The fourth illustration in the series of feathered dinosaurs for the book. This is the famous Velociraptor depicted in its native Cretaceous environment of desert Mongolia.Velociraptor was a small dromaeosaur, or raptor dinosaur, and contrary to its most famous depictions was almost certainly feathered from head to tail. This is no longer based merely on phylogenic evidence, either - as of 2007, reanalysis of the fossil has shown that its posterior forearm contains quite obvious quill knobs.
This is oil on canvas, June 2009.
Yeah, but was Mongolia a desert in the Mesozoic, or is that just how it is now?
ReplyDeleteI mean, you don't usually find raptors in deserts, even today. WTF would such large, fast predators eat in a desert, anyway?
I mean, there are dinosaur bones in the arctic, too, but it wasn't cold when they lived there.
Running uses a lot of energy, so desert beasts are either very small and fast or large and very slow, but these are neither.
Maybe these guys ate the large slow ones!
-- 2 curious faye
PS
Howz the book coming? I'm supposed to review the manuscript, y'know!
PPS
No new art? That's why I'm here.
...Well I'm also here to ask if there's anything I can do that would allow me to see a vid of the Captain doing, uhh... you. But I don't have the balls to say so, so I won't.