Dinotopia nature icons!

[melannen]

I was looking through my collection of un-uploaded icons to see find one to use for nature posts, and I realized I had a whole stash of Dinotopia icons that I'd never posted anywhere. So I thought I'd share.

Dinotopia was a lavishly illustrated picture-book-for-adults set on an island where dinosaurs and people of all races and cultures live in peace together. The book itself, though, was written with the conceit that it's a reproduction of the journal of a Victorian naturalist who was marooned on the island in the late 19th century - he has a naturalist's interest in everything around him, but especially the natural world, and trained scientific perception. The illustrations in the book every so often go over to precise botanical watercolors (and if I ever get to where I can to botanical illustrations like that, I will be satisified with my skill as an artist.) And because the time and the place the book came out of, it has a very ecological sensibility overall.

The sequels to the book get increasingly steampunky, which is why I still love the first one best: I fell in love with it as a child, I think, not for the dinosaurs, but for the way it treats with nature, observation, and finding a balance between a scientific perspective and an organic one. (My favorite character of all was the young girl Melanie, who knew all the plants in the forest and would take the naturalist main character on walks to teach him about them. I still want to be her.)

Anyway, behind the cut are some with a natural history & ecology theme based on art in the first Dinotopia book. Free to use, share, and/or alter; credit James Gurney for the original artwork.

01.  02.  03.  04.  05.  06.  

07.  08.  09.  10.  11.  12.  

13.  14.  15.  16.  17.  18.  

1. Oolu and Lightwing, a Skybax, habitat partners for Air
2. Moraine and Bigtusk, a mammoth, habitat partners for Alpine
3. Bracken and Fiddlehead, a Chasmosaurus, habitat partners for Forest
4. Magnolia and Paddlefoot, a Lambeosaurus, habitat partners for Freshwater
5. Draco and Highjump, a Struthiomimus, habitat partners for Savanna
6. Seco and Dorsolith, a Euplocephalus, habitat partners for Desert
7. The flag of the Aerial habitat, a crescent rainbow on a blue field
8. The flag of the Alpine habitat, a spine of white mountains on a blue field
9. The flag of the Forest habitat, a fir tree on a yellow field
10. The flag of the Freshwater habitat, a water lily on a white field
11. The flag of the Savanna habitat, a dragonfly on a purple field
12. The flag of the Desert habitat, a lizard on a red field
13. A man and a sauropod pose dancing: rainfall
14. A man and a sauropod pose dancing: sunrise
15. A man and a sauropod pose dancing: water running underground
16. Malik the timekeeper (a Stenonychosaurus,) with spiral shells in his laboratory
17. Melanie of Treetown, a young girl, inspecting a fern
18. Melanie, Kalyptra the Dryosaurus, and Arthur Denison on a nature walk in the jungle

Comments

[zillah975]

Oh, I love all three of the "a man and a sauropod post dancing" ones. How beguiling!

[melannen]

The pose dancing is just a side-illustration that never gets mentioned in the text again, but there's so much in just those three illustrations (and the idea of human/dinosaur pairs dancing!) Things like that scattered everywhere in the book are part of the reason I like it so much.

[softestbullet]

Yesssss Dinotopia!

[melannen]

Dinotopia!

[foxfirefey]

I REMEMBER THAT BOOK.

...another book I had around that age or so was...Man After Man! Oh man, that book is something else for a child's literature experiences.

[melannen]

I have never heard of that book, but now I WISH I HAD. It would have given me horrific nightmares and probably warped me for life, but I still wish I had.

(The illustrated books that ended up in the children's section at the library but weren't only for kids were so much my favorite: did you ever encounter Graeme Base's books? Most of them were for kids, but then there was one he snuck in there that really *wasn't*, and it was my favorite.)

[mllesays]

This book looks so neat.

[melannen]

I recommend it! The second picture book in the series is pretty good, too, although it's much more about the steampunk tech and secret underground caverns than about going on nature walks with dinosaurs like in the first one.

[fay_e]

I always thought that I had read the Dinotopia books but evidently from your descriptions this is not so! I have been tricked! DDD= Must rectify asap.

Your write-up of the Dinotopia books reminds me how much I loved 20,000 Leagues under the Sea for all the scientific descriptions of deep sea life. *digs it out to reread*

[melannen]

Well, it kind of became a media franchise after a while, so along with the three (four now I think?) big pretty illustrated volumes, there was also a series of young adult novels, and I think at least one adult novel? You might have read those. I liked them, too, but they left out what I loved best in the picture books, which were the beautiful paintings, and the fact that they're a naturalist's working notebook.

[loligo]

Aww, these are lovely! I have the first book, but I haven't re-read it since the year it came out. Probably time to get it out for my daughter to look at.

I'll definitely grab an icon or two -- I just can't decide which!

[melannen]

I would vote that you are never too young to look at Dinotopia. :D

[weaverbird]

eeeeeee! Dinotopia! I have the first two books and love them to bits, especially the first. I love the attention to detail in the paintings. I went through the first one and translated all the signs, just to see if they really said something - and they do. I stuck a post-it note on each one with the translation, too. (yep, total geek. what can I say? *g*)

Now, to decide which icons to snag...

[melannen]

...I think I got to where I could read the signs without needing to transliterate on paper. I kind of wished there was a pen-friendly script version in the books, so I could write in it easily (I pick up new alphabets really quickly. Lose them just as quickly, though.)