Today is a big day for paleontologists Dr. Julia McHugh and Dr. Stephanie Drumheller because today they published a paper describing some pretty fascinating (& grisly) dinosaur feeding traces from the Mygatt Moore Quarry in Western Colorado. This is one of several new discoveries featured in Jurassic Reimagined part 2, which I am planning on releasing in its entirety on June 12.
Thank you all for your patience and support. If you want to help me make more projects like Jurassic Reimagined possible, please consider supporting my work directly on patreon: http://www.patreon.com/historianhimself
And you can see more of my work on my website, http://dontmesswithdinosaurs.com/
This video started as a response to a frequent critic of my art, but developed into something I’ve been needing to do for a long time: clearly articulate my broad-scale view of paleoart in a historical and biological context.
In an effort to help artists, I’ve created a folder where I will be uploading resources for paleoartists. In it you’ll find a .pdf of Alligator hindlimb muscular reference compared to birds to help artists reconstruct dinosaurs and other extinct archosaurs. http://dontmesswithdinosaurs.com//PaleoartReferenceForAll/
My hope is to encourage more fun and interesting conversations about these works and paleoart more broadly. In my own career I’ve sometimes felt like scientists and paleoartists have attempted to repress new ideas, perceiving them as a threat to their reputation or the marketability of their past works, or just because they really like oldschool dinos even though new evidence contradicts them. Unfortunately this resistance to change has the effect of slowing down the development of paleoart and the scientific research and exploration surrounding it while also discouraging many up and coming artists and scientists.
I propose we embrace the near-certainty that all of our paleoart is far from an absolute truth, but is rather a human expression of our understanding of the current science. As such, we should expect those views – and our paleoart – to shift and grow and develop with the times as new discoveries come to light, both from the fossil record and the study of our modern world. If we embrace this perspective, it becomes easier to let go of beloved images of prehistoric animals based on old science (while continuing to love them as great artistic and scientific accomplishments of their era), which frees our imaginations to explore new ideas, with an emphasis on those based in good observational biology, and depict new hypotheses in scientific paleoart. Emerging scientific ideas about dinosaurs and other prehistoric animals influence and inspire pop culture, and new and exciting paleoart often then inspires and motivates new scientific investigations, which in turn feeds back into the art form.
Huge shoutouts to my collaborators and supporters, and everybody who thinks paleoart should be fun and positive and dynamic. I will continue to do my best to bring the latest science, new discoveries and perspectives and an openness to new ideas. Specific shoutout to the croc hindlimb anatomy champion Dr. Henry Tsai for providing me with the nice photos of Alligator dissection.
