Happy Holidays!

Amurosaurus riabinini :)

Otschevia

Lacking some pictures for the book. Finishing gaps. 

IPIC 2011 Awards

Just receive an email....

I think that there is misprint only in my name not in the place )))))))

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International Paleontology Illustration Competition (IPIC 2011) & Exhibit
The first edition of IPIC'2011 exhibits open to the public on 23th October and ended a few days later, on 28th.
It was a brief, but much praised exhibit.
In fact, it was one of the climax events that happens in the XXII Brazilian Congress of Palaeontology (held in Praiamar Natal Hotel & Convention) and was consider a huge success for all the hundreds of Congress attendees, as also by the public in general.

We (IPIC organizatin) were greatly honored to receive all the pieces submitted to IPIC and every one of these artworks are superb examples of contemporary paleoillustrations. Thank you everyone for sharing your wonderful art with us.

A short statistics - 32 artists from 14 countries (Argentina/5, Brazil/4, Canada/1, China/1, Croatia/1, Czeck Republic/1, Finland/1, Italy/4, Portugal/1, Russia/1, Spain/2, UK/2, Ukraine/1, USA/5) entered a total of 78 beautiful artworks.

Due to the high quality of almost all artworks submitted to IPIC'2011, it was a truly hard task - for all the 5 jurors - to decide and choose the IPIC'2011 winners.

The IPIC'2011 Jurors were:
Fernando Correia (biologist and scientific illustrator; Scientific Illustration Program Coordinator and Scientific Illustration Laboratory Director of the University of Aveiro Aveiro, Portugal)
Narendra Kumar Srivastava (President of the XXII Brazilian Congress of Palaeontology; Federal University of Rio Grande do Norte; Natal, Brazil)
Roberto Iannuzzi (President of the Brazilian Society of Palaeontology; Federal University of Rio Grande do Sul; Porto Alegre, Brazil)
Ildeu de Castro Moreira (Brazilian Ministry of Science & Technology; Brazil)
Maria de Fátima Brito (Science House; Federal University of Rio de Janeiro, Brazil).

Following Jury decision, I am delighted to announce the IPIC'2011 Awards Winners - CONGRATULATIONS!!!

IPIC'2011 Awards

Jury Awards
1st place ANDREY AUTCHIN/Russia (Demandasaurus)
2nd place FRANCO TEMPESTA/Italy (Velociraptor attack)
3rd place RODOLFO NOGUEIRA/Brazil (Psaronius)
 
Honourable Mentions
LOANA ROBOLI /Italy Jade and Silk Forest (Merit Certification Diploma)
H. SANTIAGO DRUETTA/Argentina
Nopachthus coagmentatus (Merit Certification Diploma)
XAVIER MACPHERSON/Spain
Microraptor gui (Merit Certification Diploma)

Public Voting Special Award
RODOLFO NOGUEIRA/Brazil Uberabatitan riberoi.

Bereslavka

One more picture for the new book "When the Volga was the sea". 

Mosasaurus hoffmani

Mosasaurus hoffmani. Designed for the book cover (and maybe NG magazine cover). 

Metriorhynchidae indet.

Upper Jurassic of Volga Region. 

Epivirgatites with young ichthyosaurs

One more illustration for the book about Mesozoic seas of Volga region, Russia. 

"Paleomir" is dead

"Paleomir" is dead. The ongoing issue was completed several months ago, but I think that it's dead too (at least it will not be published this year). It was four...

Tapuiasaurus

Phew! I've finished it. Hovever now I don't like the result. The scene is not interesting, not a very good composition and balanced. Animals are not very convincing and alive.

I wanted to draw tapuiasaurs with some large theropod. Together with the skeleton of Tapuiasaurus was found articulated skeleton of abelisauroid (Zaher et al, 2011). But it's not published yet. It's not desirable to draw generic abelisaur when the articulated skeleton is preserved. Also not known whether or not it's big. So I decided to depict the generic carcharodontosaurid. The findings of carcharodontosaurids appear in South America and Brazil in the early Cretaceous period (Aptian). So it could be that some carcharodontosaurid lived in this time and place. Actually I'm not very fond of making such assumptions without any factual findings, but this is an exception.

Zaher, H., Pol, D., Carvalho, A. B., Nascimento, P. M., Riccomini, C., Larson, P., Jauarez-Valieri, R., Pires-Domingues, R., Jorge da Silva Jr., N., Campos, D. de, A., 2011, A complete skull of an Early Cretaceous sauropod and the evolution of advanced titanosaurians: Public Library of Science (PLOS) One, v. 6, issue 2, 10 pp.

Tapuiasaurus (WIP)

Cut-out part of my new artwork.

Nasutoceratops (finished)

Digital painting. 3226*1996 (300 dpi)

Nasutoceratops WIP

Continued work with the picture. 

Some Coleoidea

I just have finished four illustrations for the publication about origin of ability to change color of cephalopod skin and  origin of muscular mantle and fins. Authors: Vyacheslav Bizikov and Alexey Ippolitov. 

Bactrites

Hematites

Large-nosed ceratops from Kaiparowits Formation. WIP

I'm out in the field.

Berezovsk Quarry, Middle Jurassic, Bathonian. Where remains of Kileskus aristotocus was found.

photo by Sergey Krasnolutsky

Pterosaurs and a surf

Digital painting, 6000×2783, 300 dpi

III International Contest of Scientific Illustration of Dinosaurs. Verdict.

I participated with two images:


Damandasaurus darwini


Baryonyx walkeri

Ganadores III Concurso Internacional de Ilustraciones Científicas de Dinosaurios 2011

The jury´s veredict is:

1º Prize:
“Demandasaurus Darwin”
Andrey Atuchin (RUSIA)

2º Prize
“Balaur bondoc”
Sergey Krasovskiy (UCRANIA)

3º Prize:
“Concavenator corcovatus”
Sergey Krasovskiy (UCRANIA)

-----------------------------------

Most of all participants I like the artworks of Davide Bonadonna. His artworks are great! It is unfortunate that he did not become one of the three winners.

Carnotaurus sastrei

Digital painting, 4850×4098, 300 dpi

Fragment 

Coming soon Carnotaurus

Hesperornis

This is the final illustration which I started to paint a long time ago. This is required for the new issue of PaleoMir. So I think there can be some errors due to haste and lack of much work to reconstruction this bird and its environment. I really do not like finishing the work started long ago and abandoned, but sometimes it needs to be done.

Protostega

Another illustration for "PaleoMir". For an article on the paleogeography of the Volga region in Campanian time, and the associated unique biota. 

Russian Dinosaurs

In March issue of NG (Russian edition) I have illustrated an article about Russian dinosaurs. History of findings, locations. Now I can share some images. 

Cover

Tyrannosauridae. Kundur. 

Sharipovo (Berezovsk Quarry). Bathonian. Kileskus, "Shariposaurs". 

Shestakovo (Aptian-Albian). Psittacosaurus sibiricus, titanosaur, Kyasuchus, Kirgizemys. 

Titanosaur. Volga region. 

Map of the main locations.  

Clidastes finished

"PaleoMir"

Journal "PaleoMir” (PaleoWorld in English) is the first popular science magazine in Russia on paleontology. Published twice a year - spring and fall. 

 In each issue we publish materials about the extinct animals, searching for fossils, expeditions and excavations, and paleontologists, news and new findings. It’s mainly focuses on the fossils found in Russia. 

It’s about 100 pages in issue and NatGeo magazine format. The magazine is created with specially created illustrations, photographs and articles. 

The main materials for the magazine are written by leading local specialists - staff of the Paleontological Institute of RAS, Institute of Geological Sciences, State Geological Museum. VI Vernadsky, as well as regional research centers: Komi Science, Saratov State University. NG Chernyshevsky, Irkutsk State University, etc. 

Also in the pages of PaleoMir you can read stories written by Russian ethnographers and collectors about the discoveries and locations, tips on how to properly search, dissect and store paleontological specimens. 

 Among the regular sections of the magazine there are a humorous column "Paleontologists joke", which publishes the funny and amusing stories related to the fossils, and the heading "Paleomiry" (Paleoworlds) which tells about the work of paleoartists and animalists. There was interview with Doug Henderson, John Sibbick, Alain Beneteau, Julius Csotonyi. 

The fact is we do not have the popularization of paleontology in Russia. Despite on that dinosaurs and other extinct animals attract the attention of many people in our country. There are only scientific publications or silly books with illustrations which are translated from English mainly. Of course we can watch on the TV different NG and BBC films, sometimes we can see good foreign books. But we do not have own books or TV films. Latest interesting Russian popular book about fossils published ten years ago, which number was about 50 copies. Approximately before it - 300 copies. No comments. 

Sadly, our paleontologists cannot and do not like writing for ordinary readers. We cannot go to the bookshop and buy (even more - to choose from several), a good book about extinct animals. You can only find the old books in second-hand (antique) shops or download any pdf file. The situation is very sad. Against this background “Paleomir” fated to be an unique edition. But it is the project of amateur hobby. Therefore it publishes from chance to chance, the content is mainly determined by preferences of an editor (until recently it was a Permian, now I think after changing the editor - Jurassic). 

“Paleomir” was invented occasionally. Young historian Dmitry Nuzhnenko took a great interest in fossils. He published a magazine on archaeology and decided to make a journal on paleontology. Just because this niche was unused, more precisely - was empty, and Nuzhnenko wanted to fill it. The first number in 2006 he wrote almost entirely by himself. Scientists gave some old their articles and they are not going to write anything new. Plans for the magazine were enormous - no wonder that the first number published in two languages: English and Russian. It was refusing later. “Paleomir” is the only popular edition in Russian on paleontology. Now it changed the editor and the magazine plans to make more scientific and increase the number of issues, before it published twice a year. But what will come out - it's hard to say. 

Paleomir №9 in press now. You can download free pdf archival versions of this journal from the official site. If you can read in Russian, I am sure you will enjoy.

Website: Paleomir

To download pdfs http://paleomir.ru/journals.htm

PT interview

In the current issue #97 of PrehistoricTimes. PT interview with me written by Paul McFarland. 

Sea Creatures

I've just started to make some illustrations of Mesozoic fauna of Volga region for the next issue of Paleomir.

Work in progress.

Mosasaurs (Clidastes)

 Hesperornis (started a long time ago but paused)

Some works on the drawing board

Pterosaurs (I've not decided what species). Digital sketch in color.

Working on Demandasaurus

I started to paint the work for III International Contest of Scientfic Illustrations of Dinosaurs, 2011. I decided to depict some scene of Burgos fauna. This is the initial painting.

I think that it will take about two-three weeks to finish it.  I'd like to add some pterosaurs and ornithopods to the background.

Bitten ammonites

Скоро в Палеомире.
Coming soon in "Paleomir"

Ящеры Пинеги / Saurians of Pinega

Скоро, возможно в апреле, вместе с новым номером журнала "ПалеоМир" выйдет небольшая книжка (по формату - большая, альбомная) про раскопки пермских рептилий у деревни Морозница в Архангельском крае. Там нашли большое захоронение нижнепермских пеликозавров - казеид эннатозавров, которые ухитрились дожить до верхней перми только у нас (и, может быть во Франции).
Книжка из двух частей. Первая - с архивными фотографиями (ни одна нигде не публиковалась) экспедиции 1956 года (Вьюшков, Чудинов, Ефремов) и рассказом об этой экспедиции. Вторая - об эннатозаврах и пермском периоде: про палеоландшафты, реконструкции образа жизни по особенностям зубной системы и строения черепа на примере эннатозавра, чуток - про пинеальный орган, радиоактивное заражение костей и особенности захоронений тетрапод в бассейне Пинеги-Мезени. Там же - про "растительноядность" древних тетрапод. Вторая часть с моими иллюстрациями - реконструкции казеид (эннатозавры и котилоринхи), мезенских парарептилий (никтифруреты), пеликозавра мезенозавра, эдафозавра, лантанолании. До кучи - аннатерапсид, прорисовки некоторых костей, десятки разных зубов. Будет продаваться. Текст - А. Нелихова. Книжку читали и исправляли оплошности: Ивахненко, Шишкин, Голубев, Иорданский, Байкина, Наугольных, Жегалло.


Coming soon a small book (in the large format) about the excavations of Permian reptiles near the village Moroznitsa in the Arkhangelsk region.
The book has two parts. The first - with archival photographs (never published earlier) of the Expedition 1956 (leaded by Chudinov and Efremov) and the story of this expedition. The second - about ennatosaurs and Permian period: about paleolandscapes, reconstruction lifestyle of the features and the dental systems, about the pineal organ, the radioactive contamination of the bones and features of tetrapod burial in the Pinega-Mezen basin. Ibid - about "phytophagous" ancient tetrapods.

Cover

Europasaurus

Illustration for Europasaurus Paleo-Artwork Contest 

Depicted animals:
Europasaurus holgeri
Theriosuchus sp.
dsungaripterid pterosaurs

Elasmosaurus

Liopleurodon rossicus

 

Liopleurodon rossicus