#this is based on a triceratops design I made a few years back that has some newer speculative features

[selfindulgentraptor]

A silly little triceratops animation

[gale-gentlepenguin]

Gale Reacts: Masters of the Universe: Revelation episode 5

Spoilers below

TL:DR I was not crazy about it and if you did enjoy episode 5 and like the series. I recommend skipping this reaction/review

-So they host a little funeral for Orko. Yep, gotta milk all you can out of the character ya set up to die since his introduction. Well they gave Orko more respect than He-man. Good on Adam for being a decent human being. (I will stop being cynical about this)

-Well Preternia is cool.

-Moss man is the forest.

-Adam had the sword and he is like

-"Welp you are all stuck in heaven now."

-Andra is adorable. (Also side note. I havent really seen Andra and Teela be couple like since episode 2. Like where is the couple stuff? Evil-lyn and Teela have had more dialouge together?)

-Adam and Teela being awkward which understandable.

-And Teela is still salty. At least its fleshed out a bit more. But you would think she would be OVER this by now.

-King of Grayskull? Oh this will be cool.

-Hoverboards in Heaven!

-The tower looks cool.

-Hero is his name?

-Hero is shook by the split the sword.

-Andra making a forge.

-They competitive friends in the hunt!

-Well this is somewhat cute.

-OH S***! KING GRAYSKULL LOOKS EPIC! HE RIDES A TRICERATOPS!

-Adam chose that form? Like he could have taken his He-man form? But chose that one? Okay I am genuinely curious.

-King was the first Castle Grayskull champion. Wow okay. And the guy is now talking smack about the castle.

-I like feral sorcerer lady.

-So they made a heaven forge.

-the last bit of magic!

-Roboto is like "Yea I am not sure at all but I am gonna try." He is going to die too.

-So Teela and Adam moment.

-Adam has a point. He was dead. Not like he was like "Lol i am gonna die and make you feel bad" He was saving the Universe!

-Adam is totally gonna go back because he has unfinished business.

-Adam might not get back to paradise if he goes back.

-Mossman is a million years old. Lol

-Roboto is doing it.

-The forge scene is epic.

-Roboto gonna die.

-He did it though... and it blew up in his face.

-The sword is forged tho.

-But now Roboto is dead. And he made a roboto is afraid to die.

-Wow that is f***Ed up.

-Rip Roboto

-Adam wants to go back. Okay so now we will have Adam/He-man be a more prominent part of the show now. It took some time, but hey at least he is back now.

-Adam he is owning it up to it.

-Adam be a real one.

-What the s*** he almost died right after getting back. Okay so is that the fake out.

-And tech cultists.

-Welp Man-at-arms is here to defend. LOL

-Adam reveals he is back.

-Cringer missed him. (This was cute)

-So now they back to where he died. He about to do what they need to do.

-He be calling back the magic. Now it starting to feel like He-man again

-Sorceress is BACK BABY!

-And Grayskull looks good again.

-And... Adam got F***ING STABBED. Did, did they REALLY JUST KILL HIM TWICE?! I had this feeling like they were saying "You cant come back if you die again" But I thought no There is no way they would be stupid enough to kill him TWICE.

-So Skeletor survived by putting his essence into the staff Evil-lyn had and if she had left it all of this could have been avoided

-Evil lyn is back to being bad. Because Skeletor just came back. So much for all that development Lyn.

-Skeletor just called on the power of GREYSKULL. So can anyone do that?! Does this mean Skeletor can go to Preternia?

-Skeletor's form is... well it is something. I mean its cool. But... I dont really feel like its earned. Like I wish we had some foreshadowing or something. Like he is just like "BTW I was here the whole time just in case." Now if Adam was like pushed aside or like knocked back and Skelator took it so he could show off, that would be more He-Man like. Cause then you get the moral on WHY Adam chose this form in Preternia.

-Also Skeletor getting the power sword SHOULD be a much bigger and much more earned moment. This scene should have been like the penultimate episode before the final battle. Also him Stabbing He-man/Adam would have had way more impact if this was the first time they pulled this.

-But in all seriousness. Did they REALLY JUST KILL ADAM AGAIN!?

-They took all of that development and just... KILLED HIM AGAIN.

-Side note: if ANYONE could use the power, Why not just have he-man pass the torch to Andra or Teela. Because now Adam cant even chill in heaven. He is just a dying little flea who basically got set up to DIE AGAIN. Like the writers clearly do not like Adam.

-How am I suppose to be excited? Lol Skelator is back sure but he just killed He-man. Are they gonna do a fake out death? Have him Die but then get revived by the sorceress? Regardless its in bad fucking taste.

____________________________________________________________

2.5/10

Look, Skeletor's comeback was cool and all (He and the designs of King Greyskull are the reasons this isnt a 1 out of 10). But WOW they really did Adam dirty. I was expecting He-man in a show that is named after half his old show. Even the earlier trailers showed a bunch of him... but he only shows up in flashbacks after episode 1.

If Adam doesnt die, he will likely get heal in the nick of time and and die again later anyway. Considering how predictable the show is I can already predict that they will beat skeletor. Teela's Power that was hinted at in episode 4 will make her the new Sorceress and Andra will be revealed to be a descendant of King Greyskull thus making her the TRUE heir to Castle Greyskull an have her be the new champion or reverse of that where Teela is the new champion and Andra is the sorceress. If Adam does survive he will just be Adam at the end of the series and not He-man because whatever reason about him not actually feeling like He-man was him. But my bet is that they kill him again if he isnt already dead.

Which means that He-man just becomes She-ra. But there is already a She-Ra and it actually has She-Ra in the title. And that She-Ra actually has better writing in it because it actually cares.

Because lets face it this show was not about he-man. It was about Teela.

I know its called Masters of the Universe Revelation. But they should have called it Teela: and Everyone else dies.

But I seriously have to ask. WHO IS THIS FOR?

Its not for die hard He-Man fans because it kills off or changes all the characters they know.

It isnt for new fans because most of them would have no idea who any of these characters are. The show expects you to know them already.

It isnt for Feminists. Teela's characterization is a bad stereotype of written 'strong woman'. I made a comment that it was basically a 'Guy that tried to write a Strong woman character' but it is STUPIDLY ACCURATE at this point.

She-Ra: Princess of Power 2018 already exists and does it better.

If I had to make a bet. It feels like the writers were targeting the demographic that watched He-man and hated it, then writing a Salt fic about the characters after turning one of them into a self insert.

I hate that the writing sucks, because the animation is gorgeous, there are somethings that are really cool. In fact when they show off the ideas from the original He-Man, it looks amazing. Those flashbacks? They are the best parts of each episode.

Now I am no die hard fanboy for he-man. But I did like the 2002 show. I am actually chill with some of the changes made. Not all of them, but some. But I hate lazy and manipulative writing. Writing in a show purely for shock value.

The trailers they put out for this show were manipulative. Showing much more He-man then there was.

I wasnt expecting god tier level writing for this. This was based on a 1980's show. It didnt need amazing writing, it just needed to be good enough and show it cares about its fans. But it didnt.

Lets say we removed He-man from the equation entirely. make this its own thing. Change the names, alter a few appearances. Would that have changed my opinion.

It would make me less mad, but I would also still call it a bad show because the writing is generic at best. Its hackneyed and the characters with any appeal get killed off.

How am I supposed to be excited for this?

Do you know how angry this makes me. I WANTED to be hyped as hell for the fact that Skeletor has the power of Greyskull and is getting ready to be this super big bad for the end of the season. But I am not.

I just feel annoyed and disinterested.

Will I watch the other episodes if they get released?

I dont think I have the stomach for it. They would need to do a LOT to make me want to watch the other half.

[reversemoon255]

Toy Discussion: Expanding the Gimmick - A look at Super Sentai beyond the one year

I've hit a week where I have no toys to talk about and no model kits built. It happens, and was bound to when I started doing a weekly schedule. I've brought up "Expanding the Gimmick" on multiple occasions when talking about Sentai toys, and thought it might be fun to talk about that in more detail by designing one or two new toys for a certain year that takes the gimmick and expands upon it in ways the line never did.

You have to remember that each Super Sentai, and by extension each accompanying toy line, only runs for a single year before it ends. Even if the designers want to do more with their ideas they have a certain number of toys they can produce and a time frame to design and produce them in. It's a shame, because some years could be toy lines in and of themselves, and I'd like to talk about five years in particular that I think have potential for more toys outside of the handful we got.

1992: Iguanadon Zord/Guardian Beast Iguanadon and Mammoth Zord/Guardian Beast Mastodon

While it doesn’t have a gimmick, I wanted to talk about the toys from Kyoryu Sentai Zyuranger/Might Morphin Power Rangers S1 for one big reason: if we actually made toys this would be the season to start with. Zyuranger might not be the most well recognized season in Japan, but in the states MMPR is heavily iconic and any new unofficial product would garner more attention if based on this series. It's the idea of "let's make something popular so when we do something less popular we'll have some money to fall back on."

I had two toy ideas for new MMPR toys. My first idea was an Iguanadon Zord, which in the 90s was depicted as a bipedal, herbivorous dinosaur with spikes for thumbs. Nowadays, it's depicted a little differently, but in the spirit of things we're going to be going with the lumbering lizard interpretation. The toy itself would have a similar body-type to the Triceratops or Tiger Zords, with a folding tail, small hands that retract into the torso like the Tiger's rear legs, and large legs that are pushed up and pulled down directly into the body. I also imagine it being bright green because the Dragonzord is not.

It's certainly not the most exciting or original idea when compared to some of the others we'll be discussing, but it does present a new color and silhouette to an existing lineup. It's more a sampler of "here's something new,” and allows for variation and variety.

The second idea I had was for a Mammoth Zord. I came up with this one when trying to think up a way to have a sixth Zord combine with the Megazord in a non-conventional way with its existing engineering. While I don't have as clear a mental image of a transformation, I imagine it forms a punching or shield arm and that there's a triangular or trapezoidal wedge that unfolds from the bottom of the Mammoth that has the C-Clips necessary for it to plug into one side of the Tyrannosaurus, then have the Mastodon fold in and clip into the back of the cube and the Pterodactyl clip into the front to secure it (you could probably spin it 180° to plug it in either side). The Mastodon arms are capable of moving around 135° on their hinges, so it gives plenty of leeway for it to plug into something on that 135° extension from its origin, though it may sit forward in an odd way.

And to list off a few vaguer ideas; you could do more replacement Zords, like a different chest plate instead of the Pterodactyl (more visual variety), you could do something meant to combine with Titanus to make him even more armored or attempt to make him a Megazord, or maybe a large Zord that can split into three parts to form legs and arms for the Dragonzord without needing the Mastodon, Triceratops, or Saber-Tooth Tiger.

2005: MagiCyclops and MagiSagittarius / MagiKnight

On the other side of the ocean, Magiranger was extremely popular, and I've brought up several times that MagiKing is one of my favorite toys. It was so popular that it got an upgraded re-release long before Super Sentai Artisan was even in concept. So if MMPR is how you hit the heart of the western Tokusatsu fan, Magiranger might be the go to for the eastern fan.

However, unlike the Guardian Beasts, there is actually some expansion to be done here. Magiranger had two things going for it: interplay between toys and chest plates. When I was coming up with ideas for what toys could be done here, I decided it would be best to find a middle ground between MagiKing and FireKaiser. MagiKing is MagiPhoenix plus four other Zords that combine into a Dragon, and FireKaiser is MagiPhoenix plus a single Zord as a ridable horse. A middle ground would be two or three Zords that can combine together to form a head and body for MagiPhoenix to pilot.

I eventually came up with MagiCyclops and MagiSagittarius: two Zords that combine into a MagiKnight of sorts; a new torso unit for MagiPhoenix. In my head, MagiCyclops would have larger legs and would split apart like the Dragonzord/Dragon Ceaser to have them become arms, and have MagiSagittarius' horse half swing down and split to become the legs, with the torso either splitting as well or forming part of the spine. The twist I put on the interplay idea was to have MagiCyclops and MagiSagittarius not combine with each other to form a larger auxiliary Zord, but to have each of them combine with two of the MagiDragon Zords to form new combinations. MagiGaruda and MagiTaurus could combine with MagiCyclops to maybe make a Griffin, and the other three...I didn't get that far yet.

Part of the reason I want a new torso unit is because I'd like a new center chest piece for MagiPhoenix. While MagiPhoenix can combine with Travelion, it requires MagiFairy, the same chest center as MagiKing. That's fine, but I like how FireKaiser has a slightly different feel to its chest with the addition of a new center. It's, again, an issue of variety, or in this case lack of it. It's cool that you can change out the center of the chest to give it two different feels, but it'd be cooler if you had more options.

There are other things you could do with this line, too. You could have a new warrior-like Majinn with Cyclops and Sagittarius that could form another new chest plate any Magiranger Megazord could use. You could do new train cars for Travelion that form more weaponized limbs. You could do one or more Majinn that can combine with MagiKing in a more traditionally Sentai way. There's plenty of untapped potential.

2015: Dinomaru V2, Tankmaru, Soccermaur, and Racermaru

I really like Dinomaru. It's one of the most interesting remolds Super Sentai has ever done, talking an elephant butt and making it a dinosaur. It's really ingenious. But hear me out...what if instead of using Paonmaru, they used Dragomaru? And I know your initial thoughts might be that turning an elephant butt into a dinosaur is way more interesting than turning a dragon into one, but Dragomaru has two things going for it that would make it more interesting as a combining toy than as an individual one: it's also an arm, and it's not a standard robot combination.

When you look at all the auxiliary Otomonin (Paonmaru, UFOmaru, Surfermaru, and Dinomaru) they're all very similar in that they're interesting individual toys, but boring in terms of how they combine. Each just sits inside of Shurikenjin the same as Shinobimaru, and that would probably be fine if Shurikenjin Drago didn't exist. Drago is just so much cooler than the other four, changing the basic shape of the Megazord, adding new parts onto it, extending outside the confines of the seat; it does a lot the others don't, and it's a pack-in to boot. And the worst part is, they probably planned on doing more than they released, as Shurikenjin has a set of C-Clips on the sides of its legs that go unused in every combination.

So while I don’t actually want to make a Dinomaru V2, it’s a good example of missed potential in this line. The option to have a big, orange dinosaur arm would give Shurikenjin a bit more variety in its base appearance since all that ever changes between its combinations is its chest and head, and replacing the shield and sword with extra parts that would allow Shurikenjin Dino V2 to actually look like a dinosaur rather than a robot would make it a lot more interesting than it being just a standard robot like all the other Otomonin. It could even have two combined modes: one where it’s an arm and uses its shurkien head with Shinobimaru as a center, and one where its the center and changes the form of the robot (basically repeating Dragomaru’s play pattern). Ultimately what I feel the toys from Ninninger lacked the most is that variety in transformation.

For a few other ideas, what if you had a Tankmaru that had you fold up Shurikenjin’s legs, slap big treads on them, and hook a big cannon to the top of the shuriken? What if you had a Soccermaru that had a replacement piece to swap out for Wanmaru to give it a weaponized leg and new goalie hands similar to King Shurikenjin? What if you had a Racermaru where you just replace Resshamaru with a race car or have it hook into its sides with those aforementioned C-clips, and have Shurikenjin lean forward and grab handles or a steering wheel? Maybe even have a specific neck piece so it could look forward in that position. There are a ton of crazy and outlandish things you could do with this line, especially since the Zords from Ninninger have no defined theme other than some slight ninja-aesthetic-ing. And that’s not even covering new Zords to swap in for limbs, rather than the center.

2016: Cube Polar Bear, Cube Horse, Cube Whale V2, Cube T-Rex, Cube Brachiosaur, Cube Dolphin, Cube Doves, and Cube Ants

When I saw the first sketches for Cube Rhinos, I misinterpreted it for something completely different than the final product. I thought I saw a normal-sized Cube Animal that unfolded into a short rhino-themed car and that the trailer transformed into a cage that folded around Cube Rhinos, which would even match the themes of having a Ranger fighting against their own will and the constant use of “unleashing.” Ultimately that isn’t what we got, getting something a lot larger but more simple, but we can still take this idea and run with it.

Since we don’t want to re-use an animal, it’d be better to do an animal that fits the cage or carriage theme better, like a Cube Polar Bear or a Cube Horse. Have that Cube Animal be just like the others, but have it able to pull the trailer and utilize said trailer as its arms when it becomes an upper torso piece for a Megazord. I can even imagine how a Cube Horse might transform, with the outer edges of the cube being its legs, and having the four sides fold up onto the top of the cube to become an animal, which would also give it more height than all the other Cubes.

Then there’s Cube Whale, and while I like the idea of having a giant cube that turns into a giant animal or robot, it doesn’t actually look like any recognizable geometric shape. My idea for a Cube Whale V2 is a lot simpler, with instead of it being one big cube it’s three normal ones. If you stack the cubes together A-B-C you can fold out and transform all the necessary parts and have it become a whale, and if you stack them C-B-A it becomes the basis for a standalone robot, also allowing for interplay with the other Cubes. I would say we’d want to do a different animal, but I honestly can’t think of any other animal that’s that big, so our choices may just be a different special of whale, a giant squid, or something like a Brachiosaur.

Speaking of dinosaurs, that could be a cool idea for another Cube, making one that ends up being bipedal, like a Cube T-Rex, to give some more variety to the line-up, perhaps having the cube be oriented as a diamond like Cube Wolf so it doesn’t look like a square on stilts.

I’ve always wanted to do a Cube that transforms to be very tall as well, so if we don’t do a Cube Brachiosaur for the Whale V2 idea what if we made one a normal cube, but have an entire half or quarter of the cube be the neck, folding upward like Cube Lion, then have what would be the sides of that transformation chunk fold upward onto each other to form two halves of a head, giving it roughly 2.5x the height of the other Cubes.

It would also be neat to see a Cube that folds out to be long and skinny, like a Cube Dolphin, that has both the front and back of the cube unfold like Cube Shark, then have them fold down from the top to give it a more triangular shape.

We could also take a page from BeastBox’s book and do a Cube that separates into multiple animals, like a Cube Doves or a Cube Ants depending on how many you’d want.

As individual toys, I feel like Jyuohger has the most untapped potential of all the Sentai toys I’ve handled, just because the idea was so simple yet so clever. It was this line that got me excited about the aforementioned BeastBox, which is how I still manage to get that Cube Animal fix all these years later.

2017: Phoenix Voyager V2 Inspiration

I brought this up briefly at the end of the Zyuranger section, but I like the idea of a Zord that forms a large torso unit (the Dragonzord, PatStriker, GokaiGalleon, Go-Buster Ace) and there being a single Zord that replaces all of its limbs. This has happened once with KyutamaJin, the combination of Leo Voyager and Phoenix Voyager. I’ve reviewed it. It sucks. While the base idea is something I like, it required you to take the Kyutama from every other Voyager in order to make it, leaving them all useless and unable to form, say, Cerberios or Ryutei-Oh. The only thing I’d change is making it so that that doesn’t happen.

Now, do I want this to happen in Kyuranger? Probably not. I’ve brought up that I don’t like Kyuranger very much, though if someone actually made an unofficial toy like that I’d probably still buy it. I’d rather it happen with the other toys I mentioned.

Doing, say, a Zord to go with the Dragonzord in this style not only gives additional play value, but since it would most likely combine with it the same way the other Zords do, you could potentially swap them onto the T-Rex. Not to mention you could display the Megazord and Dragonzord Battle Mode together without doubling up on limbs.

For PatStriker, it would be easy to do another large, stylized vehicle, probably something different than what we’ve seen previously. I think a PatCopter might be the most fun, as you could turn the helicopter blades into one or two giant swords.

It’d be pretty easy to come up with one for GokaiGalleon, as you’d just need to pick a Sentai that doesn’t already have a toy in the line, most likely one from Go-Busters onward since they don’t have an associated Power. Honestly, given the existing play pattern, it might be better to make something to replace GokaiGalleon in a combination, as Kanzen Gokai-Oh is formed with GokaiGalleon, Goryujin, and Machalcon, but not the four original limbs. I would suggest either a Gokai Dumpmaru or a Gokai Good Striker since their forms would work well if modified.

Lastly, Go-Buster Ace could also use a single armor-up Zord. Since Tategami LiOh uses all the other Zords (including Ace’s sword), having something to boost its performance and give it a weapon would be fun. It’d be neat to do an actual Hippo or Puma Zord (referencing Doubutsu Sentai Go-Busters) that splits into 5 parts and a mask. The Hippo would probably have the correct mass for it, though I don’t know what an appropriate vehicle mode would be. Maybe a Tank or Drill Tank?

Again, these are just rough ideas, as to why there isn’t as much transformation in this section compared to the others, but it’s still an idea I’d like to see. There are several lines where not every one of the starting Zords is used in the final combination, and having Zords that utilize those Zords for the purposes of a completed display (kind of like what I did with my Jyuohger collection with the customs I did) is appreciated from a collector standpoint.

????: TyrannoCherry, AnkiIce, and MothLemon

Now, I know I said we’d only be talking about five years, but there’s one more thing I want to cover. A lot of this discussion is based on the unofficial Transformers market. If you don’t follow that market or don’t know about it, there are a lot of small companies out there that produce a variety of different products, be they upgrades, accessories, or full toys that work with or heavily resemble existing Transformers characters. However, one of the issues I have with this market is it’s heavily reliant on nostalgia. To my knowledge, there has only ever been one original character ever released, FansProject’s Steel Core.

I think this is a distinct advantage Super Sentai fans, as a market, have over Transformers fans (no offense), but because Super Sentai is a series that is designed to change yearly, we are more open to changes in aesthetics and design. Hence, original toys in the style of Super Sentai.

I’ve mentioned a couple times that my production company put forth the idea of doing a Sentai parody, then while my producer was doing research on his own also discovered Pepsi Man, which ultimately impacted the show’s direction. This project is now defunct, but I still have the concept sketches I did for the show, Kouryou Sentai Seisoger, a dinosaur and soda can themed Sentai. (I swear it’s not that weird; Kamen RIder has used soda cans at least three times.) I’d love to be able to one day make a (toy) scale version of the Megazord I designed for it, Soda King, as while it is still another dinosaur-themed robot I took quite a number of unique takes on the idea.

Soda King, as I designed it, is constructed of three Zords. Part of the overall design aesthetic is that all the Zords are cartoony and super-deformed. TyrannoCherry is a super-deformed T-Rex with cherries for eyes that are connected by a stem to form a head crest. It has large feet to counterbalance the weight of its enormous head, and the entire torso and legs form the legs of the Megazord combination, with the super-deformed T-Rex head becoming the entire torso (which was the inspiration for the super-deformed nature of the Zords in the first place). One additional feature I was pretty proud of was that TyrannoCherry’s jaw connection was a double-ended soda can, and you pop the pull tabs to expose the female connection points for the arms to attach.

AnkiIce and MothLemon are both pretty similar. They’re a blue Ankylosaur and a yellow Mammoth, again with super-deformed heads, whose heads swivel on a 90° axis to form shoulder pads as their bodies form arms. Each was also supposed to incorporate translucent plastic into their designs, with the spikes on AnkiIce’s head and back made of translucent blue plastic in the style of ice, and MothLemon’s ears being translucent yellow plastic made to look like lemon wedges.

I bring these three up in particular, not just to get a fun story out there and talk about a design I’m personally proud of, but also to bring up the point that, even if no one decides to ever produce any unlicensed Super Sentai toys, I’d just like more toys in the style of Super Sentai in general. It’s the reason I bought Solar Saver. It’s the reason I’ve still got my ear to the ground on those Giant Saver/Space Deleter/Rescue Engine toys. I just like this aesthetic and would like to see another take on it.

Think about it; what if there was a line in the style of Super Sentai that ran for more than a year? That ran for three or five or just always produced compatible or combining robots? I would be excited to see that.

Closing Statements

I’m a big fan of Sentai toys, and it’s sometimes sad to see certain lines end before they hit their full potential. I’d like to see more toys, whether they be official, unofficial, or just in a similar style. Did I have to write an enormous essay to get that point across? Probably not. But it’s just an idea I’m that excited about.

And I’m curious, you two or three people who read this entire thing, what do you think? Do you like or dislike any of my ideas? Do you have any of your own? I’d love to hear other people’s takes on this kind of thing. I’d also like to know if you’d like me to never do this again or not. Are there any topics you’d like me take a swing at on other weeks where I have no review material? I’d really appreciate some feedback.

[jurassicparkpodcast]

On the Set of Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom | Part One | Becoming A Production Designer

Recently, I had the opportunity to sit down and talk to one of the members of the crew who worked on Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom. Now I am sure that some of you may already be familiar with this person – as he has created an absolute storm on Instagram by sharing some fantastic behind the scenes pictures from the production of the film. I am of course, referencing Andy Nicholson – the Production Designer on Fallen Kingdom.

Andy was kind enough to lend me some of his time on a Friday night to talk about his work in the film industry, and his work on the set of FK. What follows will be some highlights from the conversation we had – offering some interesting insight into the movie making magic that goes into a Hollywood blockbuster like FK.

Now we started off talking a little bit about Social Media – which was cool. When talking about how Social Media and how our fan base influenced the production, Andy mentioned how: “Colin and JA are great at engaging with the fans and maintaining an online presence.”

Andy also discussed how the presence of fans, both on Social Media, and online, influenced the decision-making process for Fallen Kingdom. Small details were considered in great length as the production team knew fans would pick up on them: “When it came to the Ceratopsian Skull which takes centre stage in Lockwood Manor, we were quite conscious that it couldn’t be a Triceratops because it wouldn’t have been big enough to kill the Indoraptor. With that in mind, we created a new genus which was an amalgamation of 2 different Ceratopsians. In the film, all of the other skeletons in the Diorama have name plaques. We never showed one for our new-genus just to keep the online audiences guessing.”

Andy then touched on the piece of Set Design which took the internet by storm. Many of you may remember that when Main Street was first built Pua'ena Point in Hawaii, there was some discussion about the fact that the orange glass of the souvenir shop was still intact. Well, Andy touched on this during our discussion, saying that: “We had built the main street in Hawaii using the same construction team who had built main street in the first Jurassic World. I hadn’t arrived yet as I was still with the crew in the in the UK and they had built the souvenir tower intact as that was how they had left the set when it was filmed in 2015. The tower was never actually destroyed on set; it was destroyed in post-production. I remember getting an email from Colin letting me know that fans had noticed on this on some leaked photos! It was a while before we would be filming yet so we had plenty of time to fix it!

The tower was never actually destroyed on set; it was destroyed in post-production. I remember getting an email from Colin letting me know that fans had noticed on this on some leaked photos!

At this point we touched a little bit on the culture of people photographing while they were filming. Andy explained that while security was tight in the UK, the popular filming locations in Hawaii are easily accessible by the public and productions in Hawaii often have set photos leaked and shared on the internet. Drones especially can be real issue. Andy touched on the presence Jurassic had – particularly when shooting in Hawaii: “People knew we were coming months before we arrived. There are several, well-known & frequently used filming locations on Oahu, so people usually know when something is going on. Especially when you’re building something big -  our Main Street was 115M/375ft long!”

We then discussed my visit to some film locations – mentioning an article I had shared with Andy a few weeks beforehand about my time visiting the FK locations in the UK. He shared some interesting insight into the filming at Pyestock, and how that area had to be transformed for filming: “We had quite an unusual problem at that location. If you look back in the film, all the Palm trees which feature in that sequence are quite short. In the UK, you can hire Palm trees, which is what we did with a lot of greenery and plants. You can’t, however, hire loads of big Palm trees. To get around this we would usually import long Palm fronds from Morocco or Spain. They get shipped in, and you dress the tops of fiberglass tree-trunks to create Palms. When we were, filming Fallen Kingdom, however, there was a ban on importing Palm Trees due to a disease that was going around. All we could get were different, much shorter fronds which weren’t ideal.

Things like that can often happen on shoots though – and we had to do a lot for this sequence because we were building part of Main Street which hadn’t heavily featured in Jurassic World while also showing parts you were familiar with. We also adapted that whole section and worked with vfx as it would be to extended in CG afterwards. We shot the whole things using both a real helicopter and a dummy helicopter ‘buck’ on a crane – allowing us to get some tracking shots of the real helicopter. Our Special Effects department used a massive 15 metre by 15 metre scaffold water-sprinkler rig suspended from a crane in that sequence to create the rain, a lot of rain – Film rain has to be much more prominent than real rain so that you can see it on camera.”

Andy then welcomed me to ask him a few of my nagging questions about his time as the Production Designer on the film. As someone who has a passionate interest in the film industry and the different ways people can get into the roles they find a love for, I wanted to first ask Andy a little bit about how he got into the film industry – particularly in the artistic roles he finds himself in today.

“I studied Architecture at Brighton, and couldn’t decide what I wanted to do. I started by working for a small boutique design company on fairly exclusive houses, then I went into the other end of the industry in Canada, working for a big much more commercial company, working on multi story buildings and large scale land development schemes. I did this for a couple of years but ultimately decided that it wasn’t for me. Large buildings can take years to design and build and that just wasn’t a speed that worked for me!

In the early nineties there was also a real turn down in the Architectural industry. I came back from Canada and decided that I’d take a look at a career that I’d always been Interested in. I had some friends from College who had gone on to take a 1 year Production Design course at Kingston Polytechnic and I went to see their end-of year show – I loved what I saw! I was aware at this point, however, that I didn’t want to go back to College for another year! I found out that a lot of the group had been doing voluntary work at the National Film & Television School in Beaconsfield. It’s one of the only film schools in the world where you can go and study specific areas of filmcraft. So, when you receive an interview, you’ll be interviewed based upon an area which you are interested in – which can be anything from editing, directing or production design.

I turned up and looked around, not wanting to go back to college – but it wasn’t like that. They were making a lot of films, so they were always looking for a crew members to support the projects. I decided to put my name down on one of the crew volunteer sheets, and about a week later I got a phone call saying, ‘One of our films is going up to Scotland for two months – are you free?’. I was! I tried out the camera at first but the Art Dept looked much more fun so I switched. It was an amazing introduction to the industry especially as we were staying on location on the Isle of Mull. For a Student film, we built a lot of sets (19th Century Crofts, props and even improvised salmon ladders and diverted streams). It was October and the weather was brutal and Production notorious (two Film school vans were written-off and our Salmon ladder was washed out to sea by a cloudburst, never to be seen again) but we survived – with the help of Whisky!...I was hooked.

I came back and basically slept on the school film floor for six months, often staying overnight, working on whatever project needed a crew. They were all small projects, but I was learning a lot about what an art department does and I got a lot of hands-on experience which was beneficial. Through some of the established film-industry ‘mentors’ (who were regularly involved in projects). I made good contacts in the industry and was able to get work on smaller-scale productions like commercials and music videos, getting more experience with each job. It was really a case of building a portfolio, gaining experience and making contacts. My Architectural degree had given me a decent training in Architectural drafting, which is a lot of what an Art Department produces & meant that when someone asked me to draw something in an art department I could just get on with it. I think the first thing I ever drew for a movie was a set of wooden gallows. Eventually, I phoned the right person at the right time and became part the Art Dept for the 1994 production ‘Restoration’. I just carried on working in film after that. Once you start working, it’s very much about your quality of work and being recognised by other individuals within the industry. I worked my way up through the Art dept on different productions and different films. On Sleepy Hollow, I got my first opportunity to work as an Art Director. From there I worked on other big US Studio films until I was asked by Director Alphonso Cuaron to work as the Production Designer on Gravity, which was my big break, I even got an Oscar Nomination for my work, which was amazing!

I’ve been designing since 2010, and I spent about fifteen years getting there. I was lucky – I got there fast, but there is no easy way of doing it. It’s really all about the contacts you make and making sure that the work you do is memorable. And, of course – there is an element of luck to it too! The key thing to note is there is no direct in – there are new people who come from all different backgrounds but can come into the industry. The industry is incredibly welcoming of new people – as long as you’re talented, enthusiastic, listen and take a hands on approach to learning.”

So, that’s a look at how Andy got to where he is today – and it provides a lot of interesting insight into how the film industry works and how Production Designers work their way up from the roles of Draughtsman all the way up to those more senior roles. Make sure you come back and join us for the second part of our chat with Andy – where we will take a deeper dive into the world of Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom.

Whilst you wait for the second part – make sure to check out Andy’s website, and follow him on Instagram for more behind the scenes insight.

Written by: Tom Fishenden

[natiashakirkwood]

'Toroceratops' is BUSTED. Conclusively.

Q: I have heard that the Jack Horner theory about Torosaurus being nothing more than old individuals of Triceratops is getting a lot of pushback. Paleo King, what are your views on the theory, and what does the evidence actually say?   A: They are arm-waving. Horner actually has a pattern of doing this, it isn't the first time. Remember the “obligate scavenger T. rex”? Every piece of evidence Bakker, Currie, Weishampel, etc. looked at, Horner basically ignored or dismissed or even denied – even things as basic as eye socket shape – just to preserve his precious theory. Later Horner confessed that he “never liked T. rex anyway” (he was always primarily a duckbill specialist, whose best work was with the Maiasaura nests) and never took the “100% scavenger idea” seriously, he simply went on TV and made these claims because he wanted to stir debate and knock T. rex down a few pegs. But making an argument you know is weak simply to stir debate, is the most unproductive sort of debate there is. Paleo-trolling before there were tumblr and buzzfeed. You'd think his fans would have learned from that whole fiasco. Most of them don't even know it happened. Score? Hornerite groupies: 0. Horner: 1

As for the “Toroceratops” theory – although Horner (but moreso his former student John Scannella) actually published academic papers and piling up skulls on this new idea, unlike with the scevenging T. rex theory, the line of argument in the papers is hardly any stronger, and the piles of Triceratops and Torosaurus skulls he cites as proof, do not actually support his claims. The theory basically runs like this: Triceratops and Torosaurus are found in the same rock layers and general region, they look very similar, both have metaplastic bone in their frills indicating bone remodelling, hence “obviously” one must be a growth stage of the other. Except that there's no real conclusive proof for that argument. The fossil evidence in their papers is either circumstantial or not in support of their theory, and some of it is even heavily altered with plaster. The make conclusions about the skulls, which the skulls themselves actually contradict! Same can be said for much of their Pachy-stygi-dracorex theory, which makes a ton of assumptions based on casts, stress fractures, and artifacts of preservation rather than native features of the fossils, as well as for Fowler's "Haplo-Suuwa-Bronto-Diplodocus" faux-pas, where downright bizarre fictions like "weighted characters" and "selective parsimony" had to be invented to turn sauropods that are clearly NOT diplodocids into good little juvenile diplodocids (just ignore the fact that Haplocanthosaurus is also known from non-bifurcated adult neck remains too, right?).

Don't you get all bifurcated on me too now....

There's no way to prove that Torosaurus was simply an old adult Triceratops. There are some VERY irreconcilable differences and between the two, and some gaping holes and assumptions in their hypothesis - even if you use ontogeny to "rationalize away" some of the variation. How Jack Horner and his team can hope to bridge these holes in their theory, I honestly have no clue: 1. The changes required are too radical for an animal that is no longer juvenile and has no growing left to do in the postcrania. Such an extreme and late change in facial geometry is unknown in any ceratopsid. 2. Torosaurus is far rarer than Triceratops, too rare to simply be the same animal a few years older. 90% of Hell Creek's large herbivores are Triceratops, Torosaurus forms less than 1%. Some may argue that this is only because few herbivores survived to old age, or that older individuals were more vulnerable to be eaten rather than fossilized – but this is pure speculation, and reason # 4 forces us to discard this idea. 3. Torosaurus has many more epoccipitals than Triceratops - and not only that, their numbers are far more variable in Torosaurus (from 30 to 37), while Triceratops always has exactly 17 (except in elderly skulls where they are reabsorbed). Scannella at SVP claimed that "perhaps Triceratops split their epoccipitals in half to double the number" - something that I can only guess was tongue-in-cheek, since there is no specimen showing evidence for such "stud splits" in either Triceratops, Torosaurus, or any other ceratopsid, much less any dinosaur, period. It sounds even more ridiculous when you realize that Triceratops actually LOST frill studs as it aged, it didn't add new ones. Those near the bottom of the frill tended to disappear first, and in the most mature Triceratops skulls, all of them are gone. To add new frill studs would be a reversal of the entire Triceratops aging process. 4. Torosaurus has never been found in association with Triceratops. If they were simply aged Triceratops, they would realistically be found in the same herds/locations at least some of the time, especially if they were weaker than young adult Triceratops and needed the protection. This association has never been known to occur for Torosaurus. You just don't find them at the same dig sites as Triceratops. 5. Different head/body proportions, even discounting the frill. The Milwaukee specimen of Torosaurus [link] has larger skull (including jugals) than Triceratops, but much smaller postcrania. Doesn't make sense why an adult animal's individual bones would be smaller than those of a "juvenile". Of course Horner doesn't specify if his 30-footers are really juvenile Triceratops or middle-aged adults, he just claims Torosaurus are "old adults". Ok whatever. 6. Torosaurus is actually smaller than Triceratops. As in, the entire body except for the head, is smaller – every bone is smaller than in the most mature Triceratops. How can an “adult” of one species have a smaller body than the “young”, and even smaller limb bones, ribs, and vertebrae? (every postcranial element from Torosaurus indicates an animal 24 ft. long, not 30 ft. as in the most mature Triceratops skeletons! I know humans and some animals lose height as they age due to cartilage contraction, but shrink the femur, the ribs and the humerus? SERIOUSLY? These parts don't even have any metaplastic bone in Torosaurus, nor do they show any proof of bone reabsorption!) 7. Horner and Scannella have never done a histological age analysis on Torosaurus postcrania to actually prove that they are any older than the biggest accepted Triceratops specimens. This would be far easier than guessing age from the skulls, since as mentioned above, postcrania do not typically feature metaplastic bone or remodeling. Not that being older would actually prove that they're old Triceratops per se, but it would at least remove one huge logical impediment that stands in the way of Horner's theory being more accepted – on the other hand, a young age for these bones would nuke it. 8. Beak shape in complete skulls is radically different - Triceratops had a strongly hooked, recurved "eagle" beak, while Torosaurus has a much less curved "condor" beak that slopes downwards and forwards, the traditional Chasmosaurine beak design. The sloping “condor” beak is also present in Eotriceratops, which is otherwise far closer to Triceratops proportions than to Torosaurus – putting even more taxonomic space between them. 9. Nasal horn position (and snout/beak length ratio) differs between Torosaurus and triceratops. Torosaurus has shorter post-nasal-horn snout and a longer beak. No ceratopsian is known to radically change beak shape or beak/snout ratios when reaching maturity. 10. Even in very old Triceratops, Torosaurus-like features are extremely rare. The only Triceratops specimen that shows even remotely Torosaurus-like snout proportions and horns is the Torrington skull [link] , which is a very old adult with reabsorbed frill studs but NO fenestrae in the frill! This may be the most basal Triceratops morph, close to a fork with Torosaurus. Even so, the beak curvature is still not identical to Torosaurus. 11. There appears to be ontogenic variation within Torosaurus itself! [link] The Yale specimen, the MOR specimens, the Denver specimen and others all show a great deal of variation in epoccipital reabsorption and horn curvature - indicating that Torosaurus a unique creature that underwent ontogenic changes and growth stages of its own, and not merely a “final phase” of Triceratops. 12. There are other ceratopsids even closer to Triceratops (like Eotriceratops, Nedoceratops, and Ojoceratops) that don't fit comfortably in any part of Horner's ontogeny sequence. Nedoceratops is the real wild card, as Horner and Scannella claim it as proof of the Trikes aging into Toros - but while it has a few things in common with both, it fails dismally as a "midlife crisis" stage between the two, since it has a very odd mix of features that, taken together, make no sense in a Triceratops growth series. They are only found individually in Triceratops of completely contradictory age groups, and most of them are not found in Torosaurus at all. Nedoceratops has a very "perky" high horn angle completely inconsistent with the forward curvature of the horns themselves as well as the skull's advanced ontogeny, if one were following Horner's theory [link] to its logical conclusions. Its horns curve like an old Trike, but their bases are angled up and back like a baby Trike. It beak roughly follows Torosaurus (almost nothing else on its face does) and Eotriceratops, but is shorter than in either, and its frill is essentially a more compact version of Eotriceratops - far shorter and more compact than a Toro frill, yet obviously also older than many Toro frills, judging by its heavily reabsorbed epoccipitals. Its squamosals don't look like anything known in either Triceratops or Torosaurus. Horner and Scannella's nomination of this skull as an ontogenic “transition” from Triceratops-morphs to Torosaurus-morphs is laughable. There isn't a hint of Torosaurus in its short frill length, low epoccipital count, or steep horn angle, and especially not in the squamosal. There is also a second, larger skull that appears to be Nedoceratops - CMN 8862, which was once labeled "Triceratops albertensis". It has the same "perky" horns and the same short, upcurved, very un-Toro-like squamosal. Clearly this animal had a different ontogeny pattern as it grew than either Triceratops or Torosaurus. It likely branched off from the family tree sometime after Torosaurus and before Eotriceratops. 13. Fake plaster fillers are misleading. The beak of the YPM Torosaurus skull, as well as the horn tips and rear frill of some Torosaurus skulls and most of the Milwaukee specimen skull have been incorrectly reconstructed to look like Triceratops. Also the MOR skulls have a huge nasal boss in place of a horn, which is not consistent with anything seen in Triceratops, least of all the beak structure. It's actually a bit shocking how the most commonly pictured Torosaurus skulls have FAKE BEAKS and FAKE skull fullers in general that are modeled on Triceratops skulls, rather than more complete Torosaurus skulls - GetAwayTrike faithfully reproduces both the complete skulls and the fragmentary ones with fake Triceratops-mimic plaster fillers (recurved eagle beaks, short snouts, etc.), the differences are often extreme. Of course some of this error was probably due to lack of access to all the Torosaurus material, and earlier date of discovery/preparation with some specimens, but still... most of what you may THINK are correct Torosaurus orbital, snout, and beak features, are FAKE. Those that have a mostly complete beak, like ANSP 15192 and the far larger MOR 981, show a VERY different beak structure than in mature Triceratops. 14. The degree of cranial variation between Triceratops and Torosaurus is greater than that between many closely related modern bird, reptile, and mammal genera. Take antelopes as an example: ignoring the keratin horn sheaths, the actual skeletons and skulls that can fossilize are VERY hard to tell apart. There is hardly any cranial variation comparable to that between Triceratops and Torosaurus. Are we then to conclude that the Gemsbok is simply an immature Eland, or that the Springbok is an ontogenic stage of the Thompson's Gazelle? A better case could be made for using Horner's lumpery on these, than on Torosaurus, even though we clearly know these animals are not growth stages of each other. Impalas don't turn into Heartebeest, even though their bodies are basically the same design on different scales! There's a lot of diversity even in unhealthy human-damaged ecosystems. So even if the Maastrichtian faunas of the Rockies were doing badly in terms of diversity, it's doubtful that triceratops was the ONLY horned dinosaur there. The presence of Ojoceratops, Tatankaceratops, Eotriceratops, all of which are more Triceratops-like than Toro, further confirms this. 15. The raw morphometric data does not support lumping them. Farke, et. al. (2013) determined the changes required to "age" a Triceratops into a Torosaurus to be UNPRECEDENTED among ceratopsids, requiring addition of epoccipitals (frill studs), reversion of bone texture from adult to immature back to adult, and unusually late growth of holes in the frill. The Torosaurus specimens cluster together, separate from the Triceratops cluster on the morphometric plot. 16. Torosaurus has its own immature specimens. These, such as the ANSP skull, have a shorter and more upcurved frill that had yet to fully flatten out, and their beak shape, horn angle, and fenestrated frills are still clearly distinct from Triceratops of the same growth stage (or any growth stage for that matter). It's not so easy to claim that Torosaurus is the mature form of Triceratops, when it has its own juvenile specimens that are clearly NOT Triceratops. They even have high frill stud counts, just like the Torosaurus adults. Clearly these animals did not closely resemble Triceratops, even when less than half-grown. 17. Large parts of their ranges do not overlap. Juvenile Torosaurus were found in Big Bend National Park, Texas, which is conspicuously devoid of Triceratops material - though Ojoceratops is present in nearby New Mexico – a compact, short-faced and short-frilled animal, almost as different from Torosaurus as it is possible for a derived chasmosaurine to be. Ceratopsid faunas, it seems, were far more diverse than the plain one-genus badlands Horner would prefer them to be. 18. Many large Torosaurus are less mature than the most mature Triceratops. Most of the Torosaurus skulls, including the largest ones, actually appear to be ontogenically LESS mature than the largest Triceratops skulls. This is true both in terms of epoccipital reabsorption and the amount of metaplastic bone. The MOR skulls in particular are gigantic, but clearly immature, having young, well-defined epoccipitals/epipareitals and relatively small fenestrae, which may mark them out as a unique new species within Torosaurus itself. 19. Torosaurus horns typically look more like teenage Triceratops than mature ones. The most complete Torosaurus skulls all have relatively slender and typically straight horns, and some have a slight double curve - not the thick robust forward-curving horns of mature Triceratops. In fact the closest thing to a Torosaurus brow horn among most Triceratops is adolescents or young adults of Triceratops which have barely attained the double curve stage: [link] let alone the strong forward curve stage of mature Triceratops horridus and prorsus:[link] [link] In order to actually turn the most mature Trikes into Toros, you would have to actually reverse the changes in their horns - undo the mature forward curve, re-lengthen and re-straighten them and in some cases even re-add the double curve found in younger Trikes - all while the postcrania mysteriously shrink by 25%! What a completely unnatural and pointless waste of metabolic processes and resources. And it doesn't happen in ANY other ceratopsid known to man. So did mature Triceratops just straighten out their horns a SECOND time and make them longer and slimmer after having already absorbed the tips and thickened the bases [link] , reversing much of the normal Triceratops aging process, all to become Torosaurus? I doubt it. There's no "Benjamin Buttonceratops" in Hell Creek, we're simply looking at two genera where the ontogeny changes worked differently. 20. Mature Triceratops specimens actually appear to be shortening the frill, not lengthening it. This goes along with the fact that they were reabsorbing and in some cases losing frill studs, not growing extra ones. The frills of many old Triceratops skulls are, if anything, receding. This is especially the case with T. prorsus, but it appears in some old T. horridus skulls as well. MOR 004 (prorsus), SMNH P1163.4 (prorsus), TCM 2001.93.1 (horridus), and several others, have the forward-curved horns and reabsorbed tips of old individuals, but the frill is moving in anything but a Torosaurus-like direction. If anything, it's proportionally shorter and more compact than in the less mature large Triceratops specimens with double-curved horns. Once again, just like with the horns and frill studs, lengthening the frill or growing new frill in these mature skulls would actually be a reversal of the normal Triceratops aging process up to that point. Some T. horridus individuals like UCMP 113697 do have a longer frill, but still lack the fenestrae of Torosaurus, and the epoccipitals are long gone, with no hint of them re-emerging and doubling in number to "become" a Torosaurus frill edge. You can check out some of these skulls here; the original drawing is by GetAwayTrike; please do note that this diagram isn't strictly Triceratops skulls, it also throws in the type skull of Nedoceratops and a referrable skull from the Scollard formation (which predates Hell Creek and true Triceratops), albeit with the missing snout restored like a Triceratops, and also includes Eotriceratops from the Horseshoe Canyon formation and Ojoceratops from Ojo Alamo.

Torosaurus and Triceratops adults and juveniles to the same scale. They look really different as youngsters and even up even MORE different as adults. The frill is basically doing opposite things in both genera as it matures (extending and flattening vs. getting more upcurved and turning in on itself). Also note that even young Torosaurus had fenestrae in the frill, and that as adults, Torosaurus overall has a much larger frill than Triceratops, but a smaller face not counting the frill.

  The big picture beyond Horner and "Toroceratops": Why the "hyper-lumper" approach is probably WAY off-base Considering how much we know about both mammalian and avian biodiversity in recent ages like the Miocene, Pliocene and Pleistocene, and also given how much less terrestrial fossil material of any sort inevitably survives over time from older epochs like the Maastrichtian (and even less from earlier times), it may actually make the most sense to say that dinosaur faunas were MORE diverse and had MORE genera and species than we can ever possibly know - likely far richer and more diverse than mammalian faunas today, perhaps even more so than Pliocene and Pleistocene faunas. We just don't have as complete a fossil record when you go back into the mesozoic. Even so, recent discoveries have more than doubled the number of maastrichtian ceratopsids known. We're well past the point of "only Trike and Toro" in the US/Canada Maastrichtian time horizon, and any proper morphometric character analysis will show that there are a number of evolutionary steps between Torosaurus and Triceratops, which form their own unique genera. Nonetheless, the view is still far from complete. Some species have probably never had a single individual get fossilized, which isn't all that strange when warm-blooded species sometimes last for less than a million years. Or we may only get one skull from an entire genus, because geological processes may have jumbled the rock layers so much that we will never have access to more than that, either due to their destruction in these processes, or their being buried in inaccessible depths, with no surface hints of their presence. Now if that one skull happens to have some similarities with an already known genus, say, Triceratops (???), people will be tempted to gloss over the differences and lump it into Triceratops, even if some parts of it don't quite fit anywhere within known Triceratops populations and growth stages. But then, is it really an odd growth stage or an abnormal individual of Triceratops, or simply something else we don't properly understand yet? Then, when you actually find more growth stages and skulls of the new animal that show it's a unique genus with its own ontogeny pattern (like we now have with Torosaurus), what can you honestly say for a person who persists in denying its status as a separate genus or holding the clear differences to be one-off aberrations of no account? This might have been plausible when there were only one or two Torosaurus specimens known to science, but now there are over thirteen of them from different growth stages, and possibly comprising three different species (T. latus, T. utahensis, and "T. magnus", i.e. the MOR skulls). Insistence on lumping two genera together "because they both have metaplastic bone" really is pointless. As it is, metaplastic bone is not exclusive to any one genus or growth stage, and we're already over-lumping extinct specimens based on arbitrary standards that would make no sense to a biologist studying living animals. There is less difference between the skull morphs of cheetahs and jaguars than you get between Trike and Toro - but nobody is proposing to lump cheetahs and jaguars into the same genus - DNA cladistics finds no less than FOUR other cat genera separating them. The same phenomenon of morphological similarity "masking" generic diversity is found all over the place, whether in Birds of Paradise or in the host of antelope genera that cannot hybridize but look nearly identical when you get rid of the keratin horn sheaths (which would not fossilize). Of course you can achieve high morphological diversity in skeletons without genetic diversity, but aside from artificial selection by humans (as in the case of dog breeds) and a few extreme cases of sexual dimorphism, it's extremely uncommon in any vertebrates. We don't have DNA from dinosaurs, but if morphometrics are any clue, dinosaur paleontologists are lumping at a generic level, far more than they would be if such DNA existed. I am not suggesting we go back to having 16 species of Triceratops like in the 1950s (some of which were nearly identical to each other, and some of which were actually other genera like Nedoceratops). But on the generic level, things are definitely overlumped - something that even a good non-DNA-dependent analysis like Tschopp et. al.'s diplodocoid paper can expose very well. If anything, the mainstream view of dinosaurs is actually already overlumped, even without Horner and Scannella's antics. As cladistic science gets more precise and uses more and better characters (and weeds out coding errors better), this is already becoming more apparent. Giraffatitan and Lusotitan are no longer part of Brachiosaurus. Galeamopus is no longer in Diplodocus. Traukutitan is no longer part of Epachthosaurus. Isisaurus is no longer in Titanosaurus. Brontosaurus - all 4 or 5 species of it - is no longer in the Apatosaurus wastebasket. It's an open secret that Mamenchisaurus and Omeisaurus between them currently contain around 10 other genera that should be spun off. And it should be obvious that not every ceratopsid with metaplastic bone is a growth stage of Triceratops. And of course, that Kosmoceratops is NOT a juvenile Utahceratops (what happened in Vegas... lol).

Dude, we don't even have the same frill stud arrangement, never mind number...

Do we really believe that metaplastic bone only exists in one species, or in just one ontogenic stage for any given species? Heck, even if Trike and Toro had identical ontogenic changes in horn and frill shape as they matured, or even if one's ontogeny pattern appeared to neatly transition into the other's (they don't, not even close), the fact that they both have metaplastic bone throughout multiple growth stages proves NOTHING conclusive in favor of lumping the two together. At best, even if the ontogeny changes matched or appeared to dovetail, and even if we didn't have inconvenient things like the ANSP skull or the Big Bend Toro juveniles to sour the deal for the Hornerites, it's still possible that these could be no more than two related genera with similar growth patterns. Even very old ceratopsids have metaplastic bone in their skulls, it's not proof of immaturity or an upcoming radical change in head shape - and even then, you could probably make a far better (though still wrong) morphological case for lumping Eotriceratops or Ojoceratops into Triceratops (despite the geographic and time discrepancy) long before you get to Torosaurus. In many cases the metaplastic bone may have nothing to do with age, and far more to do with rapidly healing injuries and getting rid of infection (bone cells that naturally die rapidly and are replaced by new ones from below in a constant conveyor-belt cycle, are far less susceptible to infection - and we know these animals, with their vein-engorged frill bones, were just as susceptible to injury and possible infection from each other's horns as from a tyrannosaur bite to the face). Many of the irregular holes in "pathological" ceratopsid skulls of various genera and ages are bordered by metaplastic bone, did they ever stop and think what the connection was there? There's definitely a paper in that. So there are a lot more plausible alternate reasons for metaplasia that Horner and co. don't even address. Is their "Toroceratops" theory still possible? Sure, but the amount of contortion (both osteological and rhetorical) required merely to make it work also violates Occam's razor repeatedly. You'd literally have to ignore everything they didn't figure in their papers (even when they mentioned an inconvenient specimen in passing) and also ignore how ontogeny works in every other well-represented ceratopsid.

Get Away Trike! This is Toro time! Note that the T. utahensis material is smaller than most "teenage" Triceratops let a lone the older ones. The two MOR skulls have nasal horns and beaks unlike ANYTHING found in Triceratops - and they were still growing.

You want more details on Horner's lumpermania with Pachycephalosaurs too? Find it here and here. 'Toroceratops' is BUSTED. Conclusively. published first on http://paleoking.blogspot.com/feeds/posts/default

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Here Are The Latest Internet Memes Unearthed By Chennai's Anna Salai Cave-In

In a freak incident, a Metropolitan Delivery Agency (MTC) bus and a car plunged right into a large crater that spread out in the middle of the street in Chennai. A massive earth-hollow was fashioned at the center of Anna Salai, near Anna Flyover, around 2 pm on Sunday.

Consistent with the Instances of India, the cave-in becomes resulting from a metro tunnel-dull machine that was drilling under the ground a few meters away. The accident happened just 50 feet far away from an earlier cave-in that took place some days ago.

Soon after the incident, all metro work turned into quickly suspended and the police cordoned off the vicinity, diverting site visitors to a different path. No casualties were pronounced in the incident.

This is the primary time such an accident has happened in Chennai although metro rail paintings have been taking place due to the fact that 2009. We will use this as a learning enjoy and all precautions may be taken to prevent such incidents,” TN finance minister D Jayakumar turned into quoted as pronouncing through TOI.

Creative Internet Marketing Ideas

It might seem abnormal that creativity should play a component in any shape of advertising and marketing. advertising and marketing, in the end, is truly about selling services or products to clients in trade for money. How can this kind of down-to-earth activity in all likelihood have a creative aspect? Creativity, in fact, performs a major part in the commercial enterprise, mainly inside the sphere of internet marketing. The OED defines creativity as: “Using imagination or original thoughts to create something; inventiveness:” In case you are acquainted with the workings of net marketing the creative component of the business will become crystal clear within the light of that definition.

The 3 crucial phrases in the above definition are “imagination”, “original” and “inventiveness”. I would say that everyone three of them is of remarkable significance in innovative net advertising and marketing. The actual mundane bit of the business, the shopping for and the selling, might not include a whole lot in the way of creativeness, however, the manner that leads to the transaction clearly does. An internet commercial enterprise entails numerous of the innovative arts too, no longer simply one. So, permit me to draw your attention to a few innovative internet marketing ideas.

The visual arts play a role in many approaches.

Website design is a totally essential aspect of any online presence; it is the shop window. A good internet site welcomes visitors in and, ideally, continues them occupied for, as a minimum, numerous minutes. Hopefully, it’ll lead them to study the products and offerings on offer and incentivize them to make that all essential buy or opt-in.

Rebranding products beneath license also require innovative artwork. With a rebranding approach, a marketer can present a current product in a completely unique model, simply as supermarkets have their personal, so-referred to as, personal brands. Those are simply existing merchandise with the retailer’s personal label and packaging. internet entrepreneurs make a product their own with a state-of-the-art appearance.

The writing of A good, effective sales letter is an artwork form in its own right. There has possibly been more written about this subject matter than every other component of internet advertising. This is creative writing of a very expert kind. An amazing sales letter will excite the readers, tell the readers, engage and even entertain the readers. If you may maintain the reader worried on your copywriting via to the end of your letter without being distracted you are in with An excellent risk of creating a sale. This takes creativeness and technique.

There are regularly in strolling An online enterprise in which copywriting will become important.

Copywriting is a term which the dictionary describes as “the text of commercials or exposure fabric”. So, apart from income letters and internet site content material, we want to be similarly creative in our writing of emails, newsletters, promotional articles, eBooks, reviews and so forth.

There is greater specialized creativity involved with the making of video presentations for websites and other promotional cloth. These movies have come to be increasingly accepted within the remaining couple of years or so. Producing These requires but any other set of creative capabilities even though some of the software now to be had allows the technical elements to be effortlessly dealt with within the spare room at domestic. So, there are some of creative internet advertising thoughts and abilities which could greatly beautify any business.

Triceratops Fossil Unearthed in Drumheller (Alberta, Canada)

Scientists from the sector-famous Royal Tyrrell museum primarily based in the province of Alberta were expressing their exhilaration at the discovery of a partial Triceratops fossil skeleton, found simply thirty minutes power from the museum’s doors.

Triceratops is possibly one of the most famous of all the dinosaurs. The call way “3-horned face” as this tremendous, Late Cretaceous herbivore had two huge horns, one over each eye and a third, smaller horn placed above the naris. Even though there had been a number of Triceratops fossils observed in North America, in particular in the American country of Montana (the well-known Hell Creek Formation) and within the Canadian province of Saskatchewan, fossils of this specific genus of Ceratopsian are extraordinarily rare in Alberta.

Uncommon in Strata from Alberta

Maximum of the exposed Cretaceous strata in Alberta relates to sediments laid down among seventy-six million and 70 million years ago (including material from the Campanian faunal stage). Triceratops fossils are determined in strata laid down on the very give up of the Cretaceous duration (Maastrichtian faunal degree). The fossilized bones of this herbivore have been first noticed by means of a former Royal Tyrrell Museum employee at the same time as exploring part of the Drumheller Badlands not recognized for its vertebrate fossils. A group of field employees under the supervision of the Museum’s curator of dinosaur paleontology Dr. Francois Therrien was dispatched and after approximately a fortnight’s excavation, approximately 30% of the entire fossil skeleton changed into recovered.

A Litter of Fossilised Bones

The bones of this dinosaur were jumbled up, an end result of the stays of this animal being washed into a river and deposited in a slack a part of water. While buried, the strata preserved what has been described by means of scientists as a “log jam of Triceratops bones”. Some of the dorsal vertebrae are an impressive sixty centimeters tall with rib bones Even though cracked and damaged in places, drawing near two meters in length. A lot of the specimen has already been transported returned to the Royal Tyrrell Museum’s preparation laboratories, the fossil bones protected by way of subject jackets made of burlap and plaster. The most important piece to move turned into a single jacket measuring 2.5 meters with the aid of 1.3 meters and weighing greater than metric tons.

Understanding The Latest Trends in SEO

The website is taken into consideration as result oriented and fruitful if it has the quality to draw heavy traffic. In order to pull visitors at the internet site, it is obligatory that it need to be optimized regarding the parameters of the ships. The logic at the back of this is that you simplest get traffic if your internet site seems on the top of the searches with the applicable key phrases. The major part of the population is using the internet offerings a good way to seek services and products. They use key phrases while doing the hunt on the seek engine. As an instance, if you need to move for the dinner, then you will seek “great restaurant in New Delhi”. With this, the hunt engine will appear the list of various websites of the eating places which might be optimized for this particular key-word.

the hunt engine algorithms are changing each day. The reason at the back of this is that they need to provide actual statistics to the customers. To ensure this, they’re often updating their algorithms. The trendy algorithm updates of Google like Panda, etc are changing the conventional methods of Seo. According to the recent replace, SERPs like Google have reduced their updating timing. they may be now striving to bring fresh facts in the searches.

The Search engine optimization is split into categories: On Page Optimization & Off Web page Optimization.

The On Page optimization includes activities which can be completed at the internet site. These activities contain the inclusion of Page titles, photograph titles, meta tags, and outline. These are taken into consideration as essentials if you want to improve the rating of the website. If These essentials are not present, then the website will no longer be able to attract the search engines like google and yahoo bots. Thus, it will not get the top spot in the searches.

As Seo has changed, normal Search engine optimization professionals use new strategies to enhance the rating and visibility of the website. One maximum influential way of improving the rating is “keyword running a blog”. This interest serves two functions. One, it facilitates in updating the website with the clean content. Secondly, it enables in targeting the keyword and additionally gives the opportunity for internal link building. The bots also remember inter-hyperlinks at the same time as estimating the authority of the internet site. So, it’s miles considered as a superb step.

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New Post has been published on Webpostingpro

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Here Are The Latest Internet Memes Unearthed By Chennai's Anna Salai Cave-In

In a freak incident, a Metropolitan Delivery Agency (MTC) bus and a car plunged right into a large crater that spread out in the middle of the street in Chennai. A massive earth-hollow was fashioned at the center of Anna Salai, near Anna Flyover, around 2 pm on Sunday.

Consistent with the Instances of India, the cave-in becomes resulting from a metro tunnel-dull machine that was drilling under the ground a few meters away. The accident happened just 50 feet far away from an earlier cave-in that took place some days ago.

Soon after the incident, all metro work turned into quickly suspended and the police cordoned off the vicinity, diverting site visitors to a different path. No casualties were pronounced in the incident.

This is the primary time such an accident has happened in Chennai although metro rail paintings have been taking place due to the fact that 2009. We will use this as a learning enjoy and all precautions may be taken to prevent such incidents,” TN finance minister D Jayakumar turned into quoted as pronouncing through TOI.

Creative Internet Marketing Ideas

It might seem abnormal that creativity should play a component in any shape of advertising and marketing. advertising and marketing, in the end, is truly about selling services or products to clients in trade for money. How can this kind of down-to-earth activity in all likelihood have a creative aspect? Creativity, in fact, performs a major part in the commercial enterprise, mainly inside the sphere of internet marketing. The OED defines creativity as: “Using imagination or original thoughts to create something; inventiveness:” In case you are acquainted with the workings of net marketing the creative component of the business will become crystal clear within the light of that definition.

The 3 crucial phrases in the above definition are “imagination”, “original” and “inventiveness”. I would say that everyone three of them is of remarkable significance in innovative net advertising and marketing. The actual mundane bit of the business, the shopping for and the selling, might not include a whole lot in the way of creativeness, however, the manner that leads to the transaction clearly does. An internet commercial enterprise entails numerous of the innovative arts too, no longer simply one. So, permit me to draw your attention to a few innovative internet marketing ideas.

The visual arts play a role in many approaches.

Website design is a totally essential aspect of any online presence; it is the shop window. A good internet site welcomes visitors in and, ideally, continues them occupied for, as a minimum, numerous minutes. Hopefully, it’ll lead them to study the products and offerings on offer and incentivize them to make that all essential buy or opt-in.

Rebranding products beneath license also require innovative artwork. With a rebranding approach, a marketer can present a current product in a completely unique model, simply as supermarkets have their personal, so-referred to as, personal brands. Those are simply existing merchandise with the retailer’s personal label and packaging. internet entrepreneurs make a product their own with a state-of-the-art appearance.

The writing of A good, effective sales letter is an artwork form in its own right. There has possibly been more written about this subject matter than every other component of internet advertising. This is creative writing of a very expert kind. An amazing sales letter will excite the readers, tell the readers, engage and even entertain the readers. If you may maintain the reader worried on your copywriting via to the end of your letter without being distracted you are in with An excellent risk of creating a sale. This takes creativeness and technique.

There are regularly in strolling An online enterprise in which copywriting will become important.

Copywriting is a term which the dictionary describes as “the text of commercials or exposure fabric”. So, apart from income letters and internet site content material, we want to be similarly creative in our writing of emails, newsletters, promotional articles, eBooks, reviews and so forth.

There is greater specialized creativity involved with the making of video presentations for websites and other promotional cloth. These movies have come to be increasingly accepted within the remaining couple of years or so. Producing These requires but any other set of creative capabilities even though some of the software now to be had allows the technical elements to be effortlessly dealt with within the spare room at domestic. So, there are some of creative internet advertising thoughts and abilities which could greatly beautify any business.

Triceratops Fossil Unearthed in Drumheller (Alberta, Canada)

Scientists from the sector-famous Royal Tyrrell museum primarily based in the province of Alberta were expressing their exhilaration at the discovery of a partial Triceratops fossil skeleton, found simply thirty minutes power from the museum’s doors.

Triceratops is possibly one of the most famous of all the dinosaurs. The call way “3-horned face” as this tremendous, Late Cretaceous herbivore had two huge horns, one over each eye and a third, smaller horn placed above the naris. Even though there had been a number of Triceratops fossils observed in North America, in particular in the American country of Montana (the well-known Hell Creek Formation) and within the Canadian province of Saskatchewan, fossils of this specific genus of Ceratopsian are extraordinarily rare in Alberta.

Uncommon in Strata from Alberta

Maximum of the exposed Cretaceous strata in Alberta relates to sediments laid down among seventy-six million and 70 million years ago (including material from the Campanian faunal stage). Triceratops fossils are determined in strata laid down on the very give up of the Cretaceous duration (Maastrichtian faunal degree). The fossilized bones of this herbivore have been first noticed by means of a former Royal Tyrrell Museum employee at the same time as exploring part of the Drumheller Badlands not recognized for its vertebrate fossils. A group of field employees under the supervision of the Museum’s curator of dinosaur paleontology Dr. Francois Therrien was dispatched and after approximately a fortnight’s excavation, approximately 30% of the entire fossil skeleton changed into recovered.

A Litter of Fossilised Bones

The bones of this dinosaur were jumbled up, an end result of the stays of this animal being washed into a river and deposited in a slack a part of water. While buried, the strata preserved what has been described by means of scientists as a “log jam of Triceratops bones”. Some of the dorsal vertebrae are an impressive sixty centimeters tall with rib bones Even though cracked and damaged in places, drawing near two meters in length. A lot of the specimen has already been transported returned to the Royal Tyrrell Museum’s preparation laboratories, the fossil bones protected by way of subject jackets made of burlap and plaster. The most important piece to move turned into a single jacket measuring 2.5 meters with the aid of 1.3 meters and weighing greater than metric tons.

Understanding The Latest Trends in SEO

The website is taken into consideration as result oriented and fruitful if it has the quality to draw heavy traffic. In order to pull visitors at the internet site, it is obligatory that it need to be optimized regarding the parameters of the ships. The logic at the back of this is that you simplest get traffic if your internet site seems on the top of the searches with the applicable key phrases. The major part of the population is using the internet offerings a good way to seek services and products. They use key phrases while doing the hunt on the seek engine. As an instance, if you need to move for the dinner, then you will seek “great restaurant in New Delhi”. With this, the hunt engine will appear the list of various websites of the eating places which might be optimized for this particular key-word.

the hunt engine algorithms are changing each day. The reason at the back of this is that they need to provide actual statistics to the customers. To ensure this, they’re often updating their algorithms. The trendy algorithm updates of Google like Panda, etc are changing the conventional methods of Seo. According to the recent replace, SERPs like Google have reduced their updating timing. they may be now striving to bring fresh facts in the searches.

The Search engine optimization is split into categories: On Page Optimization & Off Web page Optimization.

The On Page optimization includes activities which can be completed at the internet site. These activities contain the inclusion of Page titles, photograph titles, meta tags, and outline. These are taken into consideration as essentials if you want to improve the rating of the website. If These essentials are not present, then the website will no longer be able to attract the search engines like google and yahoo bots. Thus, it will not get the top spot in the searches.

As Seo has changed, normal Search engine optimization professionals use new strategies to enhance the rating and visibility of the website. One maximum influential way of improving the rating is “keyword running a blog”. This interest serves two functions. One, it facilitates in updating the website with the clean content. Secondly, it enables in targeting the keyword and additionally gives the opportunity for internal link building. The bots also remember inter-hyperlinks at the same time as estimating the authority of the internet site. So, it’s miles considered as a superb step.