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The Velociraptor that was designed for Jurassic Park is a popular factious portrayal of the real animal. Based on Deinonychus,[1] the raptors seen in the Jurassic Park franchise are the size of a human, featherless, have wrists that can pronate, lizard-like tails, and are highly intelligent.

Design Development

Jurassic Park (1993) & The Lost World: Jurassic Park (1997)

Concept art of Deinonychus by Mark "Crash" McCreery.

Initially, the Velociraptor of Jurassic Park was referred to as Deinonychus until it was changed to Velociraptor, possibly as a reference to Gregory S. Paul's classification in his 1988 book Predatory Dinosaurs of the World. The raptors that are seen in the film Jurassic Park were designed by Mark "Crash" McCreery. McCreery created concepts from the raptors in three life stages: hatchling, juvenile, and finally adult. The juvenile form did not appear in the final film, however, as it and a hatchling Triceratops was merged into the raptor hatchling in the nursery.[2] For reference when designing the dinosaur, the filmmakers requested all technical papers John Ostrom had written of Deinonychus.[3] Furthermore, Gregory S. Paul created skeletal and muscle studies for the base forms of film's Velociraptor and Tyrannosaurus similar to his drawing in Predatory Dinosaurs of the World, though Paul has said that we never received any feedback to his studies of the raptors, during pre-production [4][5] Paleoartists Mark Hallett and John Gurche also created concept art for the animal.[6][7]

The raptors were purposely made man-sized by director Steven Speilberg. Dr. Robert T. Bakker recalls in the preface to his novel Raptor Red that an artist told him over the phone that Speilberg was unimpressed with the size of Deinonychus.[8] Speilberg wanted the raptors to be menacing, so it was made longer and a foot taller. According to Stan Winston, it was an aesthetic decision to made the Velociraptor's head more blunted and rounded than the real creature.[9] Curiously, after this decision was made, the large dromaeosaurid Utahraptor was discovered, which was around the size of the film's raptors. Winston said in The Winston Effect: The Art & History of Stan Winston Studio in regards to the coincidental discovery of Utahraptor after the finalization of the film's raptor design "We designed it, we built it, and then they discovered it. That still boggles my mind."[10] There were many colorations created for the raptors in the first film. Notable examples are the vibrant colorations that were created by Mark Hallett that were discarded[6] and an unused tiger-esque coloration,[11] which would later be used by the males in the sequel film The Lost World: Jurassic Park. The final coloration chosen was brown with orange and yellow highlights, though cool lighting conditions during filming muted these bright colors.[12][13] There were two traits of the Velociraptor that were proposed but ultimately did not end up in the final film. The first were tongues like snakes and monitor lizards that the raptors would flick out in Tippett Studios animatics. These reptilian tongues were scrapped per paleontological consultant Jack Horner's suggestion, as he felt that the tongues were to lizard-like to reflect the connection dinosaurs have with birds.[14] After it was decided to use CGI in place of Tippett Studio's go-motion animation for the portrayal of the dinosaurs, Gregory S. Paul suggested that the raptors be feathered, but his request could not be fulfilled due to limitations with computer animation at the time.[15]

For the second Jurassic Park film, The Lost World: Jurassic Park, male raptors sporting a new skin color were introduced. Stan Winston explained the reasoning behind the new color scheme for the males saying "now there were male dinosaurs, as well as females; and typically in nature, the males of any species are far more brightly colored."[16] The final coloration created for the males was designed by Chris Swift.[13]

Jurassic Park III

Originally, Jurassic Park III was going to depict the raptors with the same design they had in the previous two films.[17][18] It was then decided that the raptors would be redesigned for the film. John Rosengrant explained that the redesign was meant to convey that these raptors had "evolved a little bit since the last movie."[19] Their skulls were elongated and the tip of the snout was more pointed with quills being added to the heads of the males as well. These design choices were chosen to showcase their connection with birds and then recent fossil discoveries.[20] The addition of quills on the males was explained by John Rosengrant to "[incorporate] the idea that the raptors are evolving into birds".[21]

Jurassic World

In 2004, in an online article by Nature regarding the discovery of Dilong, paleontologist Mark Norell claimed to have seen early designs of the dinosaurs in Jurassic Park IV saying "[F]rom what I've seen of Jurassic Park IV, all the dinosaurs now have feathers."[22]

Films

Jurassic Park (1993)

The Lost World: Jurassic Park

Jurassic Park III

Jurassic World

Novels

Jurassic Park (1990)

The Lost World (1995)

Video games

Jurassic Park (SEGA CD)

Jurassic Park: Trespasser

Jurassic Park: The Game

References

  1. Paul, Gregory S. (October 10, 2010) The Princeton Field Guide to Dinosaurs, pp. 136-137. Princeton University Press.
  2. Duncan, Jody, Shay, Don. (1993) The Making of Jurassic Park, p. 101
  3. Cummings, Mike. (June 18, 2015) Yale’s legacy in ‘Jurassic World’. Yale News. Retrieved November 20, 2016.
  4. Curriculum Vitae. gspauldino.com
  5. Paul, Gregory S. (Fall 2013) More on Jurassic Park. Prehistoric Times, 107, p. 46
  6. 6.0 6.1 Hallett, Mark. (Spring 2013) Remembering Jurassic Park. Prehistoric Times, 105, p. 49
  7. (December 30, 2014) Molding an identity for dinosaurs and early humans from the study of fossils. YouTube
  8. Bakker, Robert T. (1995) Raptor Red, p. 4
  9. Duncan, Jody. (November 1, 2006) The Winston Effect: The Art & History of Stan Winston, pp. 173-175. Titan Books.
  10. Duncan, Jody. (November 1, 2006) The Winston Effect: The Art & History of Stan Winston, p. 175. Titan Books.
  11. Duncan, Jody, Shay, Don. (1993) The Making of Jurassic Park, p. 48
  12. Stern, Kevin. (June 9, 2015) ‘Jurassic Party’ Reunites Dinosaur Movie Wizards. Beyond the Marquee
  13. 13.0 13.1 Duncan, Jody. (June 1997) On the Shoulders of Giants. Cinefex, 70, p. 106
  14. The Making of Jurassic Park Dir. John Schultz. 1995. Film.
  15. Curley, Vince J.J. (December 2005/Januray 2006) The Prehistoric Times Interview: Gregory S. Paul. Prehistoric Times, 75, p. 43
  16. Duncan, Jody, Shay, Don. (June 20, 1997) The Making of The Lost World: Jurassic Park, p. 25.
  17. (March 3, 2012) JURASSIC PARK III - Raptor Suit Rehearsal - BEHIND-THE-SCENES. YouTube
  18. (May 8, 2012) JURASSIC PARK III - Raptor Attack Rehearsal - BEHIND-THE-SCENES. YouTube
  19. Deckal, Larry. (October 2001) Jurassic Park III: Bigger, Faster, Meaner. Cinefex, 87, p. 16
  20. Bonin, Liane. Dino Might. Entertainment Weekly
  21. Deckal, Larry. (October 2001) Jurassic Park III: Bigger, Faster, Meaner. Cinefex, 87, p. 17
  22. Merali, Zeeya (October 6, 2004) Feathered ancestor of T. rex unearthed. Nature