Oh no! I opened the back pasture gate to let Picasso up the hill this morning, and Pete and I just can’t find him anywhere. A bit odd that he didn’t come for his treat. I hope Skittles doesn’t mind. I did see Picasso playing tag with her once…
I’m sorry about that. You never know with critters…they can have the most predictable habits, but sometimes things turn out differently. He probably found a lizard or something in the brush and ran after it.
Picasso is a Dilophosaurus, a leopard-sized predator of Jurassic Arizona. He’s quite good at catching small, slippery snacks, so it might take Pete a while to find him in the brush.
While we wait, here is a Youtube clip that squashes a lot of misconceptions about Dilophosaurus. Enjoy! 🙂
Meet Opie. He’s a happy little fella who loves to curl up in your lap, so it’s a good thing he’s about the size of a big dog!
Yes, Opie seems to think he’s a big lapdog, and he loves it when you stroke his feathers. Where is he off to now? It looks like he’s going to show you his favorite toy…Opie carries Teddy around everywhere. He’s gone through quite a few “surgeries” to poke the stuffing back in after Opie nibbled on him.
Oh! That’s Miss Kitty peaking around the corner. She’s a little shy after Opie tried playing a game of snatch with her. He’s just a big softie though, and he only wants to play. He’ll get a little droopy when Miss Kitty doesn’t understand. So he’ll curl up in his bed to snuggle with Teddy, and he’ll chirp happy chirps when he snuggles. He sounds a lot like this…
Speaking of soft and cuddly, those feathers are rather like those on an emu or kiwi. Looks a lot like fur, doesn’t it? 🙂
Emu feathers. Photo courtesy of Amanda Slater (2009)
Making progress…
Getting along spiffily (is that a word?) on my little storybook, Dippy vs. Ball. Here’s what I have so far on one of the spreads. A handy little map so we can take a little stroll around Dippy’s hometown to meet the neighbors.
Meet Rosie. She’s a bit shy, and might need a little encouragement to come closer. A few treats should do the trick. Before you know it she’ll be perfectly content to snuggle close and put her head on your lap. 🙂
Meet Copper & Daisy. These gentle giants are always happy to meet new friends. They love being part of the group.
Copper is a strapping young bull, and never leaves the side of his lovely lady. He’s very much the gentleman with her, and any friend who joins the herd. Just keep a close eye on your pockets if you have treats!
You can’t hear him, since it’s a picture of course, but Copper is chirping to Daisy. He’s found a good patch of something tasty, and he’s telling her to follow him. Many dinos could probably make a lot of noise without ever opening their mouths, like the gurgly hum Copper is making here. But you can see his lovely red throat all blown up like a bullfrog. 🙂
I imagine him sounding a lot like this…
Making progress…
I’m making progress like a ninja tortoise on my little project. If you want to see what that looks like, here’s a surprisingly fast tortoise I found on Youtube. 😛 (I love how everyone in the clip makes such a huge deal on how fast this tortoise is)
So here’s what I’ve got…
line work for the comic is complete. (though it needs a couple of updates, I found a paper describing the soft spines on Dippy’s back, and I’ve been drawing them wrong.)
first page color nearly complete.
thumbnails for front and back cover, and a few other pages are done, so I just need to finish the line work there.
Here’s a quick look at the first page. I’m going for a simpler style that’s animation friendly later on, so aside from a few tweaks on the background, this is just about done. Do you prefer the simpler, more suggestive backgrounds, or a little more detail?
Personally, I’m thinking of very minimal background, similar to the Wall-e and Big Hero 6 shorts. 🙂 Those short clips have pretty much no background, but the little scene at the bottom of the page is closest to what I’m going for. Very minimal.
Here’s a look at the Wall-e and Baymax clips, so you see what I mean.
What do you think? I would love your feedback! 😀 Just leave a quick word or two (or three) in the comments. 🙂
Coming Next Week…
This little dino is a bit shy, but she’ll come out of the bushes for a sweet hug and a small treat. 🙂
Meet Bella. She’s big, she’s loud, and she’s really happy to see you! She’s happy to see anyone really, except Alfred, but can you blame her? There’s about a-bazillion years of conflict going on there…
There she is! She is the most accommodating of Pete’s very large camarasaurus herd- voted least likely to accidentally trample the equipment. They can be an excitable bunch, and don’t always pay attention to what they’re bumping into. I’ll just say that when Pete finally got her separated from the herd there was a tractor, some flags, an air horn, and a rubber chicken involved…
These Camaras are more closely related to the smaller wild species, C. lentus (there are 3 🙂 ), which are only about 49 feet long. But that’s still a lot of sauropod on the move, especially when you multiply it by 80!
Why so many?
Paleontologists may call Bella the ugliest sauropod, but they’re pretty popular for anyone with plenty of pasture. Their friendly and calm, cow-like attitude makes them an easier alternative to the larger giants like Elmer.
If only they weren’t so loud! But some may call Bella’s singing endearing. It’s lovely to hear their chorus far out to pasture.
Have the video play in the background while you look at Bella above, I can’t help laughing at the mental picture of 50 or 100 of these fat, happy sauropods calling to each other constantly. In a herd of such large animals, you don’t really need stealth. 😀
Making progress…
It looks like I may actually meet my deadline for the Critter Cam eBook! It won’t be the full book to start with, just a taste test for 99 cents, but this might be the most exciting (and terrifying) 99 cents I ever make. It’s a huge milestone for me. I promise I’ll give you more details about it in the following weeks as I finish this one.
But enough chatter. Here’s a preview!
So what’s exactly the progress here, you ask? It looks a bit similar to the last progress post…
The line work for the 3 page mini-comic is complete
I’ve started on coloring (same basic color as on the chibi critters)
Here’s last week’s sketch, for comparison.
You’ll notice a lot of the detail’s been lost. Why? Because some day I’d like to animate these little stories and post them on Youtube. Kinda how you have little 10-30 second clips on characters when a new Pixar or Disney movie comes out.
Detail is not friendly if you want to make it move. 🙂 So that means color will be simple too, with limited (if any) shadows and highlights. I’m thinking along the lines of Caillou, Curious George, or some other kid’s TV show.
Coming Next Week…
These two love making new friends, especially if you have a treat…
Meet Twig. He’s a lot more travel-sized, if you’re looking for a dinosaur that’s not a bird. He makes up for his size by being extra fluffy and huggable. Can you resist that fuzzy tail?
Twig may be small, but he’s not nearly as teeny as most “educational” sources would have you believe. Almost all the dinosaur books I’ve come across claim this little guy as the smallest dinosaur. “As big as a chicken” is the phrase often used.
Twig would have you know he’s the size of a turkey, not a chicken (makes a big difference if you’re standing right next to it). All those other reports are actually based off a German fossil of a juvenile compy, not an adult. Another well-preserved fossil was discovered in France in the 1970’s, but paleontologists weren’t sure it was a compy until more recent years.
Twig doesn’t mind the confusion though. He’s not really bothered by much as long as he can snatch a lizard or two out of the bushes. 🙂
Just for fun, here’s a picture of Jurassic Park’s Compsognathus. This picture is from the Jurassic Park Wikia, but did not have any credit associated with it. It looks like it was cut from a screenshot of Jurassic Park: The Lost World. It’s really quite a nice little puppet, and the film makers were able to give it the very lifelike, birdy movements described in the first book of the series.
The model has a few glaring inaccuracies, but I really enjoyed watching it in the film anyway.
Shrinkwrapped skin on muscle on bone, with no soft tissue in between.
Two fingers instead of three
Broken bunny arms
The lack of feathers is not technically inaccurate, because some relatives preserve feathers, and others preserve scales on the tail. So it’s a coin toss really, at least until we can find more data. 🙂
Making progress…
Got this done while the kids where happily playing with cars…well, they didn’t play with cars the whole time, but they were playing together, without fighting! It was a rare blissful morning I tell ya. 😀
Of course it still needs work, but I thought I’d share my progress with you as I work on this. I was hoping to have the eBook done by Christmas, but that was before I realized it’s almost impossible for me to not add detail.
See, I was going for a style like the size comparison critters in this chart.
What would you prefer? The simpler, cuter, faster to draw style, or the more detailed sketchiness I’m currently going with. It’ll take a bit longer, but I’ll keep you posted regularly on my progress!
Coming Next Week…
Why, oh why must everyone call her ugly? I really don’t know. She may not be winning any beauty contests, but she’s a real sweet heart with anyone she meets. 🙂
Meet Flipper. He’s a happy-go-lucky guy who’s only ambition in life is to cruise the water for a bite of squid. He loves to greet new friends with a friendly splash.
It’s a dolphin! It’s a shark! It’s a…dinosaur?
Flipper is part of a unique-snowflake group of animals called Ichthyosaurs (think Ick!-theosaurs).
Way back when his great-great-great-great-super-great grandaddy (some lizardy thing at the time) started spending a lot of time in water. So much time, that he got really good at it, so now Flipper is basically what a dolphin or fish would look like if reptiles started an aquatic lifestyle.
At least that’s the theory. No one’s found this hypothetical, reptilian, super-great grandaddy so far, and there’s a lot of discussion when it comes to figuring out Flipper’s closest relatives.
Flipper here doesn’t think too much about all that though. He’s just happy with the bucketful of squid Pete brings him.
Making Progress…
With the Holiday Season upon us, I’ve decided that I’ll be slowing down the weekly posts. After 6 months of developing the habit, it’s going to be tough to come up on Monday and not have a post up…but that doesn’t mean I’ll be slacking!
The time I would normally dedicate to a new post will be used to finish my mini-comic book. Once that is up on Amazon I’ll then be ready to set up the sign-up forms for Postcards from the Shop, and really get to work on the picture book itself.
It’s time to stop procrastinating in the research and build-up phase, and actually get it done!
I still plan on continuing with our Critter of the Week every Wednesday, but there won’t be any new pages for a while. At least not until I get the eBook up on Amazon.
You’ll see an Art & Science post every now and then too, since there are still things I don’t know much about, and definitely need more research on.
Here’s what I’ve been working on the last couple of days. Pretty cool what a few focused nap times can accomplish! 😀
Just for comparison…here I have the current home page, the update I showed you last week, and the most recent update…keep in mind It’s not complete, so there’s lots of places that still need work. 🙂
Here I’ve finished the drawing and I’ve started putting down some basic color. 🙂
Coming Next Week…
The oft-proclaimed smallest dinosaur in the world is!…not as small as you might think.
When it comes to prehistoric critters, usually Dinosaurs are the first critters to come to mind, but really that’s just the tip of the iceberg. Among the many strange critters cruising the Mesozoic seas were the Ichthyosaurs. They’re not dinosaurs at all, even though they’re often lumped into the same pile. So if they’re not dinosaurs, what are they exactly? Here are five fast facts to help demystify these swimming reptiles…
1. First things first, how do you say that?!
I recently realized I’ve been pronouncing this word wrong all my life. I’ve been saying “Itch-theo-sore”. But that’s with English phonetics. The word comes from the Greek ichthys (fish) and sauros (lizard or reptile). With that in mind, this is what it should sound like…
So now my little girl calls them “icky-saurs” instead of “itchy-saurs”. 😀
2. Ok, so what exactly is an “icktheosaur”?
Long story short, they are reptiles specially adapted to live in water. They were born, grew up, had babies, and died in water. Basically, reptilian “fish”. Or reptilian “dolphins”.
They appeared during the Triassic period, around the same time the first dinosaurs started running around. They shared a “golden age” with dinosaurs in the Jurassic period, but most died out by the time the Cretaceous period arrived. A few species held on a while longer, but they missed out on the big asteroid that hit Earth.
3. Why do they look so much like fish/dolphin/shark…things?
If it isn’t broken, why fix it? The fish/dolphin/shark body shape works so well for a lifestyle in water, multiple animals have adopted it. A streamlined, torpedo body with stabilizing fins is perfect for slicing through water efficiently, so very little effort is needed to move around.
It’s a perfect example of what is called convergent evolution, which is when several completely unrelated animals (i.e. fish, reptile, mammal) develop similar body plans or lifestyles.
Personally? I think it’s an interesting coincidence that so many unrelated animals developed the same body shape and lifestyle…very interesting indeed. 😀
4. Wait a sec…How do we know they looked like that?
That’s an easy one. Some Ichthyosaur fossils have preserved the soft tissue of the animal, so we can see the streamlined outline, as well as a shark-like tail and fins. Many fossils also preserve things that give us clues on behavior, like a mother giving birth to live young. The fossil captures the newborn Ichthyosaur mid-birth!
5. No way…how do you know it wasn’t eating the smaller one?
Paleontologists can tell that the smaller Ichthyosaur was not there for some random reason because of where it is. The little one was halfway inside the larger one (instead of just layered under it), but clearly in the right place for a baby, and not lunch.
And speaking of lunch, some fossils preserve that too! In many of their stomachs, we find tiny hooks similar to what some modern squid have on their tentacles. Mesozoic oceans were not a bounty of fish, as we might think, but there were squids, octopuses, and all their extinct cousins with them. (lots of them had little hooks like switchblades on their tentacles.)
Of course an Ichthyosaur will eat whatever it can get, including fish, but the squidy things where just soo common. Sheer numbers means they get eaten more often.
So there you go, “Ick-theosaurs” in a nutshell. 😀 Reptiles that dove into the water, took the life and body shape of a shark, and lived alongside the dinosaurs eating calamari.
Quick Question: We all make mistakes, and sometimes a pronunciation mistake can be pretty funny (like my little girl’s “itchy-saur”). Have you ever pronounced something a certain way, only to find out it’s something totally different later? It could be a dinosaur name, or something else. I’d love to hear from you in the comments! 😀
Meet Elmer. He’s a little shy, and likes staying in his comfort zone, but he’ll be your best giant friend if you give him some greens and a big hug.
The best way to a dino’s heart is through his stomach, as they say. Well, that’s not really the phrase, but I’m sure it’s just as true, especially when it comes to these long-necked sauropods. 🙂 I think the rough estimate is a solid cube- 5ft x 5ft – of vegetation in a single day to feed one of these guys.
Oh, there’s Elmer, browsing on a few of the trees that grow here in the pasture. You’d think you’d see him right away, he’s so big. But his striped pattern is surprisingly good camouflage in that grove of tall conifers.
What’s he looking at…? Oh, here comes Pete on the Kabota. He’ll be joining us here on the platform to feed Elmer. If you lean over the railing a bit and look down, see that row of big boxes kinda spaced along the wall? That’s where the big bunches of conifer branches and ferns will go. They’re in the big shed behind us, the one to the left of the stairs we came up.
And here comes Elmer. My goodness, he’s fast. It looks like he’s moving slow, but with those long legs he sure covers ground quickly! And so quiet…You’d think there’d be the big stomping footsteps you hear in Jurassic Park.
Hey there Elmer! We have a friend to see you today. 🙂
I just can’t get over how big he is! What are we, 30 feet up? 40?
It’s hard to grasp how big these guys really are until you’re right next to them. Come to think of it, that’s the way it is with most animals.
To think that Elmer is as heavy as 5 elephants. Five! And not just any elephant. 5 bull African elephants, which are about as big as it gets when it comes to land animals walking around today.
Here’s a video that helps put that into perspective…
So five of those guys is about as heavy as the average humpback whale. Yes, Elmer here is every bit as big as a whale, and he’s not even the biggest sauropod out there!
Oh, hi Pete, we have a visitor today!
There you are, friend, a nice bunch of ferns you can give Elmer. Just grab it at the end here, and make sure your fingers are in a nice, tight fist.
That’s it.
Elmer’s teeth are like pruning shears, so we don’t want to lose any fingers today by mistake.
I think he likes you!
Making progress…
I’ve been working on actually finishing the homepage image for a bit now, and I thought I would share my progress so far.
It’s an important part of the site, since it’s the first thing you see, and it’s the “front window” of Pete’s Paleo Petshop.
But it’s also a test.
A test for style, to make sure I’m happy with it, and it’ll have the feel I’m going for.
A test to see how long it takes me to complete a full illustration. (so far two weeks, but that’s in between the margins of everything else)
And a test to make sure you like what you see as well. After all, this may be an ambitious idea and project, but the long-term goal is to earn a passive income in a way that doesn’t take time from my family.
So here is two weeks of sporadic sketching between posts, child herding, and making sure the house doesn’t fall apart. 😛 (I exaggerate, but truly, being a stay-at-home mom takes quite a bit more work than a lot of people think 🙂 )
Compared to the current homepage…You’ll notice the little saber-tooth cub lost his fangs. They’re just hidden behind extra large lips. Turns out only tusks are exposed, so all saber-tooth cats should have their teeth nicely sheathed. 🙂
I did look at reference pictures, but research was kept to a minimum since most of these animals are not in the Jurassic period. I’ll update the picture as I get to the appropriate periods, which may take a while. 😛
Coming Next Week…
I hope you don’t mind getting wet, because this swimming critter loves to splash! 🙂
Pete's Paleo Petshop 