So, you're illustrating a children's book involving dinosaurs. Do you make them feathery or scaley?

[NeedAUserName]

Depends when you illustrate it. If its any time soon I'd probably go for scales, just because thats what children know, but in ten/twenty years time definitely feathers. By then children won't remember the times of scaled dinosaurs., they'll be all about the feathers.

 

[SonofaJohannes]

I'd present both and explaining why I did it; here's a picture of what we thought this species of dinosaur looked like until a few years ago when we discovered the same species with feathers on it, and now we think it looked like this.

Scales are cooler. Kids like cool things. We're not trying to teach them evolution, we're trying to sell a book.

But it's not true. It'd be lying for sake of coolness. There is no need to coddle them with things like this. Besides, they're still huge killing machines, now they're just fabulous!

Like I said, not trying to teach them evolution. Kids want a scaly T-rex that can transform into a scaly dragon with rocket wings, not an overgrown chicken with with very big teeth.
Besides, a lot of religions claim that all dinosaurs are lies. You don't want to lie even more to those poor christian children, do you?

 

[Demonicdan]

Last time I checked only a few were found to be feathery (velocirapor, archeopteryx etc) so most would be scaley.

 

[Flatfrog]

Like I said, not trying to teach them evolution. Kids want a scaly T-rex that can transform into a scaly dragon with rocket wings, not an overgrown chicken with with very big teeth.
Besides, a lot of religions claim that all dinosaurs are lies. You don't want to lie even more to those poor christian children, do you?

I think kids like dinosaurs because they were real, so they should be as accurate as they can be. Big ones scaly, little ones feathery. Mostly it's the big scaly ones we're interested in anyway.

Personally what drives me crazy is kids stories featuring friendly dinosaurs all getting on together, or ones where all the nice herbivores can talk but the nasty mean carnivore just roars (eg Disney's Dinosaur).

As for the religion thing, actually most creationists love dinosaurs. They just say they lived in the garden of Eden and were all vegetarian until the Fall, then they died off in the Flood.

And yes, all vegetarian. Those T-Rex teeth? For fruit.

 

[Flatfrog]

Last time I checked only a few were found to be feathery (velocirapor, archeopteryx etc) so most would be scaley.

I believe most of the therapod family are now thought to have had feathers at some stage - IIRC even T-Rex may have had them when young.

 

[Demonicdan]

Last time I checked only a few were found to be feathery (velocirapor, archeopteryx etc) so most would be scaley.

I believe most of the therapod family are now thought to have had feathers at some stage - IIRC even T-Rex may have had them when young.

You learn something every day I guess.

 

[gdv358]

You can make feathered dinosaurs look cool with the right style. No one looks at a modern-day bird of prey and imagines it harmlessly eating birdseed and clucking like a chicken. No, they imagine it dive-bombing someone from above screeching at the top of its lungs and killing the poor sap at the tail end of the long drop.

Even when I was in elementary school we knew Archaeopteryx had feathers and was basically a bird precursor. If you do a search for images on that you find some of the pictures look extremely goofy while others make it look like it just stepped out of an epic fantasy novel. And that one didn't just have the feathers going on, it came with the wings and was about the size of a modern bird.

The reason we think the scaled versions look cool is because that's what we grew up with. I say get started on them young and start correcting the image with a suitably awesome looking feathered version.

 

[Cowabungaa]

I'd present both and explaining why I did it; here's a picture of what we thought this species of dinosaur looked like until a few years ago when we discovered the same species with feathers on it, and now we think it looked like this.

Scales are cooler. Kids like cool things. We're not trying to teach them evolution, we're trying to sell a book.

But it's not true. It'd be lying for sake of coolness. There is no need to coddle them with things like this. Besides, they're still huge killing machines, now they're just fabulous!

Like I said, not trying to teach them evolution. Kids want a scaly T-rex that can transform into a scaly dragon with rocket wings, not an overgrown chicken with with very big teeth.
Besides, a lot of religions claim that all dinosaurs are lies. You don't want to lie even more to those poor christian children, do you?

'Course I do, facts are facts. I take the Susan (from the Discworld novels) approach to raising kids and education. I don't care what they want or what they think is awesome, reality is reality. Face it or perrish kiddies!

 

[JJMUG]

With kids books, you've gotta weigh historical accuracy

Um... what? How did you arrive at that conclusion? I don't recall the Dr. Seuss or Mr. Men books looking like proper people/animals...

Seems pretty clear cut to me: If it's an educational book make them feathery. If it's a storybook, make 'em scaley

Are you implying the Dr.Seuss was not historical?

 

[SonofaJohannes]

I'd present both and explaining why I did it; here's a picture of what we thought this species of dinosaur looked like until a few years ago when we discovered the same species with feathers on it, and now we think it looked like this.

Scales are cooler. Kids like cool things. We're not trying to teach them evolution, we're trying to sell a book.

But it's not true. It'd be lying for sake of coolness. There is no need to coddle them with things like this. Besides, they're still huge killing machines, now they're just fabulous!

Like I said, not trying to teach them evolution. Kids want a scaly T-rex that can transform into a scaly dragon with rocket wings, not an overgrown chicken with with very big teeth.
Besides, a lot of religions claim that all dinosaurs are lies. You don't want to lie even more to those poor christian children, do you?

'Course I do, facts are facts. I take the Susan (from the Discworld novels) approach to raising kids and education. I don't care what they want or what they think is awesome, reality is reality. Face it or perrish kiddies!

In that case I think you should write an educational non-fiction schoolbook, while I write my bestseller, "The adventures of Mr. Scaly T-rex that can transform into a scaly dragon with rocket wings".
While you sir, intend to educate today's youth, which is honourable, I intend to sell books.

 

[Laser Priest]

Kids like things that look cooler.

Scales are more awesome than feathers.

That's better than a fact, that's science!

 

[Cowabungaa]

In that case I think you should write an educational non-fiction schoolbook, while I write my bestseller, "The adventures of Mr. Scaly T-rex that can transform into a scaly dragon with rocket wings".
While you sir, intend to educate today's youth, which is honourable, I intend to sell books.

Well I could still include graphic scenes of horrific dinosaur violence. Historically accurate and it does well with the kiddies. Yay for disembowelment!

Also, what you're describing reminds me of:

 

[fix-the-spade]

...Yes, one of the things I would like to do in life is illustrate children's books.

Needs more detail on the publication before you can decide.

If it's a kid's book in the Charlie and Lola style, it's fairly simple. Getting the content right in terms of recognisability for each character is more important than factual correctness. I wouldn't necessarily portray them as either, areas of flat(ish) colour with distinct profiles would work best. Maybe small areas on the outline that imply feathers for some, but only to provide a way to differentiate characters more easily.
Breaking from reality is acceptable if it makes the characters easier to identify with.


If it's a kid's science book, then both and it's tricky. Current science say they have feathers, but it's still not ingrained in popular culture. Without some kind of explanation, even if just a 'did you know' cutout box near the beginning, picturing the dinos as feathered wil garner a lot of scorn from people will little knowledge but a lot of voices.
More importantly, we only know that some dinsoaurs were feathered, not necessarily all of them or what the total layout of the feathers was. Were they downy and thick like most ground dwelling birds or did they have proper, aerofoil shaped quills? It's a bit tricky.

Even more, how will do you decide the markings? It's hard to know whether to go with a more believable mottled colour scheme or over saturated brights would work best. 'Proper' camoflague would certainly appear more credible to most adults, but might not hold the eyes of a young child very long. It's also hard to make a picture striking or lead a viewers eyes without any areas of strong contrast, more over it would ignore that some current predators are bright orange and stripey.
Brighter schemes would make sense from a composition point of view, but might lsoe credibility for the sake of being striking.

Anyway, there's my two cents.

 

[SonofaJohannes]

In that case I think you should write an educational non-fiction schoolbook, while I write my bestseller, "The adventures of Mr. Scaly T-rex that can transform into a scaly dragon with rocket wings".
While you sir, intend to educate today's youth, which is honourable, I intend to sell books.

Well I could still include graphic scenes of horrific dinosaur violence. Historically accurate and it does well with the kiddies. Yay for disembowelment!

Also, what you're describing reminds me of:

Words cannot describe how beautiful that was.

 

[gazumped]

I never even thought about that! I'm hoping to become a children's book illustrator (when I gwow up) so it's an interesting thought...

Perhaps the best thing to do, though, would be to see what the author wants. They might have written the book with big scaly monsters in mind and don't think it'll be right if the image is changed... I can see why the idea of misleading the kids could feel wrong but perhaps you could get around it by putting an extra little drawing in the back of a feathery dinosaur with a quick explanation about how although dinosaurs are often shown as scaly, there's evidence they might've been feathery.

After all, there are a fair few traditional mis-representational characters, such as the jolly looking bearded pirate, they're entertaining and it makes it easier for kids to recognise what they're looking at but they can find out more about the real history when they're older and more into realism.

Kids like things that look cooler.

Scales are more awesome than feathers.

That's better than a fact, that's science!

Ah, but depending on the age, some kids prefer things that look cute to things that look scary.

 

[Nazz3]

I'll make them look like chickens