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markwitton.bsky.social
Palaeoartist, palaeontologist, author, documentary consultant and creature designer. Not necessarily in that order. More about me at markwitton.co.uk.
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My advanced copy of King Tyrant has arrived and, wow, @princetonupress.bsky.social did an amazing job turning my ramblings and scribblings into a great looking book! Very excited for you all to see it yourselves in May. #tyrannosaurus #paleontology #paleoart #dinosaurs #fossils

submitted 1 day ago • 5 comments

Fresh out of the oven, some new #paleoart for #FossilFriday: mother Coelodonta antiquitatis hurries along her offspring, Bort, who spent too long looking for a personalised novelty licence plate on the mammoth steppe. "Come along, Bort!", she says. #fossil #Iceage #paleontology

submitted 2 days ago • 5 comments

For #valentinesday and #FossilFriday, here's Tyrannosaurus engaging in face biting, a behaviour evidenced from numerous tooth gouges and puncture wounds in their skulls. Among living species, face biting is strongly correlated with the onset of sexual maturity, so this image is love-adjacent, sorta.

submitted 9 days ago • 8 comments

Things are hotting up for the increasingly close release of my next book: King Tyrant: a Natural History of Tyrannosaurus rex. We now have preview content for a few pages, showing off the text, diagrams and #paleoart. Full book comes out in May! #FossilFriday press.princeton.edu/books/hardco...

submitted 9 days ago • 5 comments

Happy #HornbillsDay! Here's some Malabar pied hornbills from our trip to Sri Lanka. @markwitton.bsky.social #birds #Hornbills

submitted 9 days ago • 0 comments

Large manuscript on the history of #Megalosaurus #paleoart resubmitted today after a round of peer review. It's a big paper - over 40 formatted pages - where I go on and on about some of my favourite old-timey paleoart, like John Martin's 1838 The Country of the Iguanodon. What an awesome image.

submitted 10 days ago • 2 comments

Iguanodon was named 200 years ago today, so here's (AFAIK) the first time it appeared in #paleoart: an 1833 watercolour/pencil study "Reptiles Restored, the Remains of Which Are To Be Found in a Fossil State in Tilgate Forest, Sussex" by George Scharf. That's Iguanodon on the left. #Sciart thread...

submitted 13 days ago • 5 comments

From 2019, #paleoart of the asteroid-induced tidal wave that crashed into the southern coast of the United States at the end of the Cretaceous period. It's probably not shown large enough here, even though it dwarfs the giant titanosaur Alamosaurus. #sciart #paleontology #extinction

submitted 13 days ago • 7 comments

The Jurassic Coast Trust is shutting up shop. This is sad news. I've worked a lot with the JC in their mission to promote the amazing geological heritage of Britain's south coast, hopefully Dorset and Devon councils will continue these efforts. www.bbc.co.uk/news/article...

submitted 15 days ago • 4 comments

From 2019, for #FossilFriday, here's a flock of Jeholopterus wheeling and whirling around the early evening air for Jurassic midges. Anurognathids like this were among the most unusual of #pterosaurs, a result of whole-body specialisations to insect hawking. #paleoart #sciart

submitted 16 days ago • 2 comments

Full details are now up for the in-person launch event for the book Palaeontology in Public - This will be at the KCL Strand campus in central London on Saturday 22 March, 14:30-19:30 More info and a sign-up form is here, if you would like to attend: forms.office.com/e/dsKYteTD1B

submitted 16 days ago • 2 comments

New #paleoart to accompany a new paper on the skull of Vegavis, a Mesozoic bird that seems to be closely related to modern waterfowl, pushing the ancestry of modern birds into the Age of Reptiles. Link to paper: www.nature.com/articles/s41... #sciart #dinosaurs #birds #evolution

submitted 17 days ago • 5 comments

Looks like our chapter on Spinosaurus in the media will be out of date within a few months, @tattersdill.bsky.social. But when the Spinosaurus looks like _this_, we may have got out at the right time. (I mean, isn't the _real_ Spinosaurus awesome-looking enough?)

submitted 18 days ago • 12 comments

Painting nodosaurids today: here's one I made earlier (2023), the Late Cretaceous European genus Stuthiosaurus. We don't know much about this species but the spines on the hips are notable, apparently being welded to the sacral shield. Drawn for @palaeogames.bsky.social. #paleoart #dinosaurs #sciart

submitted 18 days ago • 0 comments

For #FossilFriday, here's some #paleoart of a casual afternoon in the Early Cretaceous Wealden group, with iguanodonts, tyrannosauroids, polacanthids and sauropods making a mess of a watering hole. The mashed-up muds left by these animals can be found to this day in Wealden rocks. #dinosaurs #sciart

submitted 23 days ago • 5 comments

Attended a great panel at @morethanadodo.bsky.social this evening about the amazing new Dewars Farm tracksite. Well done to @dremmanicholls.bsky.social, @djemurdock.bsky.social @kirstymedgar.bsky.social and @lukeemeade.bsky.social for informative answers to heaps of audience questions!

submitted 24 days ago • 0 comments

We'll be having the online launch for Palaeontology in Public on Tue 18 Feb 18:00-19:30 UK-time It will feature comments from Mike Benton, Riley Black, Natalia Jagielska and Alison Laurence, & discussion with some of the chapter authors More info & signup link here: forms.office.com/e/gpWburvZPk

submitted 26 days ago • 3 comments

My poster on the life appearance of Megalosaurus, as presented at SVPCA 2024. A paper on this, and the history of M. reconstructions, is currently in the system and should (hopefully!) be published later this year. Posting this in the interim as a poss. useful #paleoart reference. #Sciart #dinosaur

submitted 26 days ago • 13 comments