Various Images of Aquiline

I know that Aquiline has not much to do with pure palao-illustration but this is my reality. I got into palao-illustration because of my alter-ego called Aquiline. I wanted to create a world for him and it has to be believeable. Also, I think this is a great opportunity to boost public awareness of Australian palaeontology! :-) I think people are smart enough to tease apart mythology and truth. Afterall humanity has always needed a legend to make sense of reality. Aquilin is an Imperial Diallonyx (Diallonyx melanofelis imperialis). Being what he is, his relationship with Reddiegonians and the Kadimakara which are the extinct animals of Australia are quite complicated. For every palaeo-illustration I might do nine drawings of Aquiline.

The two drawings above show Aquiline with Rose, the person I am roleplaying with on My Space (http://www.myspace.com/mistyvaleintheforest). The uppermost image is of Aquiline sitting on a rock. I could not concentrate on it so much because I was really supposed to be studying for that Environmental geology exam. I was really focused on how the claws would grip the rock. I was full of tension that day and this is how I release it. I've had a brainwave lately and figured out how the phalanges are positioned under the flesh of the paws. I think it's actually quite similar to possums. The one below that shows Aquiline taking off. He has wings that are quite like swift's wings. At rest they are housed in pouches whose intterior is located in a different dimension. That is why they are not visible when a Diallonyx is on the ground.




These are various pictures of Aquiline's face. It can be difficult to draw him because his face can so easily look vicious but yet there has to be a hint of kindness to him. I suppose the best place to put this is in the eyes. Here you can also see a little picture of the head of a Muttaburrasaurus langdoni. I really like this animal, I think it has equine grace. I look forward to working on it more. You can also see the skeleton of a drawing of a person on the left.



Here I was trying to illustrate the very odd shape of a Nothosaurus to a friend. I could not really remember it well and I've put the wrong number of temporal holes in it's skull. I didn't have any reference at the time, I was on an Environemental geology field trip. That was the most depressing trip I went to. We went to the Strahan and saw the King River delta. It was totally dead. There was no sign of life anywhere and it was totally silent. Everything had been killed by the toxic acid mine drainage and the entire area was covered in a moonscape of tailings orange due to the rusting of iron. There was not even a single bird call or a scrap of algae. n some places an unknown white substance oozed out of the ground like pus from a wound on the face of the Earth. I really hated that subject.

In this picture, on the right, you can also see a top view of Aquiline's head comeplete with his whiskers.

My Lecture Folder Scribbles

Ah ha! Now we are getting closer to the core of the psychology of why I do palaeo-illustrations. These drawings are ones I did on the front inside cover of my binder folder that I use to take notes from my lectures. I've had it since I was in grade eight but I was drawing in my lesson notebooks back then. My grade nine maths book is basically an alphabetical treatise on Diallonyx! But that is probably a story for another day if someone wants to hear it.

When I started to go to university I had no lecture books but I do have binder refill paper, which many of my scribblings on ruled paper have been done on. The inside of the folder had a plain white paper liner. Now that blank whiteness was just too tempting, so naturally it has been covered in drawings! Most of these were done during 2006-2007 and generally I guess you could say that it tells the tale of the relationship between Psycorn and Diallonyx. You could say that Psycorn is a Dragon but that is not really an accurate description for what he is. He is a being composed of plasma, super-heated gas. Pure energy. Hence they are often known as "plasma beings." Plasma beings are very ancient and most believe that they have been around since the Big Bang itself. They are also very insecure because they don't have a well defined barrier between themselves and external reality like we do. They don't have cell walls or skin. For this reason they often hide in planets so their energy doesn't dissipate so easily. The plasma being that took up residence in Earth underwent massive trauma when a foreign body approximately the size of Mars collided with the earth 4 billion years ago. The earth was blasted to pieces and when it reformed it had a moon. The plasma being was also split into pieces that took up residence in different parts of the planet. Here they started to feel threatened by the presence of each other and started to fight because each thought the other was trying to steal its energy. After some time they discovered the uses of genetic modification and started to manipulate animals to fight each other with. The Diallonyx melanofelis species complex is the animal that Psycorn toys around with. Prodraco reddiegoniensis is the plaything of Flickertongue, the other major plasma being in the Reswobian universe (not pictured here).

On the bottom of the page is the dicynodont, Kannemeyeria. Dicynodonts were therapsids or mammal-like reptiles that lived during the Permian and Triassic Periods, a time span between 298 and 205 million years ago. The name dicynodont means "two-dog-teeth." This comes from one of their defining features which is what resembles a pair of fangs on the upper jaw in the position canines would be on a dog. In this case they were on either side of a beak. They are believed to be herbivores and the "canines" or tusks were used to root around for tubers or other subterreanean plant foods. They could have also been used for fighting or defense against predators. Kannemeyeria has been found in South Africa, Argentina and India and in 1985 a quadrate bone was recovered from the early Triassic Arcadia Formation of south-east Queensland showing features similar to Kannemeyeria. This is truly a Gondwanan genus. :-) I find the therapsid body plan a bit akcward to draw at the moment. Their stance is semi-sprawled and they have rather peculiar shoulder pectoral girdles that I can't quite figure out yet. I need to do more research on these animals.

In the bottom left hand corner you can see the skeleton of a therapod dinosaur. This is the framework over which I reconstruct the animal.




This is the back of the folder's inner cover. It is really a lot of random thoughts with a small Dromornis that you can see in the left hand side of the picture. On the far right is the framework of a Diallonyx that I didn't complete because I wasn't happy with it. The legs felt wrong to me.

Tasmaniosaurus triassicus

This beastie is the oldest archosaur known from Australia. Actually his remains were only found a short distance from the university where I study everything I desire with the exception of palaeontology! Tasmaniosaurus was probably the top predator of its time in the Triassic swamps of Hobart. In appearance it would have probably resembled a crocodile and I have modelled its flesh on saltwater crocodile soft anatomy. I was probably about a metre long and had a similar lifestyle; feeding on the amphibians and heavily scaled fish of its environment. It is believed to be a member of the Proterosuchidae and thought to be a relative of Chasmatosaurus that inhabited Africa and China.

I did this drawing with the possibility that I may have to get into contact with John A. Long, a well-known palaeontologist in Australia who works the Devonian Gogo Formation near Broome in Western Australia. At that point I didn't know where to go for my Honours Project and doing the drawing helped me digest my thoughts. I have several of John Long's books and I did this drawing based on a reconstruction of a skull I found in his Dinosaurs of Australia and New Zealand and other animals of the Mesozoic Era.