All right, then, this is the first ever adequately illustrated vertebra of Giraffatitan
September 15, 2013
I thought I’d done a decent job of illustrating MB.R.2180:C5 last time, but Wedel was not satisfied, demanding ventral and right-lateral views as well as the provided right lateral, anterior, posterior and dorsal.
All right then: here you go!
Here once more, for comparison, is Janensch’s (1950) illustration of the same vertebra:
As you’ll see, I changed the composition of my version, now that I have a right lateral view, to more closely match the composite of Janensch’s figures. The third row of mine is now exactly the same composition as I used for his illustrations, so it’s easier to compare the two.
Sauropod Vertebra Picture of the Week 
September 15, 2013 at 6:08 pm
You should do radiographs of these.
September 15, 2013 at 6:59 pm
We’d be too late — Schwarz and Fritsch (2006) beat us to it! See figure 4 in particular.
Reference
Schwarz, Daniela, and Guido Fritsch. 2006. Pneumatic structures in the cervical vertebrae of the Late Jurassic Tendaguru sauropods Brachiosaurus brancai and Dicraeosaurus. Eclogae Geologicae Helvetiae 99(1):65-78. doi:10.1007/s00015-006-1177-x
September 16, 2013 at 2:08 am
I’d just like to say the recent glut of exceptional sauropod vertebrae pictures (indeed exceeding the advertised 1 per week minimum quota) is to be lauded. I both deeply appreciate the collective effort of the SV-POWsketeers and the high resolution details of the bizarre skeletal remains displayed herein. In celebration of SV-POW’s recent return to vertebral glory I am now drawing a sauropod stomping the viscera out of a theropod.
Thank you kind sirs.
September 16, 2013 at 3:39 am
What no oblique views? How can we makerbot it without full 360 degree rotations about all axes and a histology? Never mind, just post a full NMR scan.
September 16, 2013 at 4:21 am
…aaaand here you go!
September 16, 2013 at 6:39 am
…aaaand here you go!
https://svpow.com/2013/09/16/brian-engh-stomp-time/
September 16, 2013 at 8:14 am
What no oblique views? How can we makerbot it without full 360 degree rotations about all axes and a histology? Never mind, just post a full NMR scan.
I had already been thinking the past few days about whether these Taylor Normal Form 6-way views would be some kind of bridge between conventional (i.e., fewer views or only one) illustrations and just posting 3D models, or the data to generate them, in whatever packet of data comes to fill the niche currently occupied by the “scholarly paper”.
Then I thought, “Who is actually going to give people permission to publish 3D models, when every kid in the industrialized world could be cranking out tiny Sue skulls?” (This is in a not-terribly-hypothetical future where 3D printers are about as common as iPhones.)
That leads to three thoughts:
1. There’s no reason to worry about Little Jimmy Badegg selling pirate Sue prints in a world where everyone has the data and can print their own–unless the museum wants to be the only one selling Sue prints.*
2. Fossils in accredited museums are considered to be held in the public trust. Does that extend to 3D models of those fossils? If not, why not?
3. Given that photogrammetric software can already make decent models of some objects when fed enough photos, can museums prevent people from generating and printing 3D models of objects on display? I don’t mean legally, I mean technically–just as right now I can, to a first approximation, rip any song ever recorded and broadcast the file freely to the world, what is to stop people from doing the same with 3D files of fossils in the very near future?
* In which case, they better take Sue off display now. Although there are probably already enough photos of the mount floating around the net for photogrammetric software to work with. I wonder if this could be automated: a Google-Scholar-like bot trawls the net for photos of Famous Mount, compiles all of them, and generates a 3D model. Or an error message that there aren’t enough photos.
September 16, 2013 at 8:53 am
I have already written a program that can do the first part.
September 16, 2013 at 9:00 am
More to the point here, I’ve also wondered how close we are now to the point where ad-hoc 3d model-printing from photogrammetry becomes something non-specialists can do. I assume there are printing bureaus out there for those without access to their own 3d printers, so the difficulty is all about making the software intuitive enough.
Peter Falkingham thinks it’s easy enough.
September 20, 2013 at 7:16 am
[…] Let’s take another look at that Giraffatitan cervical. MB.R.2180:C5, from a few days ago: […]
September 27, 2013 at 3:08 pm
[…] immer noch nicht alle Knochen vollständig illustrieren (und tatsächlich musste Mike auch nochmal nachbessern). Mike hat den Job also für einen Wirbel gemacht, und ich bin sicher das im Laufe der zeit immer […]
September 27, 2013 at 3:08 pm
[…] pointed out, all those papers still do not completely illustrate all bones (and in fact Mike had to upgrade his figure right away). So Mike has now done the job for one vertebra, and I am sure over time there will be […]
January 9, 2018 at 4:26 am
[…] Based on its proportions I reckon it’s probably a C5 or so, based on comparisons with Giraffatitan (for example). […]
March 4, 2019 at 5:39 pm
[…] photographs from the cardinal directions. To illustrate a specimen nicely in a descriptive paper, you will at minimum want photos from anterior, posterior, dorsal, ventral and left and right […]