Sea Star - NOAA Ocean Exploration Sea stars are echinoderms, which translates to “spiny skin” and refers to hard parts embedded in their tissue which may protrude as spines. This sea star was seen on the seafloor at 1,823 meters (5,98...

oceanexplorer.noaa.gov/multimedia/o...

Looking at photos from the NOAA Voyage to the Ridge 2022 Expedition and this is crazy - is it just me or does this sea star look like it was knit by hand?!

A more recent entry to the category but instant classic in my mind:

Dr. Lindsay Zanno with the "Dueling Dinosaurs" Nanotyrannus fossil at the North Carolina Museum of Natural Science (Photo: Justin Kase Conder/Walter)

A strong second place:

Museum staff member(?) sitting in "Carcharocles" aka Otodus megalodon jaws reconstruction by Bashford Dean in 1909 (AMNH)

The undisputed #1 greatest photo of a person with a fossil:

Paleontologist Altangerel Perle, with the Museum of Natural History in Ulan Bataar, Mongolia, stands between the forearms of Deinocheirus

Watching a video from the Smithsonian on the making of Gary Staab's 50ft-long Megalodon sculpture. Something about seeing artists/workers climbing on and around it like insects really leaves you with a sense of how big this thing would've been

This might be a first in the world of #paleoart

Nice job capturing the unique texture of marsupial fur

If there’s a desire for an online-based robust virtual paleontology “meeting”, my honest best advice is the folks that really really want this to happen aggregate a leadership team and make it happen. This isn’t a dig (🥁) at all, but it’s not going to happen through SVP this year. I ran the 2023 virtual meeting and promise there just isn’t enough time on the calendar to go the SVP route. If a team of 8-12 highly motivated, reliable individuals can be brought together on this and establish 10-point lists of benefits, challenges, and deliverable targets, I will enthusiastically help however I can in a consulting capacity. Please understand though that however much work you think this will be, double that and you might be close. Not trying to discourage anyone, but that’s the reality of these things. That said, accessibility is crucial and this overall concept is definitely worth pursuing.

Regarding potential virtual paleontology meetings. (I built and ran the 2023 SVP virtual meeting.)

Ooh giving them some options is very prudent, will definitely consider

Thank you! Gorgeous work btw

Curious about your guys' answers, if you've been in this position. If anybody outside of paleoart has any insight I'd love to hear!
@serpenillus.bsky.social @joschuaknuppe.bsky.social @markwitton.bsky.social @bobnichollsart.bsky.social @sketchy-raptor.bsky.social

Question for fellow paleoartists:

When creating #paleoart to be featured on the cover of an academic journal, how do you decide the dimensions of the piece? Do you reach out to the folks at the journal and ask them? Design a vertical composition and let them crop? Or something else?

#sciart

Thanks! I have to thank Paul Mayer, curator of fossil invertebrates at the Field Museum, for the scientific input

If I look exhausted, it's because this was after a whole day of digging trenches to protect the dig site from rain. This was a task I took on without being asked to, and I was proud of the results.

That's me in blue, on the left

Not my sweaty ass being part of an exhibit panel at The Museum of the Rockies!!!
I volunteered last summer to help dig up a new chasmosaurine ceratopsid (horned dinosaur somewhat related to Triceratops).

That's something you don't often see in paleoart - here's a detail of my own attempt to rectify lol

And while I can't afford to bid, I your energy really made the auctions entertaining and the items were great (god I need a Csotonyi mural). I think next time you should remind people how expensive framed art/prints are, and how they're a steal at those auction prices

I loved it! I was planning on making a post or 2 about it. I thought there was quite a diverse & intriguing slate of speakers & talks, the museum has some incredible material on display, and Dr. Kirk Johnson gave perhaps the best talk I've ever seen. His story covered so much and left me inspired

Detail of the Triceratops reconstruction I made for the North Carolina Museum of Natural Sciences' award-winning research project, Cretaceous Creatures

Coloration is meant to match a mural/reconstruction by Julius Csotonyi
#paleoart #sciart

Oooh what is this fossil?

Yeah, preservation & taphonomy absolutely plays a role. As does my own aesthetic bias/preference I think

A paleoart meme/trope that kind of bugs me is giving Sinosauropteryx a bushy, fluffy, squirrel-like tail.

I am not saying this is implausible, and I appreciate speculation, but it's not what the fossil evidence seems to reflect.

Okay in hindsight not the best angle but for reference I am 6ft6in (2m) tall and the horns extend past where I was standing

Amazing work!

Retrodeformation of the Tyrannosaurus rex specimen “Black Beauty”

Hadrosaur skull

Isolated view of the Gorgosaurus specimen known as “Blossom”

Platinum palladium hadrosaur contact print

Timeline cleanse:

The gorgeous, masterful fossil photography of Andre Gogol (in collaboration with the Royal Tyrrell Museum collections)

#paleontology #photography #paleoart

Biggest surprise of #DinosaursAndMOR so far: Yoshi’s Trike (long-horned Triceratops specimen) is WAAAY bigger than I thought! I’ll try to get a pic with me for scale before the conference ends
📍Museum of the Rockies

Brodavis, the freshwater hesperornithiform bird from the Hell Creek Formation of Late Cretaceous North America. Composition loosely inspired by The Birds of North America by John James Audubon.

Done for the Cretaceous Creatures Project at the North Carolina Museum of Natural Sciences
#paleoart

That fish in the background of every single shark photo you've seen: the pilot fish, Naucrates ductor. It's almost hard to find pics of oceanic whitetip sharks *without* pilotfish in them

#FossilFriday & happy to see coworker & coauthor Erin Fitzgerald’s culmination of fierce fieldwork, ace preparation of difficult material & great paint job on the display-skull, out now w/ Spinosaurus mirabilis, debuting @ Chicago Children’s Museum on March 1
#SciArt