This must be probably one of the biggest debates (if not the biggest) about dinosaur appearence in popular culture and paleoart, a subject as old as the first Jurassic Park movie, and it seems like there are 2 very clear thoughts on it. While they do have different variations of each other, it seems like the debate has come down to this: do feathered dinosaurs look cool or dumb?.
Now, I have to warn you, this article contains my personal thoughts and I don't intend to insult or attack any posture in any way. If you agree or dissagree with me, that's perfecly fine.
1) The feathery side.
"Cassowaries are badass!" "Vultures look awesome" "You don't think birds are cool? look at an eagle and think again".
These are the kind of comments I find when talking about the subject, and they can variate their degree of support of the idea based on what they think is right.
Many of them are paleoartists, and they know how to draw dinosaurs and other prehistoric creatures. They are talented, good people who want the public to see other takes on their beloved, classic dinosaurs. Is not weird that many aren't fans of the Jurassic Park-styled designs.
But sometimes, they can go a little far, by saying things like "F*ck JP dinos!. They are awful, featherless monsters. Why they can't put feathers like a cassowary, they are far more scary!"
Certain site even said "Our T rex is much cooler than the T rex in Jurassic World. Instead of being scaly, it has feathers like a giant ratite (the large flightless birds like the ostrich, the emu and the cassowary). Instead of roaring at the top of it's lungs, it honks like a large goose. And instead of being a mindless killing machine of humans, is actually kind of a coward in front of humans. This is a far more interesting animal that the vintage, outdated, cliché JP T rex."
Well... I don't think so.
Many people that "defend" the feathers use cassowaries as examples. These birds are known to be pretty violent at times and they are known to injure and even kill people. It´s kinda like "don't judge a book by it's cover" kind of argument.
It is true that cassowaries are dangerous. But let me put this case. Let's take a person, any random person, and ask him or her "what is scarier, a cassowary, or a crocodile?". Most likely they are going with the croc.
Because, like a very intelligent person putted it:
Dangerous =/= frightening.
The same can be said for, well, many birds sadly. The fact that an animal is dangerous doesn't mean that is scary from an asthetic point of view. Dolphins are known to attack people, and they are not scary looking, in fact, they are quite the opposite.
So, are the "feather guys" wrong when they say that feathers are cool or scary? absolutely not. I'm going to get why later. But let´s see the oposite side of the argument. And I'm talking of course...
2) The scaly people.
They are in favor of the idea that feathers are "not scary, they look ugly or ridiculous", going to the extreme sometimes and say stuff like: feathers ruined dinosaurs. There's even people that direcly deny them and say: no, neither Velociraptor nor T rex had feathers! show me the evidence!.
When they get to that extreme, they should know that we have direct evidence that several species of dinosaurs had feathery integument (a fancy word for covering), to be more specific, scientists agree that all Coelurosaurs and some species of small Ornitischians had feathers, protofeathers, quills, fluff, fuzz, etc.. That evidence exists, wether you like it or not.
But let's put that aside, because we are talking by popular culture standards. Why do they dare to say something like that then? well, from my point of view, maybe is because they don't want to think of their beloved dinosaurs in a different way that they remember. And I can understand that. I used to be like that years ago. Thinking of a feathery T rex was almost Tabu for me. But today, I draw T rexes and raptors with feathers. But for them, maybe is very hard to admit that the T rex or the raptors didn't looked at all like they showed them in Jurassic Park.
But even if they are just ok with the dinosaurs presented in Jurassic Park, some still can't take dinosaurs seriously when they have feathers. Why?
Here is the part I'm most interested in. The question is not if feathered dinosaurs look scary or not, I think we should ask: How we can make feathered dinosaurs look scary?. Because that is the ultimate thing. Feathered dinosaurs can be scary... if you make them right.
3) The design is everything.
The job of a paleoartist is reconstruct a prehistoric organism following the evidence avaliable. Those reconstuctions are not meant to be scary, but natural.
"Cassowaries are badass!" "Vultures look awesome" "You don't think birds are cool? look at an eagle and think again".
These are the kind of comments I find when talking about the subject, and they can variate their degree of support of the idea based on what they think is right.
Many of them are paleoartists, and they know how to draw dinosaurs and other prehistoric creatures. They are talented, good people who want the public to see other takes on their beloved, classic dinosaurs. Is not weird that many aren't fans of the Jurassic Park-styled designs.
But sometimes, they can go a little far, by saying things like "F*ck JP dinos!. They are awful, featherless monsters. Why they can't put feathers like a cassowary, they are far more scary!"
Certain site even said "Our T rex is much cooler than the T rex in Jurassic World. Instead of being scaly, it has feathers like a giant ratite (the large flightless birds like the ostrich, the emu and the cassowary). Instead of roaring at the top of it's lungs, it honks like a large goose. And instead of being a mindless killing machine of humans, is actually kind of a coward in front of humans. This is a far more interesting animal that the vintage, outdated, cliché JP T rex."
Well... I don't think so.
Many people that "defend" the feathers use cassowaries as examples. These birds are known to be pretty violent at times and they are known to injure and even kill people. It´s kinda like "don't judge a book by it's cover" kind of argument.
You don´t think I´m scary? look at my claws, they want to say hi!.
It is true that cassowaries are dangerous. But let me put this case. Let's take a person, any random person, and ask him or her "what is scarier, a cassowary, or a crocodile?". Most likely they are going with the croc.
I´m not a cassowary, but I can crush your skull faster than you can blink.
Because, like a very intelligent person putted it:
Dangerous =/= frightening.
The same can be said for, well, many birds sadly. The fact that an animal is dangerous doesn't mean that is scary from an asthetic point of view. Dolphins are known to attack people, and they are not scary looking, in fact, they are quite the opposite.
So, are the "feather guys" wrong when they say that feathers are cool or scary? absolutely not. I'm going to get why later. But let´s see the oposite side of the argument. And I'm talking of course...
2) The scaly people.
They are in favor of the idea that feathers are "not scary, they look ugly or ridiculous", going to the extreme sometimes and say stuff like: feathers ruined dinosaurs. There's even people that direcly deny them and say: no, neither Velociraptor nor T rex had feathers! show me the evidence!.
Who would have thought that this kid in one of the best movies ever
made defined in 11 words the way of thinking of many dinofans.
But even if they are just ok with the dinosaurs presented in Jurassic Park, some still can't take dinosaurs seriously when they have feathers. Why?
Here is the part I'm most interested in. The question is not if feathered dinosaurs look scary or not, I think we should ask: How we can make feathered dinosaurs look scary?. Because that is the ultimate thing. Feathered dinosaurs can be scary... if you make them right.
3) The design is everything.
The job of a paleoartist is reconstruct a prehistoric organism following the evidence avaliable. Those reconstuctions are not meant to be scary, but natural.
This beautiful drawing made by the talented Emilly Willoughby
is a very accurate reconstruction of a Velociraptor. It doesn´t look really scary
(unless you are a small mammal), because it wasn't meant for that.
But when talking about designing a creature for a movie or a tv show, you have to think different. Unless you are making a documentary about dinosaurs accurately, you have to change the real animal in some ways. Even modern animals in movies are exagerated. So when making a dinosaur for a movie, a work of fiction, instead of thinking "How did it really looked'" think of "how can I make it look accurate and cool". How boring would have been Jurassic World if the raptors of the raptor squad only did things that animals in captivity do, like sleeping all day? yeah, that would have been awesome to see.
It's for one the behaviour. As long as you depict the animal as a powerful and dangerous predator, you would have that base, but it isn't enough. A scary movie villain has to reach to the audience and leave an impact on them. You have to design it like a predator would look. Then is when feathers come to the subject. And some designers just fail on an enormous level.
Because the movie wasn't awful enough, the bluejay-mylittleponny-T rex from dinosaur island
looks completly ridiculous with that colour choice. Imagine a lion coloured like this,
do you honestly think is going to be able to stalk it´s prey like that? this piece of s**t is dead in
a week.
I´m really glad the raptors didn't end up looking like this, because
not only is innacurate, but the design of those feathers looks way too silly to be taken seriously by a filmmaker.
But there are some legitimaly cool feathered dinosaurs. They CAN look cool and scary with feathers, but that takes composition, direction and focus. Of course, what something looks "cool" is an entirely subjective thing, but if I had to pick a dinosaur that was scary looking for a movie, I would pick some of these.
This updated jurassic park/world t rex made by one of my favourite paleoartists, Fred the Dinosaurman, is a great example of how a t rex can look awesome with feathers.
If they decided to put feathers on a Velociraptor in Jurassic World 2, this would be a great design
choice.
Another drawing made by Fred the Dinosaurman, this time a Yutyrannus. And holy s**t, this one
isn't scary... is f***ing terrifying!
This doesn't count as a dinosaur species, it's a fictional theropod
made by Alexanderlovegroove for #buildabetterfaketheropod. But it's still a pretty
good example of how to make a scary looking feathered dinosaurs. Just look
at those lifeless eyes, so awesome.
This Utahraptor pack, made by Julius Csotonyi (also one of my
favourite paleoartists) is very interesting. The large utahraptor in the center
has a great facial expression that looks really cool, another great part
on this awesome piece.
So the next time you see a comment on Facebook or Youtube saying "Feathered dinosaurs look silly!" or "the Jurassic Park designs are terrible, is much better a very fluffy T rex, like a chicken", tell them "Feathered dinosaurs can look cool, you just need to know how to make them". And if you don't care to listen to the 200 comment debate that is going to happen, just turn off the notifications, it helps a lot.
Thanks for reading, comments are apreciated, and I'll see you next time. Bye.
