New artwork for Fall 2010

Hey Folks,

I'll have some more on taphonomy in the next few days, but before I get to that, I've got some new artwork to post instead. As I've previously alluded to, this has been an absolute heinous semester, even though I've only taken 1 credit in courses. I've spent the entire semester working on several manuscript projects (at least one of which is about to come to fruition; more on that in the coming weeks). Just over this weekend alone, I've received page proofs for my first paper, received final acceptance for another paper, and submitted the revisions for a third paper. Life is good.From left to right: Agujaceratops, Pentaceratops, Anchiceratops, Arrhinoceratops, and adult Triceratops (="Torosaurus").

In addition to all these, I've been busy with several art projects. The longest project (and still incomplete) is a series of cranial drawings of chasmosaurine dinosaurs for Denver Fowler, for his research he presented earlier this month at SVP for his Romer prize presentation.

Agujaceratops mariscalensis for Denver Fowler's Romer presentation.Subadult Triceratops for John Scannella's Romer presentation.

John Scannella, another Ph.D. student here at MSU/MOR, has recently earned some time in the limelight for killing "Torosaurus" (now known to be just the adult form of Triceratops) - although many people over the summer misinterpreted his study as somehow killing Triceratops instead. John asked me back in September to redraw one of Hatcher's beautiful plates of Triceratops for his Romer presentation. Unfortunately, the skull that Hatcher figured lacked a nasal horn, and he needed it to have one... so I drew it with one, and I can only hope that my drawing doesn't make Hatcher roll over in his grave.

Here's the paleontological 800-lb gorilla in the room: formerly Torosaurus, but what has convincingly shown by Scannella and Horner (2010) to simply the adult form of Triceratops, although many unfortunately still cling to the olde wayes of palaeontological research. This was actually for Denver Fowler's talk rather than John's, and is based on a rather complete "Torosaurus" skull here at Museum of the Rockies.
This I just did for fun over the summer - I actually did this up at Lake Tahoe (and only took about 3 hours, even though it's about two feet wide) while I was on vacation there over the summer. This I believe is some kind of Diplodocus. Some dinosaurs are pretty, although in many cases I could care less which one it actually is. Drawing sauropod dinosaurs is OK, because they're almost as big and almost as cool as a baleen whale. Sorry dinosaur fans, they just never quite made it, but they get an A for effort.Lastly, this is one of my most recent drawings - this is part of a big bird bone. But that's all I'll say for now; I only put this up here because its a good example of a specimen drawing I've done. This one only took about 4 hours.

Anyway, time for shameless self promotion: I auctioned a bunch of prints off at the SVP benefit auction earlier this month, and made a total of ~350$ for the auction, which, according to Denver F., is something like 1.7% of the entire proceeds from the auction. That feels pretty damn good on multiple levels- for one, just knowing that I helped raise that much money (and it only cost me about six bucks to print all that stuff out, including the plastic sleeves) and two, that it was because people liked my artwork and were willing to bid anywhere from 30-80 bucks for prints. Unframed, unmatted prints in a plastic bag.

Anyway, due to the overwhelmingly positive reaction I got for my artwork at the auction, I recently started an account on ETSY.com so that I can try and sell some prints of this stuff, and be able to afford food, and gas, and things that are usually denied to graduate students. I'm just kidding about that, but being able to make a few bucks off doing what I love would be pretty fulfilling. Anyway, if you're interested, go ahead and take a look at my Etsy account.