Re: New Dinosaur Art Web Site!

["Jaime A. Headden" <qilongia@yahoo.com>]

David Marjanovic wrote:

<...but:>

  I am a staunch beleiver in praising a person's art, and while i cn
point out "flaws" this is to the point to show an artist points of
improvability. Jordan's skill is evidence whether or not his work
appears flawed in respects to details, or whatnot. David says something
like this at the end of the post. However, I also feel that critique of
Jordan's work in general on the list as a whole was a perhaps
inglorious move ... that was a personal critique, and should not have
been publicized. As a result, my rebuttal is also public.

<_Byronosaurus jaffei_: Nice, and beautiful feathers, but why doesn't
it have feathers on the snout? There is no evidence for a beak,
AFAIK...>

  Feathers are a subjective feature. No dinosaurs have been described
beside the dinobirds to be bearing feathers. I would think that until a
dromaeosaur or troodont are described with feather impressions, or
traces, then one could put them wherever. *Sinornithosaurus* has a
"crest" above the head that probably corresponded to long filaments
that lay on the scalp, but it is important in ntoing the absence of
anything like them more rostral to the orbits. This is true of birds,
in spite of the beak. The cere in eagles can be feathered or not.

<What's so special actually about "an air chamber in the snout passing
from the nostrils through to the mouth"?>

  An autapomorphy of *Byronosaurus jaffei.* Big, eh? The passage
terminates in the chamber between antorbital fenestra and dorsal to the
choanae, if I read the paper right.

<_Carnotaurus sastrei_, too, has problems with perspective (e. g. the
neck probably looks too long).>

  This restoration is based on Louis Psihoyos' photograph of the mount
of the holotype in Argentina. It's a well articulated mount, but the
skull has not been restored from its squished condition, resulting in
the dorsal cranial bones being turned upwards and the side of the jaw
squeezed. Greg Paul mentioned this in _PDW_, and offered a wider, more
correct skull restoration than the mount.

<Theropods, as shown in trackways, used to literally put one foot _in
front of_ the other, like what they do today.>

  Theropods are not cats: the feet progress anterior to one another,
but they are still set apart from an inline orientation. A line drawn
anteriorly through the second toe intersects the second of that
preceeding, depending on gait it splays a little. They do not progress
so that the third toes are in line with each other.

<...dispute the proportions (thin arms? long trunk?) and the exact size
of the sickle claws.>

  This is all largely speculation as there are no preserved arm or leg
elements besides some foot bones, and the sickle was smaller than other
dromaeosaurs relative to size of the toe and foot.

<_Erlikosaurus andrewsi_: "Andrews' Erlik's lizard" -- I'd have
mentioned that Erlik Khan is the king of the dead in ?Lamaism.>

  Erlik was a king in some Sumerian stories, but in Lamaist stories,
his wife died and he proceeded into the underworld to retrieve her (a
la Orpheus); while there, he had to let her leave to stay, and was
subsequently killed, then arose (...from the dead...) to rule the
underworld. This would explain why the name was chosen (a king risen
from the dead is analogous to a "hellish" skull being unearthed and
risen from the ground).

<...Extremely unlikely. Lions, for example...>

  Scavenger versus active predator again.... Need we go into something
that there isn't enough evidence to support one way or another?
Archives....

<Why don't the upper and lower beaks of _Chirostenotes_ match?>

  Because the premaxillae are unknown, and the reconstruction is
hypothetical, the lower jaw may still have fit within the upper jaw in
the most rostral portion, as it does in oviraptorids. It's a cool head,
though. :)

<_Ornitholestes hermanni_ (Herman*n*'s bird thief) looks like a vulture
with its feather coat ending at the neck base. That's unlikely for this
dinosaur.>

  Then take this up with Greg Paul and see his restoration of the
creature with a bare head and neck. Also, the teeth in *Ornitholestes*
are unusual in being longer the more rostral they are, and would
probably have served a "plucking" function. The vulture analogy goes
from there.

<_Shunosaurus lii_: "Li's Shuo lizard" Shu, not Shuo. The tail club is
widespread among euhelopodids. Exist*e*nce, just like the way you write
it on the _Tyrannosaurus rex_ page.>

  There's a tail club from the Dashanpu quarry attributed to
*Omeisaurus* ithout justification (by Dong). This does not make the
feature widespread, and until further evidence, its still a
*Shunosaurus* autapomorphy.

  Jordan Mallon wrote:

<<...the young fledgling in the background is covered in a downy coat.
This feature is fairly common to the Coelurosauria and would have
served to insulate the young...>>

  David Marjanovic wrote:

<Why not the adults too?>

  Hypothesis: Smaller theropods had just a low surface-area to mass
ratio that heat would be lost to a much greater degree than in large
theropods ... Henderson, in a recent issue of *Paleobiology,* pointed
this out. One can then apply this to juveniles versus adults, as was
illustrated in Sloan's 1999 article in Nat. Geo.: Mike Szrepnik's
illustration of a "fluffy" baby rex with a bare-skinned adult.

---------

  I personally feel that a number of the artists I've seen on the
Dinosauricon had talent, real talent. It's the degree to which an
artist will develop that talent, step away from imitating others and
turn to a unique style (my brother's anime was incredible once he got
away from copying others, much as it helps an artist to know how
certain things are drawn to copy other artists, and is now the copied
one, but that's an irrelevant corrolary). Critique is probably an
important detail in allowing artists develop, but not publically. Then
it just becomes tantamount to humiliation. I'm sure this was not
David's intent, but it can be read that way.

=====
Jaime "James" A. Headden

  Dinosaurs are horrible, terrible creatures! Even the
  fluffy ones, the snuggle-up-at-night-with ones. You think
  they're fun and sweet, but watch out for that stray tail
  spike! Down, gaston, down, boy! No, not on top of Momma!

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