Whoa; I’ve got a lot of commenting to do… :blink:
I think Stenonychosaurus is used for the docile variety of the Troodon.
I have only two of James Gurney's
Dinotopia books to refer to, but you seem to be right. Malik, the timekeeper at Waterfall City, is referred to as a “
Stenonychosaurus” in the first book, while in the Dinotopia Digest Novel
Lost City, a community consisting members of (presumably) the same species that live apart from the rest of Dinotopian society are referred to as “
Troodons”. This may have been incidental; perhaps Gurney was unaware of
Stenonychosaurus's synonymization with
Troodon in 1987, or he just preferred the name “Stenonychosaurus” (the logic being that the dinosaurs would prefer being called “Narrow Clawed Reptile” to “Wounding Tooth”). In any case, it's an interesting idea that some faction of a particular species of dinosaur would identify itself by a different name.
Now, the colored picture of Krau and Penny:
You did an incredible job with the texture of Penny’s hair,
and I love the colors and striping pattern on Krau (though I think his arms, neck, and the end of his tail should be striped as well). The colors of the costumes look great, too.
The main thing I don’t like is the decorative collars or fans around their necks (and Krau’s tail); I thought they looked much better in the sketch. While the colors on the new versions are good, they have no outlines (and honestly look a bit messily rendered), and thus do not “fit” stylistically with the rest of the picture.
Krau’s left foot looks pretty good, but it looks a bit misaligned with the band around his ankle . There also seems to be a whole chunk of his right foot and ankle missing, as one of his claws looks to be “drifting” off his toes and his right leg seems to disappear behind his left. Finally, although his arm is well drawn, it looks to be in a rather unusual position for a dinosaur (or maybe it’s just me).
As I said before, I’m not much good when it comes to drawing humans, but perhaps Penny would look less “cartoony” if her eyes were a little smaller and less round, and if her eyes and nose were a little farther down and closer to her mouth. It might also help if you gave her a more defined chin and forehead.
Also, Penny’s hands look a little skeletal. This shouldn’t be hard to check for yourself, but the spaces between human fingers don’t extend that far back on the hand; if you measure your hand from the wrist to the fingertips, at least half of it consists of the palm and the corresponding back of the hand. The divisions between the fingers also don’t reach as far back as that between the first finger and the thumb.
While it doesn’t exactly relate to drawing Penny better, I just realized that those big flared sleeves of hers are either heavily starched or defying gravity;
they should be drooping down towards the floor weight should be pulling them towards the floor (particularly her right sleeve).
I’m not any good at ascertaining a person’s age in real life, so I can’t offer much advice on how to make Penny look older or younger. Compared to how I draw humans, though, I think you did a great job on her proportions, posture, and overall physical appearance. She looks much more realistic than the few sorry attempts I’ve made at drawing humans.
Now, on to the
Troodon and
Pteranodon:
I really like this idea of yours for a dinosaur story.
I haven’t seen a lot of stories like it, and the world can always use more fictional dinosaur universes.
Incidentally, your concept reminds me a lot of a story I tried to make when I was younger, involving a young
Pteranodon who fell out of his cliff nest and befriended a
Struthiomimus.
I commend you for putting feathers on your
Troodon.
I’m particularly impressed that you included them on the hind legs, a feature that several small carnivorous dinosaurs probably had, but that many artists fail to include in their impressions of feathered dinosaurs. (The feathers probably would have been attached to the back of the leg, however, and I wonder whether a dinosaur adapted for fast running would have short or absent leg feathers to improve aerodynamics. :unsure:).
I do have to say, the head feathers look a bit like a horse’s mane. Also, I think the ones on the arms look too “wispy”. To my knowledge, the arm feathers (or “remiges”) on most dinosaurs that had them were the barbed, vaned kind, similar to those on bird wings, but symmetrical (since they weren’t used in flight). Most restorations of them I’ve seen portray them as being longer towards the front of the arm, and shorter close to the shoulder.
The right hind leg is too sharply bent, and the thighs look too bulky. (Judging from the illustrations I’ve seen, the troodontid thigh only accounted for about a third of the leg’s length.) Also, like its relatives the dromaeosaurs (“raptors”),
Troodon probably had a sickle claw on the inner toe, smaller and less strongly curved than a raptor’s, but still held off the ground in the same way. (Depictions of benevolent
Troodon seem to have a tendency of excluding this characteristic.)
I think my favorite drawing of the
Troodon is the head in the lower right-hand corner. The shape of the snout and head looks quite good (keep in mind that troodontids had very long, narrow snouts), and I like the expression.
My only real suggestion would be to move the eyes down and forward a little, to make the character’s large troodontid braincase more prominent.
I really like how you did the baby
Pteranodon. It’s very cute.
I particularly like how you did the eyes. Realistically, there should be a membrane connecting her wrist with her shoulder (the propatagium), supported by a horizontal spar on the wrist called the pteroid bone.
By the way, how do you plan on having her end up so far from home? If it helps, there is evidence that, like modern reptiles, hatchling pterosaurs were very precocious, possibly capable of flight immediately after hatching (This at least seems to be the case for smaller pterosaurs like
Rhamphorhynchus and
Pterodactylus). On the other hand, the discovery of
a colonial nest site of
Pterodaustro, containing fossilized eggs, hatchlings, and adults suggests that at least some pterosaurs cared for their young to some extent. If you don’t already have an idea, perhaps the
Pteranodon was trying to fly, but got caught in a wind that blew her far inland.
Before I go into further scientific critique on these drawings (I’ve probably already been extremely frustrating
), how realistic do you want the dinosaurs in this story to be, in terms of the physical appearance of the dinosaurs, and which species you use? I’m sure you’ll be taking a few scientific liberties, but are there any particular paleontological guidelines you want to be conscious of? For instance, there is no fossil evidence of
Pteranodon past the mid-Campanian stage (80 million years ago), though it is possible that it survived longer, but simply was not fossilized. Also, pterosaurs probably could not walk on their hind legs, but walked on all fours like bats (though for
Pteranodon and many of its relatives, the limbs were more upright); they took flight by “catapulting” themselves into the air with their wings (video
here).
In case you’d find references useful, here’s
a procession of troodontids (
Troodon is third from the right) and
one of them close-up (I had trouble finding troodontid illustrations on the web that I trust as scientifically accurate, and I hope these suffice). And
this site has some VERY useful information on pterosaurs.
Finally, Jared’s star day picture:
I LOVED this picture. What a great birthday present.
All of the characters are very well done.
Have you drawn Rinkus before? He looks fantastic here.
And HILARIOUS in that party hat.
Great expression, too.
Ah, too bad Pterano didn’t agree to wear the hat.
I’d have loved to see him in it. Although with that crest of his, he’d either have to punch a hole in it to fit it over his head, or hang it off the end of his crest like a hat rack.
