Love in the Time of Chasmosaurs

Episode 27: Donnasaurs and Dempseysaurs (Featuring Matt Dempsey)

As the summer fades and the leaves start falling, nothing better but to sit and listen to the latest episode of the LITC podcast. Marc, Niels and Natee discuss a favourite from the early 90's: Donna Braginetz' brilliant Dinosaurium, the dream museum in book form. In a not dissimilar vein, Marc and Niels interview Matt Dempsey, whose musculoskeletal dinosaur reconstructions are a great help to palaeoartists everywhere. Lots of discussions about tyrannosaur legs, ornithiscian quadrupedality and Jurassic Park abound.

What does Peak 90's look like? How can you tell a corn snake from a milk snake? Can a T. rex look too good? Will there ever be justice for Tenontosaurus? All this and more in episode 27.

 

Show Notes At Chasmosaurs.com

Episode 26: The Burian Episode

For episode 26, we’re crossing a big one from our list: The work of the legendary Zdeněk Burian, as it appears in 1972’s Life Before Man. Surely, this book is worth an entire episode, so we’re foregoing the interview this month. Niels, Natee and Marc discuss not only the art of the Czech master, but also his life, his beliefs and his enormous legacy. How did Burian get around reconstructing dinosaurs when he had no access to any fossils? Is romance dead in today’s palaeoart? What can we learn from Burain’s portfolio in the modern day? Will Marc be able to type “Petrodactyle” without AutoCorrect ruining his day? And will Niels be able to pronounce it properly?

 

Show notes at Chasmosaurs.com

Episode 25: Prehistoric Planet 2: Electric Beelzebufo! (Featuring Gabriel Ugueto)

We're back! After a few months' break, the podcast resumes with a Prehistoric Planet 2 special and welcomes the return of palaeoartist, Gabriel Ugueto, who can finally tell us more about his role as concept artist on the series. We can wax lyrical forever about the show, and nary a soul can stop us.

 

Show notes at chasmosaurs.com!

Episode 24: Roby’s Roars and Troco’s Tricks (featuring Emiliano Troco)

Our guest this episode is Emiliano Troco, a modern 'old master' whose traditional paintings evoke the imagery of the flowering of early 20th century palaeontology. Our Vintage Dinosaur Art title is Dorling Kindersley's The Ultimate Dinosaur Book, another of those formative publications released in the same year as Jurassic Park, and one which can quite justly claim to have then lived up to its name. Can Niels resist making a Slam Dunk joke? Can Marc resist referencing Jurassic Park and vintage dinosaur toys all at once? Can Natee resist breaking into Carrollean verse? Can Troco resist flying into a berserk rage whenever anyone mentions Zdeněk Burian? Find out in this exciting episode!

 

Show Notes at Chasmosaurs.com

Episode 23: Invicta Invasion and Dart’s Dinovember (featuring Rebecca Dart)

Our first episode of 2023 celebrates classics of two different kinds: the masterly palaeoart of the Queen of #DrawDinovember, Rebecca Dart, which surely merits the stamp of ‘modern classic’; and, in what Niels has determined is a one-off for us and not the beginning of a foray into collectibles, the enduring charm of the Invicta dinosaur toys commissioned by London’s Natural History Museum, beginning in 1974. How does Rebecca work her timeless magic on her snapshots of deep time, and what role does a love of plants play in it? Will Marc and Natee persuade Niels of the merit of the Invictas or simply be too run away with by their enthusiasm as collectors? Is it premature for Natee to be eating a Cadbury’s Creme Egg?

 

Show notes at Chasmosaurs.com

Episode 22: Postcards from TetZooCon 2022 (Featuring everybody)

Episode 22 closes off the year 2022. Here is the yearly postcard from TetZooCon, in podcast form! The UK's biggest event of Our People, organized by that man Naish and presumably other people, was held early December at the Bush House in London. It was a palaeo-heavy conference, with lots of dinosaur and especially pterosaur talks, the yearly palaeoart workshop, lots of attention for the Crystal Palace Dinosaurs and the launches (or re-launches) of some significant books. And this time, you can hear all about it! Niels, Marc and Natee did not only attend the event, but took the time to interview a whole bunch of people there, from speakers, familiar names, palaeoartists, authors and regular - as well as not irregular - attendees. So enjoy this lavish episode full of news and remeniscence, featuring Darren Naish ,Victoria Arbour, Dougal Dixon, Natalia Jagielska, C. M. Kosemen and a whole bunch of others.

 

Show notes at Chasmosaurs.com

Episode 21: Alice in Woodwardland

It's time for episode 21, and it's a special one. Instead of our usual format, we've skipped the interview this week to take our time to talk about one of our oldest, most special and most cherished palaeoart books yet. After all, what Vintage Dinosaur Art is more worthy of an in-depth look than Alice B. Woodward's Golden Age illustrations in Henry Knipe's Evolution in the Past, all the way from 1912? The fact that two-thirds of us have come down with a brutal cold has nothing to do with it, I promise.

What's all this talk about a Golden Age of illustration? What, if anything, is a rhabodontid? Is Natee secretly a total T. rex stan? Are we all going to break into a Gilbert & Sullivan song and dance number? (No.) And what did the scientists of the 1910s make of the infamous butt-brain hypothesis? Find out in this riveting episode.

 

Show notes at Chasmosaurs.com

Episode 20: All John’s Yesterdays (featuring John Conway)

A big one for our twentieth, as today we discuss what is, so far, probably the most influential palaeoart book of the 21st centruy: the seminal All Yesterdays, by John Conway, Memo Kosemen and Darren Naish, which came out ten years ago (insert obligatory reference to how old we are).

The book is famously full of outlandish and speculative takes on dinosaurs andotherprehistoricanimals and shook up the palaeoart world like a whirlwind... but does it hold up now? In anticipation of the book's ten year anniversary event at the upcoming TetZooCon, Marc, Niels and Natee discuss the not-quite-vintage dinosaur art title and its many unique illustrations.

For the interview, illustrator John Conway himself reveals how the book came to be, his opinions on the book's legacy and the surprising way All Yesterdays has set the course for his own subsequent work. Has the All Yesterdays movement become boring? Is there going to be a new edition? Are the authors ever even going to be in the same room together in the first place? What new works has John got up his sleeve? Is Marc allowed to come to John's birthday anymore? Stay tuned for John announcing the launch event to his latest book!

 

Show Notes at chasmosaurs.com

Episode 19: Sweet Stebbing and Naughty Zubin (Featuring Zubin Erik Dutta)

Greetings, one and all! Today's episode features quite a contrast: the naïve, childish creatures illustrated by Hillary Stebbing in her 1946 children's book Extinct Animals, contrasted against the gnarly, outlandish modern work of Zubin Erik Dutta, a true up-and-comer in de palaeoart world. How do horror and pin-ups influence dinosaur art? Does every ceratopsian scrap gets its own genus name? What on earth is a Jakapil? And how did we end up with a dinosaur book with no T. rex in? All this and more in today's wonderful episode.

 

Show notes at Love In The Time of Chasmosaurs

Episode 18: Prehistoric Planet Special! (Featuring Gabriel Ugueto)

Slightly later than planned, thanks to the vagaries of existence (ah, yes), Episode 18 is something of a Prehistoric Planet special, as Niels, Marc, and Natee take a brief sojourn away from Vintage Dinosaur Art to wax lyrical about the much lauded Apple TV+ documentary series. Could we possibly heap yet more praise onto it amid the universal acclaim? Palaeoartist Gabriel Ugueto was among the over 1,500-strong team of creatives and scientists who lent their powers to the series, and though he’s still contractually not permited to talk about his role in it, we still get to hear about some of the many projects he has recently completed and is currently working on, including the Extinct book series written by Professor Ben Garrod, and Gabriel’s own title on Triassic tetrapods.

 

Show notes at chasmosaurus.com