Sabertooth!
So I told you guys I would get pics of the awesome Christmas presents sargon999 got me. Here's one of them. A full-size cast from a Smilodon fatalis skull, complete with tarpit finish.
It's my favorite present I've gotten in a long, long time. Thank you, darling.
I'm also making you look at this picture, because it's pretty much the most excellent picture of Tazendra ever taken. Do yourself a favor and go look at it full-size. I cannot stop laughing about it. Every time I see it I go off again.
When asked to list her breed on paperwork, I put "lolcat."
Captions welcome.
Replica by Bone Clones. The quality is very, very good. It looks a lot like a real tarpit skull, the casting job is really beautiful. The only complaints I have are minor: it doesn't feel like real bone to the touch and is too light, there's a couple of spots where you can see the stain ran a little bit, and whoever took the flash off after it was molded didn't do it quite right on the back teeth, which feel much sharper than they actually should. Still, if this is representative of their overall quality, I'd give it an A and buy from them again anytime. Beautiful replica.
The full gape is quite impressive. Something you don't see in the usual side views is how monstrously huge their incisors were, and how they are not chisel-shaped like a lion's or a housecat's, but fucking pointy and shit.
Most of that is not braincase, most of that is occipital and sagittal crest. You can see how flared the cheekbones are to admit the enormous biting muscle, and how rough and pitted the surface is to provide more surface area for the muscle fibers to anchor.
Look how sturdy that is. Look at that thick, hard forehead and the awesome rise of the occipital crests on the back of the skull. Those anchor neck muscle, which Smilodons had a lot of.
Modern cats don't have many teeth compared to other carnivores like dogs and foxes. Their dentition is designed to eat meat and nothing else. In Smilodon fatalis, this was taken to an extreme; they had only two rear teeth on a side. But look at that rear upper tooth, look how huge it is. It closes over the lower teeth like shears. Very powerfully built.
You can also see on the inside of the left lower jawbone where the stain trickled down a little bit and left streaks.
A beautiful portrait.
People always comment on how pretty Tazendra is. I live with her and see her make silly faces all the time and know how generally stupid she is, so it's hard for me to remember that other people see a black cat with all the cultural and personal symbolism that comes with that.
I see the damp, stinky goblin who puts her butt-fur in my face at least three times a night.
Sabertooths must have left their tongues sticking out sometimes, too.
This is the shot I was trying to get while shooting all those other pictures. It should give you a good idea of size. Tazendra is a medium-ish cat.
There are lots more pictures of Tazendra at my Flickr account, so you can just click through and scroll back or forth to see those. These are the best pictures of her I've ever been able to take.
Bone Clones sells many different replicas, and while I don't think resin is much of a stand-in for the various wonderful tactile qualites of real bone, the casts of extinct beasties and endangered beasties are certainly of high enough quality to justify the price. The level of detail on this thing is astounding, down to the sinus cavities and sutures. The only reason I can tell it's a replica is because I'm really, really used to looking at real skulls. From more than a few feet away, you can't tell at all.
Anyway, that's the awesome. Hope you enjoyed!
It's my favorite present I've gotten in a long, long time. Thank you, darling.
I'm also making you look at this picture, because it's pretty much the most excellent picture of Tazendra ever taken. Do yourself a favor and go look at it full-size. I cannot stop laughing about it. Every time I see it I go off again.
When asked to list her breed on paperwork, I put "lolcat."
Captions welcome.
Replica by Bone Clones. The quality is very, very good. It looks a lot like a real tarpit skull, the casting job is really beautiful. The only complaints I have are minor: it doesn't feel like real bone to the touch and is too light, there's a couple of spots where you can see the stain ran a little bit, and whoever took the flash off after it was molded didn't do it quite right on the back teeth, which feel much sharper than they actually should. Still, if this is representative of their overall quality, I'd give it an A and buy from them again anytime. Beautiful replica.
The full gape is quite impressive. Something you don't see in the usual side views is how monstrously huge their incisors were, and how they are not chisel-shaped like a lion's or a housecat's, but fucking pointy and shit.
Most of that is not braincase, most of that is occipital and sagittal crest. You can see how flared the cheekbones are to admit the enormous biting muscle, and how rough and pitted the surface is to provide more surface area for the muscle fibers to anchor.
Look how sturdy that is. Look at that thick, hard forehead and the awesome rise of the occipital crests on the back of the skull. Those anchor neck muscle, which Smilodons had a lot of.
Modern cats don't have many teeth compared to other carnivores like dogs and foxes. Their dentition is designed to eat meat and nothing else. In Smilodon fatalis, this was taken to an extreme; they had only two rear teeth on a side. But look at that rear upper tooth, look how huge it is. It closes over the lower teeth like shears. Very powerfully built.
You can also see on the inside of the left lower jawbone where the stain trickled down a little bit and left streaks.
A beautiful portrait.
People always comment on how pretty Tazendra is. I live with her and see her make silly faces all the time and know how generally stupid she is, so it's hard for me to remember that other people see a black cat with all the cultural and personal symbolism that comes with that.
I see the damp, stinky goblin who puts her butt-fur in my face at least three times a night.
Sabertooths must have left their tongues sticking out sometimes, too.
This is the shot I was trying to get while shooting all those other pictures. It should give you a good idea of size. Tazendra is a medium-ish cat.
There are lots more pictures of Tazendra at my Flickr account, so you can just click through and scroll back or forth to see those. These are the best pictures of her I've ever been able to take.
Bone Clones sells many different replicas, and while I don't think resin is much of a stand-in for the various wonderful tactile qualites of real bone, the casts of extinct beasties and endangered beasties are certainly of high enough quality to justify the price. The level of detail on this thing is astounding, down to the sinus cavities and sutures. The only reason I can tell it's a replica is because I'm really, really used to looking at real skulls. From more than a few feet away, you can't tell at all.
Anyway, that's the awesome. Hope you enjoyed!