Projects
Carboniferous driftwood
Digital painting of a Late Palaeozoic river landscape — petrified wood as an archive of tectonic history.
The small troodontid Sinovenator
Digital sketch of a Sinovenator from the Yixian Formation – and what is genuine in a privately held skeleton.
Fossil scorpion
Digital painting of the soil fauna of the Chemnitz Petrified Forest, featuring Opsieobuthus tungeri.
Chirotherium trackmaker
Digital drawing of the Chirotherium trackmaker – and why the supposed thumb is actually the little toe.
Remigiusberg “Ursaurier“
A panoply of Lower Permian tetrapods from the Remigiusberg locality, developed over years.
Proceratosaurus portrait
A little exercise to break in a new device – with no scientific claim.
Lissodus dwarf shark
Digital painting of a tiny hybodont – created for a conference poster.
Marine invertebrates: Sponge diversity
Digital plate on demosponges, glass sponges and stromatoporoids, for academic teaching.
Trilobites: motile fortresses
Digital painting of four trilobite genera, illustrating how these Palaeozoic arthropods armoured and folded their bodies.
Belemnites, the squid bullets
Digital plate on belemnites – rostrum, phragmocone and the aberrant giant forms.
Dakosaurus vs. Shark
Digital painting of two top predators of the Solnhofen archipelago – proven by stomach content.
Bird time
Sketches of an Adélie penguin and a hypothetical proto-shoebill – notes on Cenozoic birds.
Mammal faces
Two study heads from spare studio moments: Arsinoitherium and the cave bear.
scenography / mini diorama
Mini diorama of the Late Jurassic reef fauna in the Oriental Building at Sanspareil Rock Garden.
Procynosuchus, the Korbach Dachshund
Digital model and mounted 3D print of one of the most primitive cynodonts known.
Hands-on sea urchin
Digital model and mounted 3D print of the Late Jurassic sea urchin Rhabdocidaris as a hands-on object.
Jurassic coelacanth
Digital model and mounted 3D print of a Holophagus – and the question of the right coloration.
Cricosaurus
Digital model and mounted 3D print of a marine crocodylomorph of the family Metriorhynchidae.
Ammonite
Digital model and mounted 3D print of an Aulacostephanus from the Late Jurassic.
Crinoids & rugose coral
Digital painting of a group of crinoids and a solitary coral – two opposite challenges.
Sea urchin blueprint
Construction drawing of Rhabdocidaris – why echinoderms are harder than dinosaurs.
Parareptiles going after soil fauna
Digital painting of Late Permian soil fauna and a lizard-like parareptile as its hunter.
Thrissops, the leopard fish
Digital painting of Thrissops from the Ettling quarry – every spot placed after fossil evidence.
Goniatite, Ceratite & Ammonites
Digital plate on the development of ammonoids from the Devonian to the Middle Jurassic.
Ichthyosaurus & Plesiosaurus – early in a double manner
Digital painting of two Early Jurassic marine reptiles that also stand at the beginning of their research history.
Fayolia as xenacanthiform egg capsules
Digital painting of Fayolia – and why fossil eggs are named in such a peculiar way.
Clams / Bivalves
Digital plate on the disparity of bivalves – from symmetrical forms to the rudists.
A unique Dakosaurus skeleton
Pencil drawing of the first complete Dakosaurus skeleton – a Late Jurassic marine crocodylomorph, with gut content.
Archaeorhynchus, flying chicks from the Cretaceous
Digital drawing of Archaeorhynchus – and the question since when birds have actually existed.
Tetraceratops, the bizarre, horned pelycosaur
Digital painting of Tetraceratops insignis – and how an overlooked taphonomic detail overturned its classification.
Edaphosaurids, sail-backed herbivores rare in Europe
Ink stipple plate on the European record of Edaphosauridae – including the new genus Remigiomontanus.
Sphenacodontian-type predators
Digital overview of early synapsid skulls – and the question where the Early Permian therapsids are hiding.
Calamite strobili
Pencil rendering after virtual modelling: two types of fossil strobili from the Saxon Döhlen Basin.
Transitional pterosaurs – the links no longer missing
Digital drawings of Makrodactylus and Propterodactylus, the connecting links to the pterodactyloid bauplan.
Anatomy of a seed fern
Semi-schematic illustration of trunk and frond anatomy in Medullosa stellata from the Chemnitz Petrified Forest.
Biocrusts: Earth’s history, but from the ground perspective
A time spiral of Earth's history seen from the biocrusts – cyanobacteria, algae, lichens and mosses.
Branchiopod crustaceans / ‘prehistoric’ shrimp
Digital plate of the four branchiopod groups: tadpole shrimp, clam shrimp, fairy shrimp and water fleas.
Eukarya diversity icons
Digital icons for 34 groups of nucleated life, arranged for the 'Opuntia of Life'.
Ghost sharks / Chimaeras
Digital painting of three extant chimaeras – cartilaginous fish that are neither sharks nor rays.
Fungus-infected Lichen
Digital painting of an Atacama lichen infected by a lichenicolous fungus.
Fossilisation comic
Comic on the path from carcass to fossil in the Late Jurassic plattenkalk – for Caturus and for Juravenator.
Trophic pyramid
Ecological diagram of the ‘Solnhofen’ biota: separate trophic pyramids for the island and marine faunas.
Reptile-to-Bird tree
Simplified tree of the frequently heard saurian names, focused on avian evolution.
Map for Geo Destinations
Digital map with miniatures of actual geo destinations in the Altmühltal Nature Park, including Archaeopteryx localities.
scenography / exhibition concept
Concept, illustration and model making for the dinosaur corner at the Altmühltal Nature Park Information Centre.
Experiment instructions
Digital drawings for experiment kits: inventory of materials and essential working steps for a given age group.
a child’s day time spiral
Time spiral for a special exhibition: Earth's history projected onto a child's school week.
Tetrapod tree
Simplified overview of tetrapod phylogeny, first created for the travel guide SaurierZeitReise Deutschland.
Flyer & roll-up banner
Flyer and roll-up banner for the Friends' Association of the Jura Museum Eichstätt.
Time Spirals with Formations
Five time spirals on the geological history of Thuringia, each focusing on a certain time slice.
Opuntia of Life
A phylogenetic overview of all groups of organisms in drop-shaped units – named after the prickly pear Opuntia.
Protein Targeting pathways
Constructed graphic on protein transport into mitochondria and chloroplasts – abstracted rather than naturalistic.
Research History diagram
Graphical overview of the historical concepts of the clade Stramenopiles.
Juravenator taphonomy
Model of the taphonomic state of Juravenator – mixed techniques, as a hands-on object.
Pliosaurus kids
Digital model used for a life-size 3D print: a juvenile Pliosaurus as a selfie point, 3 m long.
Temnodontosaurus
Digital model used for miniature 3D prints of one of the largest ichthyosaurs – with corrected flipper outlines.
Dimetrodon juvenile
Digital model and mounted 3D print of a juvenile Dimetrodon for the Natural History Museum Magdeburg.
Baby Dimetrodon
A life-size reconstruction of a juvenile Dimetrodon for the Museum für Naturkunde Magdeburg, mounted alongside the prepared slab.
“Oreodonts”
Pencil and oil wash: two North American merycoidodontids, preliminary studies for oil paintings.
Moradisaurus
Head studies of Moradisaurus based on a maquette – a giant among captorhinids.
Eggs & Embryos
One synapsid, four dinosaurs: studies of perinatal juveniles and their egg types.
Carboniferous shark eggs
Pencil sketches of Fayolia, the egg capsules of xenacanthid freshwater sharks from the Carboniferous and Permian.
Compsognathus & Sciurumimus
Digital drawings roughly based on models – two theropods from the Solnhofen archipelago.
Dicynodont therapsid
Digital studies of Tropidostoma as a trackmaker – and on the resilience of dicynodonts.
Thuringian Forest early amniotes
Semi-scientific sketches of the Early Permian amniotes of the Thuringian Forest Basin.
Ammonites‘ demise
Digital painting on the end of the Cretaceous – and why mass extinction is not mass mortality.
Cartilaginous fish, stem and crown Chondrichtyes
Digital plate of selected cartilaginous fishes from the Permian to the Cretaceous, with the main lineages.
Archaeopteryx’ world: from sea to shining sea
Digital mural of the Urvogel's habitat – an archipelago in the Late Jurassic shelf sea.
Permian megafauna
Digital painting of four Permian tetrapods – Dimetrodon, Archaeosyodon, Scutosaurus and Eryops.
Palaeozoic colonial filterers using zoom
Digital plate of Fenestella and Monograptus – a bryozoan and a graptolite, using exaggerated zoom.
Solnhofen flying theropods
Digital painting of three Late Jurassic primeval birds: Archaeopteryx, Alcmonavis and Ostromia.
Solnhofen flightless theropods
Digital painting of the three flightless predatory dinosaurs of the Solnhofen archipelago.
Arthropods: it’s their world, we merely inhabit it
Hand-drawn line plate of extant arthropods – and why their bauplan rules the animal kingdom.
Carnivora, namely the Challenging Apex Predators
Tempera painting of wolf and spotted hyena – two predators challenging their coexisting apex predators.
Moulding stagonolepid osteoderms
Replicating delicate Triassic skin bones in double silicone shells before thin sections destroy the originals.
Juravenator replica
A hands-on replica of Europe's best-preserved predatory dinosaur, made for the Altmühltal Nature Park information centre.
Silicone casting
Where the bone is gone, the impression remains: ultra-fine silicone moulds reveal vascular openings and palatal denticles of baby pelycosaurs.
Giant amphibian
Uncovering the largest bone from a sandstone block of over 600 kg – an amphibian some three metres long from the time of the first dinosaurs.
Pantelosaurus replication
3D scanning and printing turned the table-sized Pantelosaurus saxonicus slab into two nearly identical, much lighter replicas.
Pantelosaurus restoration
A century of pyrite fears, sulphatic efflorescence and 1970s varnish repairs – and what the 2024 restoration actually found.
Triassic bones
Red on red, brittle and poorly preserved – no beginner's piece, and what kind of bones these are has to stay secret for a while.
Dinosaur bones
Removing the crust from a series of dinosaur bones – good colour contrast, but a fracture behind every square centimetre.
The blown-up guitarfish
Scientific line drawing of Apolithabatis seioma, a Late Jurassic ray whose only known specimen was found during a blasting operation.
Elvis, the curl-crested pterosaur
Digital painting of Petrodactyle – on head crests, sexual dimorphism and the handicap principle.
Belemnites & ichthyosaurs in a swimming race
Digital painting of a hunting scene – ichthyosaurs chasing belemnites, for the Jura Museum Eichstätt.
Contemporaries of “ursaurier” in the delta
The remaining biota of the Remigiusberg delta: fishes, invertebrates and tiny quadrupeds.
Sharks in local rivers and lakes
Digital painting of Bohemiacanthus – apex predator in the great lakes of the Early Permian.
Marine invertebrates: rhynchonelliform brachiopods
Digital plate on the variety of brachiopods – pedicle, spines and frill as solutions for anchorage.
Marine invertebrates: learn your corals
Digital plate on tabulate, rugose and scleractinian corals – for academic teaching.
Marine invertebrates: ancient cephalopods
Digital plate of the Palcephalopoda – from elongated Ordovician forms to the coiled nautiloids.
Paleozoic fishes
Digital timeline of large Late Palaeozoic fishes – Eusthenopteron, Ichthyostega, Orthacanthus.
River monsters
Digital timeline of two freshwater ambush predators – the coelacanth Mawsonia and the mastodonsaurs.
Stem-crocs: Pseudosuchia
Digital timeline of the crocodile lineage – from Triassic land hunters to Cretaceous giants.
Pterosaurs
Digital timeline of the pterosaurs – from Rhamphorhynchus to the Cretaceous giants.
Theropods
Digital timeline of the theropods – and what Tyrannosaurus, Archaeopteryx and Deinonychus share.
Cryptogams: Algae, lichens and mosses in textbook illustrations
Selected textbook plates on algae, lichens and mosses, from cell level to mire succession.
Early amniote with skin preservation
Stipple drawing of the ‘climbing dwarf’ Ascendonanus from the Chemnitz Petrified Forest, with preserved skin.
Proof of plate tectonics: the rake-toothed Mesosaurus
Handmade sculpture of Mesosaurus – Wegener's key witness for continental drift.
A track and its producer: was Chirotherium made by Ctenosauriscus?
Handmade sculpture of the presumed producer of the Chirotherium tracks, for Gotha and Bad Dürkheim.
Aquasaurs and other prehistoric “shrimp”: distribution and predators
Digital plate on egg dispersal and predators of aquasaurs and other prehistoric shrimp.
skull of a large Jurassic pterodactyl: Petrodactyle wellnhoferi
Pencil drawing of the skull of Petrodactyle wellnhoferi with its conspicuous head crest.
Ichthyosaur reconstruction
Digital model and mounted 3D print of an ichthyosaur for Museum Solnhofen, 1.6 m long.
Juvi & Juri: Twin model of a small predatory dinosaur
Two models of Juravenator in different postures, for Eichstätt – mixed techniques.
skeletal aggregation of mammal precursors: Pantelosaurus saxonicus
Colour-coded drawing of the famous Freital ‘saurian’ slab holding six skeletons of Pantelosaurus.
Marine invertebrates: extant examples
Digital painting of three extant invertebrates – and what their soft tissues hide from the fossil record.
Sauropodomorphs
Digital timeline of the sauropodomorphs – from Plateosaurus to the titanosaurs.
Cenozoic mammals
Digital timeline of the 'age of mammals' – from Ambulocetus to Mammuthus.
Sharks as ammonite crushers: the mystery of Ptychodus solved
Digital painting of Ptychodus – how new finds from Mexico resolved the lifestyle of a Cretaceous shark.
