Understanding Dinosaurs

An Introduction

I like drawing dinosaurs. I have loved dinosaurs since I was a child and my mother ran a small exhibition of animatronic dinosaurs in the local mall. I never grew out of it. My passion for leaning all their names bled into a need to learn everything I could about these ancient beasts that once roamed the earth millions of year ago.

My passion, however, never became serious enough to lead me into a career of science. Part of me still regrets that. But as I grew up, I knew, my life had to be dedicated to art. Not the big idea, artist-statement filled, kind of art. Perhaps something more simple and basic. So, while I am not a scientist, and I am not even a professional paleoartist, I do love to draw and paint dinosaurs. I have devoted much of this year to painting dinosaurs and other prehistoric creatures. But as I explored these ancient animals and my love of their variety and complexity, I realized there was more I could do to share my deeper love of paleontology. Most people I talk to about dinosaurs know the names of the standard few that we all grew up with. Stegosaurus, Triceratops, T. rex. But explaining to someone that I am working on painting feathered therapods, or why pterosaurs are not dinosaurs, they seem to get a little lost.

So I am writing this series of articles. Collectively, I am calling it, Understanding Dinosaurs, as I hope that it allows others some basic understanding of what is and isn't a dinosaur, and some of the many groups they can be divided into.

Much of this series was inspired by Keiron Pim's Dinosaurs: The Grand Tour, which is an amazingly laid out overview of hundreds of dinosaurs. It is one of the best general studies of dinosaurs in a single volume that I have read and I cannot recommend it highly enough.

I hope the information in this series, as well my own illustrations, will help enlighten others to the vastly interesting world of the dinosaurs. 

For more of my paleoart, or to order prints of my work, check out my online shop at Redbubble: 
Jeff Powers Illustration Shop