."

Miga, for the uninitiated, was an Olympic mascot here in Vancouver - part bear and part orca.  I assume it is the orca that Billy, the made-up child in this real-life situation, is relating ichthyosaurs to.  Dolphins, whales, fish, orca - ARE ichthyosaurs so similar?  Or, like Miga, more of a mix of creatures?

Or are we just imposing our understanding of extant animals upon extinct ones?  What did ichthyosaurs look like?

With these beautiful aquatic reptiles being the focus of ART Evolved's next Gallery, I thought we should begin discussing how exactly they should be reconstructed.  What are the current controversies palaeo-artists are dealing with when restoring ichthyosaurs from fossil to flesh?

Darren Naish (at Tetrapod Zoology) recently (Sept. 2008) discussed a few of the assumptions we make when we think of what ichthyosaurs look like and how they behave.  Did they really have dorsal fins?  How much of our knowledge of ichthyosaur body shape was faked by unscrupulous preparators?  Most aquatic swimmers (fish, dolphins) have a dorsal fin, two pectoral fins and a powerful tail.  Why did ichthyosaurs retain their two hind-fins?  In an older article, Naish ponders the question: Did they use their pectoral fins and "fly" underwater? 

There are also a few questions I'd like to ask here, confronting the traditional view about ichthyosaurs:
1) Was their skin slick and smooth like a dolphin, or bumpy and scaly like a monitor lizard?
2)  Did they eat only squid and ammonites?
3)  Did all genus of ichthyosaur reproduce through live birth?
4)  Did they partake in cannibalistic behavior?
5)  What did the huge Shonisaurs eat?
6)  Could I have ridden one?
7)  Isn't there an easier way to spell "ichthyosaur?"  Maybe with less h's?

I am hoping that some of our readers might have some insight into the World of Ichthyosaurs!  Help us reconstruct more accurate creatures!  Speak up!  We won't bite! ...much!

And to get our collective ichthyosaur brains working, watch this They Might Be Giants "Nine Bowls of Soup," staring Mr. Ichthyosaur...

Discussion Topic: Sauropod Necks... Slender or Thick?

The most obvious and fascinating thing about the Sauropods was of course their necks. Some them had unfathomably long necks, and with nothing alive today with anywhere near this sort of configuration (at least anywhere near their size) it leaves us asking a lot of questions about them.

This year has seen a great deal of debate about how Sauropods held their necks. Computer modelling has suggested that these giant Dinosaurs could not raise them much above parallel to the ground, but now research by the SVP-OW gang on living animal skeletons suggests this was not the case.

With this issue on our minds, I bring you to my big question about Sauropods. How thick would the soft tissue around their necks have been to hold up such large structures?
Aesthetically I've personally always preferred the super slender neck look, such as this by Gregory Paul.

However today I modelled such proportions in 3D. The results didn't look so convincing. In fact to be honest it looked like the whole neck should have just snapped off and fallen to the ground.

I love this look for Brachiosaurus, but is this slim neck only believable due to some sort of visual trick caused by it being rendered in 2D?

A beefier slim such as this by Mark Hallett is the thinnest I can think of for a 3D model. The Jurassic Park Brachiosaur had similar proportions to these guys.

Or was that still too slim?

In a later rendering by Gregory Paul, he drew a bulkier and more massive neck. It is a drastic departure from his earlier attempt. I can personally see where he is coming from imagining this as a living animal, and not a picture on a piece of paper. Yet it is a drastically different feeling animal and piece.

Some like John Conway have taken this bulking up to Arnold-like proportions.

Artistically we have many choices on how to reconstruct a Sauropod. The question is which of these is artistic liscense, and which is based on the once living animal?

Which of these do you think looks closest to what a living sauropod would have had? Do you know of any research that points to an answer? Or is it like the neck posture itself, and still surrounded by controversy?

Leave your comments below...