Adobe CS5 - Part 131

2 06, 2012

Celebrating the Queen’s Diamond Jubilee – A Special Event

By Mike|2024-04-22T14:11:26+01:00June 2nd, 2012|Categories: Adobe CS5, Everything Dinosaur News and Updates|0 Comments

The Dinosauria over the Last Sixty Years

Over the next few days a number of events are being held around the United Kingdom and the Commonwealth to celebrate the diamond jubilee of Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth II, who has been the queen for sixty years. The queen’s coronation was held on the second of June 1953, but she actually ascended to the throne a year earlier on the death of her father, King George VI. At Everything Dinosaur, the challenge was how to create a banner for placing on our website celebrating the occasion and how to incorporate palaeontology and specifically dinosaurs into the theme.

Everything Dinosaur

Everything Dinosaur – Diamond Jubilee Banner

A Royal occasion with one or two dinosaurs.

Picture credit: Everything Dinosaur

To return to Everything Dinosaur’s home page: Visit Everything Dinosaur.

For example, if the queen reigns for another three years and one hundred days or so, she will become the longest reigning British monarch, passing Queen Victoria who reigned from 1837 until 1901. It was in the reign of Queen Victoria that the word Dinosauria was first coined. Richard Owen (later Sir Richard Owen), used the phrase “fearfully great lizards”, otherwise referred to as “terrible lizards” to establish a new Order of reptiles – the dinosaurs.

More different types of dinosaurs have been discovered in the reign of Her Majesty the Queen than in the reign of any other British monarch. In fact, more dinosaur species have been named and described in the last sixty years than in the previous one hundred and fifty years.

The dinosaur featured on the banner, wearing the Union Jack bowler hat and holding a Union Jack flag is a Proceratosaurus. This dinosaur was chosen at it was named and described in the year her Majesty was born (1926). The fossils of this dinosaur were found in England (Gloucestershire), this is the county where two of the queen’s children Prince Charles and Princess Anne have their royal residences (Highgrove House and Gatcombe Park). Proceratosaurus is believed to be a member of the tyrannosaur family (Tyrant Lizard Kings), appropriate to have a tyrannosaur on a banner celebrating a royal occasion. In addition, this dinosaur although discovered in England, was named by a German palaeontologist, our Royal family (the house of Windsor) are of German descent.

Proceratosaurus Celebrates a Royal Occasion

Theropod enters into the party spirit.

Picture credit: Everything Dinosaur

Let’s hope the weather improves and that the forecast rain does not occur so that the diamond jubilee celebrations can proceed under clear, blue skies.

Hope everybody has fun. Congratulations your Majesty.

To return to Everything Dinosaur’s home page: The Everything Dinosaur Website.

26 05, 2012

Helping to Make an Unusual Graduation Card

By Mike|2023-02-01T13:41:18+00:00May 26th, 2012|Categories: Adobe CS5, Everything Dinosaur News and Updates|0 Comments

Providing Assistance to the Parents of a Graduate – Quetzalcoatlus

Our team members tend to get a lot of emails and letters, we try our best to respond to all those that require a reply. One of the more unusual requests for assistance received by Everything Dinosaur involved a graduate, geologists and azhdarchid pterosaurs.

Everything Dinosaur

Genny Marcus Haskins has just graduated with a degree in Wildlife Conservation – our congratulations to her. Her parents, Sue and Roger are both geologists. When Genny was born, instead of a stork being depicted on cards announcing the birth of their daughter, Sue and Roger decided that it would be more appropriate to illustrate Genny’s arrival with a pterosaur carrying their little bundle of joy in its jaws, rather than the traditional stork.

Graduation Card

When Genny graduated from high school, a geologist/artist friend revised the non-stork/pterosaur image providing an updated picture of a flying reptile. As Genny aged, so pterosaurs evolved – that was the general idea. So when Genny graduated with her degree, it was necessary to find a picture of another, later type of flying reptile and the Quetzalcoatlus, one of the last of the pterosaurs (Maastrichtian faunal stage), and one of the largest known was selected.

Genny’s Unique Graduation Card

Keeping up with the evolution of the Pterosauria.

Picture credit: Everything Dinosaur/Sue Marcus and Roger Haskins

The picture above shows the graduation card that team members at Everything Dinosaur helped design. We were happy to help out these geologists from overseas, although we are not sure how we managed to have a Velociraptor photographed lurking behind the card, with all the dinosaur toys and games we have, we suppose that this was always going to happen. Still Genny is in no danger, she can always escape by taking to the air.

Glad to have helped out, from all of us at Everything Dinosaur, good luck with the job hunt Genny.

In the meantime, visit Everything Dinosaur’s award-winning website for replicas of pterosaurs and dinosaurs: Pterosaurs, Dinosaurs and Prehistoric Animal Models.

14 05, 2012

Unusual Requests sent to Everything Dinosaur

By Mike|2023-01-31T22:09:15+00:00May 14th, 2012|Categories: Adobe CS5, Everything Dinosaur News and Updates|0 Comments

How to Fly on a Pterosaur

At Everything Dinosaur we get lots of emails, letters and drawings from people with an interest in dinosaurs and prehistoric animals. We do our best to respond to them all, helping where we can and supplying information and advice. We get a number of what might be regarded as rather unusual requests, usually related to dinosaur toys and games for example, Susan from Virginia (United States), contacted us yesterday with a plea for help.

Everything Dinosaur

This is what she wrote :

“My husband and I are both geologists, so, when our daughter, Genny, was born, we had a friend/colleague do a cartoon of a Pterodactyl (instead of a stork) bringing the baby. When Genny graduated from high school, he managed to paste her head on a later (more evolved, get it?!) version of a pterosaur. After many gray hairs on our part, she has just graduated from college. She has no interest in becoming a geologist, though she’s become accustomed (or maybe inured) to my humour. I would love to have her announcement card showing her riding the Quetzalcoatlus (she selected the image she liked).”

Having selected an image of an azhdarchid pterosaur – the Quetzalcoatlus that was one on display at the Everything Dinosaur on-line shop, Susan then had the problem of creating the image of her daughter riding the flying reptile.

Although our team members would be the first to admit that they are not experts at Photoshop CS5, but yesterday evening they had a go and produced the image below which they then emailed over to Virginia.

Flying A Pterosaur – Graduating to Success

Image created for Susan by Everything Dinosaur team members.

Picture credit: Everything Dinosaur

Congratulations to Genny for graduating and we wish Genny and her parents every success. Now back to our dinosaur toys and games.

To view the extensive range of prehistoric animal models and figures available from Everything Dinosaur: Dinosaur Models and Replicas.

11 05, 2012

New Papo Baby T. rex Models

By Mike|2024-04-22T14:21:40+01:00May 11th, 2012|Categories: Adobe CS5, Dinosaur Fans, Everything Dinosaur Products|3 Comments

Baby T. rex Models from Papo by Everything Dinosaur

The new Papo baby Tyrannosaurus rex dinosaur models have arrived at Everything Dinosaur. These are the last of the tyrannosaurids to be added this year by the French manufacturer who have introduced a total of four T. rex models into their “Les Dinosaures” figure series.

The Papo Baby T. rex Models

Baby T. rex models from Papo.

Picture credit: Everything Dinosaur

Papo Baby Tyrannosaurus rex

As well as a new brown version of their standing T. rex model, Papo introduced a “running T. rex” replica, both these models came out in February, the babies; or should that be hatchlings, are the latest additions along with one more model, a large replica of the sauropod Brachiosaurus due to be launched in July.

Like the adult T. rex models, the babies have articulated lower jaws, although the mouths do not open as wide as with other Papo figures. As these dinosaurs have been sculpted looking up, perhaps seeking food or protection from a parent, team members at Everything Dinosaur used their photoshop skills to have our newest recruits to the Papo model range studying the Everything Dinosaur logo.

Papo prehistoric animal models: Papo Dinosaur Models and Figures.

Dinosaur enthusiasts can now re-create their own version of the new Tyrannosaurus exhibit at the Los Angeles Museum – they can create their own family of tyrannosaurs with these exciting and beautiful Papo replicas.

A spokesperson from the award-winning, mail order company Everything Dinosaur stated:

“We are delighted to receive these two Tyrannosaurus rex models into stock. The models are the same sculpt but the colour schemes are different. We have a green baby T. rex and a brown baby T. rex.”

8 05, 2012

Happy Birthday Sir David Attenborough

By Mike|2023-01-30T07:30:05+00:00May 8th, 2012|Categories: Adobe CS5, Animal News Stories, Everything Dinosaur News and Updates, Famous Figures|0 Comments

Many Happy Returns to the Naturalist and Broadcaster

Today, May 8th is the birthday of Sir David Attenborough, the naturalist, broadcaster and keen fossil collector who has done so much to popularise Earth sciences and a fascination with life on Earth, both extant and extinct. We at Everything Dinosaur, would like to wish Sir David many happy returns for the day.

Sir David Attenborough

Happy Birthday Sir David Attenborough

Still enthusing about the natural world.

Picture credit: Sir David Attenborough/Everything Dinosaur

Many of our team members have been inspired by Sir David’s enthusiasm and energy. We wanted to create a special tribute to him and as we are getting better at using the software programme Adobe CS5, we created a special banner on the Everything Dinosaur website which has been posted up today honouring the great man. We have had the pleasure to be able to write reviews on a number of books that accompany the many television documentaries that feature Sir David. Only the other week, we set about trying to discovery the whereabouts of the book “Life on Earth” which accompanied the 1979 seminal documentary series narrated by Sir David and made in conjunction with the BBC’s natural history unit. This book has gone missing from our office library and we have instigated a search around the offices and the warehouse to hunt down our copy.

One of the most influential television series for us, was not the “Life” series of programmes that established Sir David as the voice of natural history programming in the BBC, but a little known, short series called “Fabulous Animals” first broadcast we think in the mid 1970s. In this programme, aimed at children, Sir David enthused about mythical creatures and the fossils that inspired the legends and myths. For many of us, our fascination with all things Dinosauria came into being at this point. The programme was broadcast in the summer holidays, mid-morning and although a distant memory for most of us these days, it remains a favourite amongst us.

Sir David’s Birthday Banner online at Everything Dinosaur

Celebrating the birthday of Sir David Attenborough.

Picture credit: Everything Dinosaur

Having covered the main Kingdoms and Phylum of the natural world, Sir David’s work stands as testament to the broadcasting qualities of the BBC’s natural history unit. Hopefully, “Life on Earth” will be broadcast on terrestrial television once more, in the near future, giving us a chance to watch all over again an example of this extraordinary body of work which Sir David has dedicated a life time to creating.

From all of us at Everything Dinosaur – we wish Sir David Attenborough a happy birthday.

Visit Everything Dinosaur’s award-winning website: Everything Dinosaur.

1 03, 2012

St David’s Day – Dragons, Dinosaurs, Facebook and Solving Problems with the Post Office an Important Update

By Mike|2024-04-23T06:49:57+01:00March 1st, 2012|Categories: Adobe CS5, Everything Dinosaur News and Updates|0 Comments

The Start of Spring?

Today, March 1st is, St David’s Day, and according to some sources the first day of Spring. It may feel a little spring-like as we observe the frogs in the office pond cavorting about and certainly if we check the office barometer we can see that we are indeed in for a spell of relatively settled weather. However, today most of us have not being going around with a “spring” in our step.

St David’s Day

Firstly, we wanted to celebrate St. David’s day (patron saint of Wales), by putting up some pictures of dragons that we saw at one of the Welsh schools we visited recently. Unfortunately, the pictures of a some beautiful, red Welsh dragons made by the pupils have been put somewhere in our office and we can’t find them – whoops. This in the Chinese year of the dragon as well, how unfortunate, still here is a picture of a dragon-like creature, an illustration of the pachycephalosaur Dracorex.

A picture of a dragon-like creature. An illustration of a Dracorex dinosaur.

Picture credit: Everything Dinosaur.

It may not be quite a dragon, but it gives us the excuse to post up a dinosaur illustration.

Today, has been fun as far as getting to grips with our new Facebook format is concerned. As from the end of this month, all Facebook pages will automatically change to a new layout. Just when we were getting to grips with this site, the format changes and we have to learn some new things – deep joy.

We have managed to put together a new cover as requested, not brilliant photoshop work but hopefully visitors to the Everything Dinosaur Facebook page won’t be put off too much by our limited CS5 skills.

Facebook Cover – Everything Dinosaur

Everything Dinosaur on Facebook.

Picture credit: Everything Dinosaur

To visit Everything Dinosaur’s Facebook page (please give our page a “like”), that would be brilliant: Everything Dinosaur on Facebook.

Feel free to visit our Facebook page, we post up various snippets and other bits and pieces, such as product pictures, updates on research, new models, links and so forth, just look up Everything Dinosaur on Facebook.

Hopefully, things will be back to normal for the Post Office tomorrow, we will wait and see.

Visit Everything Dinosaur’s award-winning website: Everything Dinosaur.

22 01, 2012

Tumbling Dinosaurs – New Dinosaur Soft Toys

By Mike|2023-01-25T20:27:35+00:00January 22nd, 2012|Categories: Adobe CS5, Everything Dinosaur News and Updates, Everything Dinosaur Products|0 Comments

Soft and Cuddly Tumbling Dinosaur Soft Toys

Hand-crafted and very importantly sponge washable dinosaur soft toys. Say hello to Triceratops in his bright orange livery, part of a trend this year that sees the introduction of some particularly colourful Triceratops soft toys. Joining our “Trike” as we like to call him, is a happy Stegosaurus and a bright red T. rex.

Dinosaur Soft Toys

These new soft toys are super soft, very cute and have proved very popular on test with our young, budding palaeontologists.

Dinosaur Soft Toys – Dinosaur Tumblers

Cute and cuddly cinosaurs.

Picture credit: Everything Dinosaur

To view the soft toy dinosaurs and other examples of prehistoric plush available from Everything Dinosaur’s user-friendly and award-winning website: Soft Toy Dinosaurs and Prehistoric Animals.

Aimed at children from 3 years and upwards these super soft toy dinosaurs with their cute faces inspired team members at Everything Dinosaur to create a Valentines day card (see picture above). Bright and colourful they make an excellent addition to a young dinosaur fan’s soft toy collection especially when the young dinosaur fan may be also an enthusiastic collector of Cuddlekins dinosaur soft toys.

15 01, 2012

The Juvenile Dracorex – An Exclusive Illustration

By Mike|2024-04-22T14:04:46+01:00January 15th, 2012|Categories: Adobe CS5, Dinosaur Fans, Everything Dinosaur News and Updates|0 Comments

Adding a Juvenile Dracorex Dinosaur to the Safari Ltd Picture

After having carefully modified the Safari Ltd picture that was sent to us so that it depicted a more accurate Late Cretaceous scene, we added for extra affect an image of a juvenile Dracorex. It is likely that these members of the Pachycepahlosaurini (bone-headed dinosaurs) lived in small groups and younger members of the herd, sub-adults and juveniles probably stayed close to the adults for protection. It is also highly probable that these young animals would also have looked different from the older, more mature herd members, so we set about creating an image of a juvenile Dracorex using the Safari Ltd image of the Wild Safari Dinos Dracorex replica as a template.

Juvenile Dracorex

The Mum and Baby Dracorex

Creating our mum and baby Dracorex image.

Picture credit: Everything Dinosaur

Changing an Adult Dinosaur into a Juvenile

First of all we reduced an image of an adult Dracorex in size. We could have “morphed” the body a little to give the juvenile a bigger head and larger eyes in proportion to the rest of its body, as seen in actual fossils of baby dinosaurs that have been discovered, but for the time being we kept the body shape roughly the same shape as the adult. We could use the Wild Safari Dinos Dracorex dinosaur model as our template.

Next, we toned down the orange colouration of the throat and the face, assuming that only adult, mature animals perhaps those old enough to breed or to exert some sort of social dominance over other herd members would develop such colourful markings.

The large crests, bumps and horns on the naris around the eyes and at the back of the head were removed, again the presumption was that such skull ornamentation was probably only present in older animals and these features would become more prominent as the youngsters grew. The raised scutes, along the flanks and running down the back-line of the adult replica were also removed.

We placed the image of the juvenile in close proximity to the adult Dracorex image, so that a comparison between the two could be made (ontogenic differences) and also to give a sense of scale. As stated earlier, juveniles probably stayed close to the older members of the herd for protection from predators.

So there you have it, Everything Dinosaur’s impression of a juvenile Dracorex, all we need now is more fossil material ascribed to this pachycephalosaur genus so we can see how wildly inaccurate we were!

To view the Safari Ltd range of prehistoric animal figures: Dinosaur Figures (Safari Ltd).

14 01, 2012

Adding a Juvenile Dracorex to the Safari Ltd Picture

By Mike|2023-01-25T15:32:25+00:00January 14th, 2012|Categories: Adobe CS5, Dinosaur Fans, Everything Dinosaur News and Updates, Everything Dinosaur Products|1 Comment

Working out what a Juvenile Dracorex Might Look Like

Yesterday, we published a couple of images of new models by Safari Ltd. The 2012 product catalogue produced by this American company depicted a scene with one of their new Wild Safari Dinos models – Dracorex very prominent. We commented on this picture and changed the original pterosaur image from a Rhamphorhynchus which lived during the Jurassic, replacing it with an image of the Carnegie Collectibles Quetzalcoatlus, which is more in keeping with the Late Cretaceous, the time when Dracorex lived. We decided to modify the image and add a juvenile Dracorex to the scene.

Juvenile Dracorex

We mentioned that it would be interesting to try and re-size an image of the Dracorex replica, alter the colouration slightly and then re-insert into the artwork so that a juvenile pachycephalosaur could be included. Using our limited photoshop skills, team members at Everything Dinosaur set about altering the picture so that a young dinosaur could be depicted.

The Safari Ltd Picture with a Juvenile Dracorex

Adding a baby pachycephalosaur to an image.

Picture credit: Safari Ltd/Everything Dinosaur

As well as re-sizing the model and placing it in the foreground to emphasise the impression of a much smaller animal, we have toned down the bright throat colouration. The assumption here is that only mature adult animals would have such striking colouration, an indication of their maturity and potential to breed. The horns and other skull ornamentation have also been removed from the model that we have tried to depict as a young Dracorex. It is very likely that such crest, bumps and horns were only present in fully grown individuals. It is a testament to the quality of the models made by Safari Ltd that with a few simple touches, a juvenile dinosaur can be depicted and added to this picture showing the Wild Safari Dinos Dracorex dinosaur model.

To view the range of Wild Safari Prehistoric World models and figures: Safari Ltd. Prehistoric Animal Models.

13 01, 2012

Showing Off some of the New Safari Ltd Dinosaur Models

By Mike|2023-01-25T15:29:05+00:00January 13th, 2012|Categories: Adobe CS5, Dinosaur Fans, Everything Dinosaur News and Updates, Everything Dinosaur Products|1 Comment

A Flock of Dracorex Comes this Way

It is always interesting to see how manufacturers display their models in their catalogues. Not only is there a great deal of attention and care given to the design process, but the same attention is lavished on the models when it comes to displaying them in the company brochures. Take for example the new additions to the Wild Safari Dinos range made by Safari Ltd. There are four new replicas being introduced into this popular line this year, and the company has found a novel way of highlighting the New Safari Ltd dinosaur models. The new dinosaur figures are Acrocanthosaurus, Vagaceratops, Ceratosaurus and Dracorex, all these models are eagerly anticipated by Everything Dinosaur team members. The colourful Dracorex model is shown in a skilfully crafted scene in the Safari Ltd product catalogue. A flock of these Pachycephalosaurs (or should that be a herd), is shown crossing a river with a pterosaur flying overhead.

The Safari Ltd Catalogue Image – Dracorex

A flock of Dracorex crossing a river. A novel way of highlighting new Safari Ltd dinosaur models.

Picture credit: Safari Ltd

Safari Ltd Dinosaur Models

Scientists believe that dinosaurs such as Dracorex did live in groups and the scenery chosen by the designers at Safari Ltd is reminiscent of the sort of habitat in the Late Cretaceous where these bone-headed dinosaurs would have lived. The only slight issue we would have with this artwork, is the depiction of a Rhamphorhynchus pterosaur flying overhead. The Rhamphorhynchus is a model in the Wild Safari Dinos replica range, it is a very beautiful item in its own right. Unfortunately, this type of flying reptile is associated with marine deposits from the Middle and Upper Jurassic. No rhamphorhynchoid pterosaur ever flew over a group of Dracorex, this type of flying reptile was long extinct before the dinosaur known as Dracorex evolved.

We have altered the original image, and replaced the Rhamphorhynchus with a model of Quetzalcoatlus, a pterosaur known from the Late Cretaceous, which is more in keeping with the geological time period associated with Pachycephalosaurs.

The Dracorex Image as Modified by Everything Dinosaur

Prehistoric animals from the Late Cretaceous.

Picture credit: Everything Dinosaur/Safari Ltd

Perhaps with a little more time, and a little more skill we could scale down one of the images of the Dracorex, change the colouring slightly, losing the bright red throat patch and then insert into the picture a representation of a juvenile dinosaur following the adult animals in the herd.

To view the Safari Ltd range of prehistoric animal models and figures: Prehistoric Animal Models and Figures (Safari Ltd).