Friday, June 28, 2013

A bipedal Apatosaurus and a Deinonychus

Bipedal Apatosaurus. Sepia ink, sepia powder, coloured pencils, and gouache on recycled paper 278 x 190mm.
Inspired by Mike Taylor's article on the probability of bipedal sauropods and by Scott Hartman's accompanying skeletal on the Walking with Dinosaurs blog. This drawing is another of those curious things which should serve more as a study, but which I nevertheless spent too long working on and eventually 'lost my way' with. One of the perils of being obliged to work on something at sporadic intervals.

A not dissimilar fate befell this Deinonychus study.

Deinonychus. Sepia ink, coloured pencils and gouache, sketchbook page.
Inspired, of course, by birds of prey in general, I made a conscious effort of bulking up its feathers much more than my earlier attempts, and aiming for a yet smoother, more avian silhouette (it suddenly occurs to me how long ago I actually began this study, as it went on to form the basis for Marc's Deinonychus portrait in the New Year greeting I completed back in January). I think perhaps its front third is fairly respectable, which perhaps is just as well, since that third eventually made its way upon a garment after some persuasion.

I also note that the Apatosaurus features what might be considered my signature 'dappled leaves' markings which I seem to apply on all and sundry when I'm not thinking too hard about coloration. I ought to devise something with which it can alternate...

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8 comments:

  1. Very nice to see the Apatosaurus. It would be interesting to get the thoughts of sauropod-rearing specialist Heinrich Mallison and all-round dinosaur biomechanics wizard John Hutchinson -- I will tweet them. I will just reiterate, though, what I said in that WWD post: Diplodocus is better suited to this behaviour, with its more slender neck and much fatter tail.

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    1. Thank you, Mike. Here is the thread on Twitter with Heinrich's and John's thoughts, in case the readers are interested.

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  2. Hey Niroot, I want to publish your Deinonychus on my blog, I'll put chasmosaurs as the source but, do you want me to link your name to Himmapaanensis or your deviantart gallery?, I don't see much activity on Himma (the last post is from 2012), have you abandoned it? are you using another blog that I don't know about?.

    Nice talking to you and seeing that you keep getting better and better!.

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    1. I don't really mind which, but perhaps dA might be a safer bet for now. I haven't abandoned Himmapaanensis, only since contributing here, I'm afraid I've neglected there somewhat.

      And thank you!

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