Vintage Dinosaur Art: Predatory Dinosaurs of the World - Part 3

Who asked for one more round of Predatory Dinosaurs of the World? No? Well you're getting it anyway. If it's any consolation, you might not have expected to see Dimetrodon and Eryops showing up in a book with such a title, and yet here they are. Pesky Dimetrodon, always sticking its giant fin in where it isn't welcome.

Vintage Dinosaur Art: Predatory Dinosaurs of the World - Part 2

It's back - Greg Paul's 1988 magnum opus, Predatory Dinosaurs of the World. As we established in the first post, it's long deserved its prime position in the Palaeoart Hall of Fame, having been not only highly prescient but also hugely influential on almost everyone interested in reconstructing Mesozoic theropods. It was stuffed with the sort of truly fantastic and uniquely observed artwork you just didn't see anywhere else - theropods fighting ritualistically, having a nap, and gathering in family groups around a carcass.

Vintage Dinosaur Art: Predatory Dinosaurs of the World - Part 1

It is widely documented - not least by this blog - that a very few popular dinosaur books published over the last century stand out as real 'landmarks'. Books that are incalculably influential, for good or ill (and often a bit of both), giving rise to countless copycats and wannabes and spreading peculiar styles and memes far and wide in the world of palaeoart. Greg Paul's infamous Predatory Dinosaurs of the World is undoubtedly one such book, arguably doing more to spread the Paulian style than any other of his works. It's so well known that, for a long time, it seemed like a bit of a waste of time covering it; surely it's already been done to protofeathered death? I'm glad I changed my mind.

Vintage Dinosaur Art: Dinosaurs - Living Monsters of the Past (Part 2)

It seems like an awful long time since the first half (it isn't really, I just moved home in the meantime), but here's Part 2 of my look at this Bentontastic book from 1993. As promised, I'll open with a more detailed look at the piece used on the cover, namely Vladimir Krb's fantastic Albertosaurus panorama produced for the Royal Tyrrell Museum of Palaeontology.

Essential Links in the Paleoart-pocalypse

Okay, so "paleoart-pocalypse" doesn't exactly skip lightly off the tongue. Forgive me. I'm tired.

I'm going to be on the road for the next few days, so I won't be able to write much more about the paleoart debate. It's hot on my mind. Probably a bit too hot, to be honest. It will be nice to get away from the computer for a little while. Especially since a hefty chunk of that time will be spent in the geology collections of the Field Museum. Posts to follow, rest assured.

There are serious issues to be hashed out in paleoart (and as Matt Van Rooijen has pointed out in a few venues, the problems are hardly limited to paleoart). Artists deserve fair compensation. They deserve a realistic expectation of how well paleoart can sustain them. But these issues get lost in the generation gap, and the discussion on the Dinosaur Mailing List, which I wrote about on Tuesday, frequently devolves into misunderstanding and (sometimes hilariously hyperbolic) name-calling. Science lovers fret over the poor funding science often receives, and of all genres of illustration, paleoart is uniquely affected by this. We can't hope to fix the problem, but we can fight for paleoartists to be treated fairly.

In following the ups and downs of this discussion, I'm reminded of a Kurt Vonnegut quote. I may be a paleo-n00b, but I absolutely believe that this applies to the grizzliest of the grizzled veterans as much as it does to me: "There's only one rule I know of, babies - God damn it, you've got to be kind." Act like a bully and watch your credibility waft away on the slightest breeze.

Here, I'll provide a handy set of links to writings on this topic. Cross-posts are included to ensure that important comment threads aren't missed. I'll add to this list in the future as the discussion progresses in what I hope will be a fruitful way - with more than just artists participating. I apologize if any important posts were missed; additions gratefully accepted in the comments.

Last Updated 3/26/2011

SciAm Guest Blog: Kalliopi Monoyios' Art in the service of Science: You get what you pay for

David Maas: Epic GSP (x-posted at ART Evolved)

The Paleo-King: Greg Paul Threatens Legal Smackdown (x-posted at ART Evolved) and Is Paleo-Art Dead?!

ART Evolved: Pandora's Pencil Box, I Own Greg Paul's Albertoceratops! Taking essay submissions for more GSP-themed Philofossilizing posts.

LITC: The Great Debate in Paleoart
Superoceras: The new "Bone Wars": Greg Paul, science, and the art of paleontology. (x-posted at ART Evolved)
The Faster Times: Gregory S. Paul and the Future of Paleoart
Skeletal Drawing: The History of Skeletal Drawings parts one, two, and three
Gregory S. Paul's website: He's issued a refined statement addressed to fellow paleoartists as well as project managers.

Dinosaur Mailing List:

For each of these, I'm providing only the first email in important threads. Follow at your own risk.
GSP statement on use of my dinosaur restorations
RE: GSP statement on use of my dinosaur restorations (follow up)
RE: GSP statement on use of my dinosaur restorations (more follow up)
Another important point
Actually Doing Something About the Great Paleoart Ripoff
dino branding
Use of paleoart in scientific publications.
Still more on paleoart in technical and other publications
Technical paper copyrights
Reductio Ad Absurdum. It is 1984 Dinosaur Time..!
Clarification of scope of paleoart market and other items
A short outline program for improving paleoart

The Great Debate in Paleoart

"Why are dinosaurs so popular?"

It's one of the perennial questions you'll read in interviews with dinosaur experts. For my part, I think that dinosaurs' staying power has to do with their reality. They lived. Certain other pop cultural memes (zombies, vampires, mythological beasts) depend on inventions of the imagination or new strains of analysis for vitality. Dinosaurs are remote enough to retain their allure as monsters, yet close enough for us to observe through the tools of science. Paleontology is a science that depends on artists to communicate its findings to the general public. Pop culture offers an outlet to popularize the science and attract new blood to the discipline. Paleontology provides new raw materials for pop culture to craft stories. The cycle repeats.

If you doubt the artist's vital role in this interplay, look at a paleontology article in National Geographic. Now strip out the paleoart. Not nearly as compelling, is it?

For the last week and a half, a discussion has been occurring within the online paleoart community, spurred by Gregory S. Paul, one of the giants of modern paleoart. That's almost an understatement. Beginning his career working with Robert Bakker, Paul was a key player in the dinosaur renaissance, the overturning of stale, limiting ideas about dinosaur physiology that reached its popular peak with Jurassic Park. Now, it's fairly common that a layman with little interest in dinosaurs will at least be familiar with the idea that they were much more dynamic creatures than the grim old paradigm held. "Dinosaurs are not boring," Paul wrote in his landmark book Predatory Dinosaurs of the World, "and one can only make them so via ignorance." Now that the old concept of sluggish, brutish reptilian creatures has been cast off, scientists have the freedom to follow the evidence where it leads.

On Thursday, March 11, Paul sent an email to the Dinosaur Mailing List firmly requesting that other paleoartists cease emulating the "Greg Paul look."

My specific problem is that some other artists who utilize my work as the basis to generate their art to a significant degree are underbidding yours truly on a regular basis. I know that my work is being used because I have received requests to access my material by others to use on their projects. Making it worse is that it seems that some product producers knowingly or unknowingly wish to utilize the GP look, and are turning to lower priced artists to obtain it.

From there, the discussion quickly forked off into complementary paths. One concerned Paul's assertion that he in some way owns the characteristic pose of his skeletal diagrams, in which a bipedal dinosaur is depicted "pushing off" with the left foot in the greatest extent of the animal's stride. Paul writes:

Do not pose it in my classic left foot pushing off in a high velocity posture. Not because I am inherently outraged -- it would be rather nice if not for some practical issues. For one thing I have succeeded in getting some big payments for unauthorized use of this pose by major prjects [sic] that should have known better.

At this, most have balked. Artist Nima Sassini wrote at his Paleo King blog that Paul's request is "nothing short of megalomania." I think it's silly at the very least, but though I felt it warranted mention, I'm not going to expound any further on this. I bring it up mainly to say that I fear that this aspect of Paul's argument, as well as some folks' dislike of his tone, distracts from the more important points he's made.

Paul stresses that the illustration of a dinosaur isn't simply a drawing. Every stroke of the pen is underlain by hours of research. He writes:

I do a whole lot of work for every dinosaur I do, and it requires considerable time. Traveling hither and yon. Digging up all those old obscure papers. Cross scaling elements. Raising my blood pressure trying to cross scaling elements when it is not working out for some damn reason. Years of becoming familiar with animal anatomy and function (notice how I turned out to be right about giant theropods having flexed legs after all). Keeping up with the increasingly massive literature. Reworking old skeletal restorations as new information comes in and the occasional oops about a prior effort.

How should paleoartists be compensated for their work? There are many enthusiastic amateurs, some of whose talents approach the professional masters of the craft. Paul has a long-standing reputation for academic rigor (the flip side of which is his penchant for making broad taxonomic pronouncements in the popular press). So protecting the Greg Paul Brand is in his best interest. But as Mike Taylor states in the comments of Nima's first post on this issue at ART Evolved, this is almost a Utopian argument: Paul may not like it, but the reality of any market is that experienced professionals who command high prices can be outbid by plucky up-and-comers.

Clearly, Paul is absolutely within his rights to call other artists on their appropriation of his work. The most flagrant example of this I've seen appeared about a year ago. There are certainly amateurs who use Paul's work as they learn the craft and develop their own style. Paul has acknowledged that this is not an issue, as it's an important part of an artists growth and a practice he himself used when he was younger.

Taylor's comment brings me to my major concern, and the one thing I want to focus on today: How many paleoartists can the market sustain? Money for paleontology is hard to come by, a perennial problem made more acute by the current economic climate. Though I have a special place in my heart for paleontology, I admit that other areas of science are more vital to mankind's well-being. This is not to discount the important insights about life's history paleontology continues to offer; it's merely a pragmatic acknowledgment of its place relative to other disciplines such as medicine and energy. Paleoartists get a small slice of a small pie when working for scientific clients, and here, Paul's point is that folks who need paleoart for a project need to budget properly to pay the artist fairly. Hopefully that's possible.

As I've been writing this post, the discussion on the mailing list has come around to addressing my big concern. Mark Witton has said it perfectly, and I doubt I can improve on his phrasing.

The harsh reality may be that it may be almost impossible to eek out an existence on palaeoart alone in modern times - even if you are one of the best in the business - and live comparably well, much less support a family. It is an extremely dedicated, specialised branch of art, after all, so there isn't a massive amount of work to spread among even the handful of artists already out there.

So. Is this truly the reality we're faced with? Are the days of dedicated professional paleoartists fading away? None of these artists is getting rich off of this, so it's important to remember that for all of the veterans complaining about losing money, this a matter of livelihood, not greed.

While paleoartists certainly fit well within the Graphic Artists Guild or the Guild of Natural Science Illustrators, their specific needs might warrant a guild of their own. Mike Habib has indicated in an email to the Dinosaur Mailing List that he's in the process of planning a paleoartist gathering at this year's Society of Vertebrate Paleontology meeting where he'll propose an informal paleoartists' society, writing that he "plans to formally suggest some organization and future goals at that event." He hasn't revealed much more than that, and I'm sure I'm not alone in eagerly awaiting more information. Similar attempts have failed in the past, but hopefully this will be more successful and improve the lot of paleoartists.

One thing's for sure. The entire community, from journal editors to exhibit designers to artists to working scientists to representatives of academic presses, needs to be heard to figure out the most equitable and feasible way forward. The lay public and those working in science-related media, such as documentaries and pop-sci magazines, should also know what's going on, for the simple fact that paleontology and pop culture have the symbiotic relationship I described above.

I do have some personal stake in this as a graphic artist. I'm not a scientific illustrator, but I do hope to base at least part of my future livelihood on doing graphic design for scientific clients, whether they be journals or popular magazines, for pure research or popular science communication. I desperately want paleoartists to have the power to make the kind of living that any skilled worker deserves. But I worry about the dilution of the field as money-crunched media producers drive compensation lower and lower. I'm following along with all of the threads of this conversation as an enthusiastic learner. Though I sometimes feel like I've been writing this blog forever, I'm reminded every day that really, I'm a rank newb. As always, I invite constructive criticism of anything I write.

I've mentioned it on the Dinosaur Mailing List and I'll bring it up here - any paleoartist who doesn't have a blog of their own and would like to talk about this issue publicly is invited here to do an interview or guest post. As this conversation evolves, I'll do my best to explain the issue and offer what little help I can.

Relevant Links:
Included as a reference to statements made by Gregory S. Paul, as well as my main topic above. Not comprehensive, but important to the issues discussed in this post.
GSP statement on use of my dinosaur restorations
RE: GSP statement on use of my dinosaur restorations (follow up)
RE: GSP statement on use of my dinosaur restorations (more follow up)
Another important point
Actually Doing Something About the Great Paleoart Ripoff
Reductio Ad Absurdum. It is 1984 Dinosaur Time..!

Some of the conversation, especially in the final thread linked, is continuing today, and won't be archived at the DML site until tomorrow.

Greg Paul's Dinosaur Coffee Table Book

You don't have to wait until the October publication of his Princeton Field Guide to Dinosaurs for new material from Gregory S. Paul. In what he calls an "early 21st century experiment in cyber paleo publishing," Paul has published his Dinosaur Coffee Table Book via DIY publishing service Blurb.

The publishing industry is in the middle of an upheaval, spun for a loop by the internet and the rotten economy. More than ever, publishers are held up by big tentpole titles by blockbuster authors or celebrities. This means much less of a willingness to take a risk on an unproven author or on content that doesn't appeal to the broadest audience. The effect in turn on science writing - print or digital - has been dramatic, as evidenced by the recent Pepsigate problem at ScienceBlogs and the cutbacks on dedicated science writers at many news organizations. So while paleo enthusiasts might view a full color book containing many never-before-seen Greg Paul pieces as a sure-fire hit, it's not the easiest sell to a publisher.

Paul writes at the Blurb product page, "I have long wanted to do a book featuring the bulk of my body of color restorations of dinosaurs, something like those Zdenek Burian [link mine] put out when I was a kid... The problem with all color books is that they are so expensive to produce that they often don’t make much money and publishers are reluctant to produce them, all the more so as the world goes increasingly digital."

Even spending $20 on a book is a careful decision for me right now, so I don't think I'll be able to shell out the nearly $70 for this one (or $120 for the larger deluxe edition pictured above). Certainly, I don't hold the price against Paul; one downside to print-on-demand publishing is higher cost-per-unit. And really, it's not out of line for what a traditional publisher might charge for a large-format art book. An initial review sent out to the Dinosaur Mailing List today indicates that the quality is quite good, so if you're a big collector of paleo books and artwork, I would definitely consider picking this one up.

The Princeton Field Guide to Dinosaurs

This October, Princeton University Press will release Gregory S. Paul's new book, The Princeton Field Guide to Dinosaurs. If you'd like a sneak peek, a twelve page preview is available right now (hat tip to Ian Paulsen for posting it to the Dinosaur Mailing List). This should sufficiently whet your appetite, and there's a lot more meat on the bone: 320 pages, to be exact, with over 500 illustrations.

Paul is renowned for his reconstructions of ancient life, and his Predatory Dinosaurs of the World is still held up as one of the great pieces of dinosaur literature, twenty-one years after its first publication. If you've seen an animated dinosaur from the last two decades, chances are it is strongly influenced by Paul - or directly guided by him. For more, visit his official site, which includes galleries of his work and an exhaustive autobiography.