

Keep in mind that fur is acceptable in this evolutionary line! Dragon Skeleton You can experiment to create many fun designs, all very different. To understand how this kind of dragon moves you can observe movement of big cats.Īgain, there’s no need to copy this anatomy 1:1. Dragging it on the ground is fully allowed. The tails of therapsids are flexible and are used more for communication than for balance. It can be brought to life in a convincing way (E.g., Dragonheart, Eragon, Dungeons & Dragons). It’s very hard to place those additional limbs in a plausible way, and the whole design is very unrealistic when you compare it to most “real” creatures. Instead, a special mutation has gifted them with an additional pair of limbs (it actually happens in nature see dipygus). It’s quadrupedal like most mammals, so it can’t sacrifice its forelimbs for the sake of wings. It’s closely related to mammals, so it can move like them and be quite intelligent. Feathers are acceptable as well in this evolutionary line. For example, your “wyverns” can use their wings for walking. There are many different designs you can base on this anatomy. But you can use two simple rules: the femur can’t go back farther than 90 degrees, and the feet usually copies its angle. There’s no other animal today that moves like dinosaur saurischians, so you can’t really base the movement on anything else. Remember to keep the tail long, meaty, and quite stiff-it’s used for balance. However, this type of dragon design is actually the most plausible, and that’s how they’re often portrayed in the pop culture today (See Skyrim, Game of Thrones, the Hobbit, Harry Potter series). We call four-limbed dragons wyverns, and some people don’t consider them dragons, but a different kind of mythical creature.

Probably all carnivorous saurischians were bipedal, so the forelimbs were redundant anyway. They were created without hands, so this dragon doesn’t have arms. This could be a saurischian species that evolved membranous wings. Let’s take a look at their possible anatomies. If we look at the evolutionary tree, we can place dragons in two possible groups: saurischians (the dinosaurs that birds came from), and therapsids (mammal-like reptiles). The best way to ensure believability of an unreal creature is to base its design on the anatomy of real animals. That’s how we decide if a creature is believable or not. General Anatomy: Two Kindsĭragons aren’t real, but if we want them to look like something living in our reality, their design must obey certain rules. Once you’ve mastered these basic techniques, you’ll be able to create lots of creative dragon variations like these I drew while making this tutorial.
