Yutyrannus

Yutyrannus huali was discovered in China in 2012 and became famous as the first large dinosaur found with preserved filaments — fossil evidence that has since made it a go-to example of a “feathered tyrannosaur” in documentaries, books, toys, and paleoart. Two relatively complete, articulated fossils are known, and the filaments themselves turn up only in patches near the neck, back, arm, foot, and tail. The preservation quality is poor enough that none of the tests researchers usually run to confirm true feathers — molecular studies, examination under different types of light, cross-sectioning — were ever performed on them. Some of the structures are also longer than collagen fibers typically get, which is one reason this reconstruction treats them as keratinous spines, more comparable to the tail spines found on Psittacosaurus, rather than as true branching feathers.

This reconstruction takes a different angle, built around details of the fossil that often get left out entirely. Unlike most tyrannosaurs, Yutyrannus had larger arms with three fingers, and a skull some researchers link more closely to carcharodontosaurs than to typical tyrannosaurs. Most distinctively, it had three head crests — a prominent midline crest plus one over each eye — that would have made for a striking display, but that most paleoart skips over entirely in favor of showing off the filaments. Since the fossil’s keratin sheaths weren’t preserved, there’s no way to know how far those crests actually extended above the skull, which is what inspired the deliberately dragon-like pose here.