We’ve all heard of the Jurrasic Park franchise and it is widely loved by the community. For those who have not watched it I reccomend you do, or at least the first Jurrassic Park movie. And if you’ve watched the Jurassic World movies then you know the raptors; Blue, Charlie, Echo, and Delta. These dinosaurs are very well-known and many know Velociraptors as the large man-eating pack hunters their portrayed as. The only downfall to this is the scientific accuracy.
The origional raptors in the Jurassic Park movie are large, about 6 feet tall and 11 feet long-which is similar to other raptorid species. Micheal Crichton created the first rendition of the giant Velociraptor in his novel- Jurassic park- in 1990, he based it off of the Utahraptor, a large raptor that’s about 6 feet tall. He did not like the name Utahraptor, which I dont blame him for, its less marketable. In realty, the scientifically accurate Velociraptor is small, about the size of a turkey, and has feathers. In which is significantly different from the Velociraptors in the movies and novels.
The differences don’t end there though, the Dilophosaurus was another dinosaur that got a significant design change. The Diliphosaurus that kills and eats Dennis Nedry is small, spits acid, and has a large frill and head crest. Even though we dont know for sure, paleontologists are confident the Dilophosaurus did not spit a tar-like acid. However, they might have had a poison or venom imbeded into thier saliva like modern day Gila Monsters or Komodo Dragons. The paleontologically accurate Dilophosaurus was large, significantly larger than the one seen in the franchise. But, it did have to large forward facing crests on its head, most likely not the frill though. Sadly, we most likely wont know if this dinosaur, or any had a frill untill technology or a new mummy reveals itself.
Finally the Gallimimus seen in the movie, wasn’t that different compared to the rest but the scientifically accurate one had feathers. The drastic differences end there, the rest of the dinosaurs were just unporportionate to thier real-life counterparts; Trannosaurus Rex, Triceratops, Brachiosaurus, and Parasaurolophus. Which was due to a common practice paleontologists at the time, which was an effect known as shrink wrapping. We all know and love the masrterpiece Jurassic Park is and acnologe the hard work so many people put in to put it on the screen for us.
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