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Featured Projects
Alligator Brain Anatomy
Wight Model A and 4-40 Engine
Older Projects
Memphis Belle Infographic
3D Printable Tyrannosaurus rex Brain!
As part of scientific outreach.... and just plain fun!.... we uploaded a 3D interactive, and annotated, model of the brain cavity, cranial nerves, vasculature, and balance/hearing organs of the big boy, Tyrannosaurus rex . Best part? You can download the 3D model for free, and print it out on any 3D printer. How cool is that? This specimen is from the American Museum of Narural History (AMNH 5117), which we had on loan almost a decade ago.
Additionally, you can learn more than you ever wanted to know about Tyrannosaurid neuroanatomy
and paratympanic sinuses in the braincase from the technical paper we published nearly 10 years
ago. Here's the citable, download via
the button below:
Witmer, L. M. and R. C. Ridgely. 2009. New insights into the brain, braincase, and ear region of
tyrannosaurs, with implications for sensory organization and behavior. Anatomical Record
292:1266–1296.
Allosaurus Feeding Mechanics
This is an earlier example of one of my educational outreach projects. The goal was to take hardcore biomechanical simulation data in a technical publication on how the carnivorous dinosaur Allosaurus might have fed, and snazz it up for dissemination to a wider audience. The model was built, rigged, and animated in Maya based on CT data. The CT based skull models were tweaked slightly to match known restorations in the primary literature, and the movements were coordinated to the biomechanical simulation output via rotoscoping in Maya.
Anatomical Impact of Horn Poaching in Rhinos
This was the most heartbreaking activity I've ever been involved with. The WitmerLab was contacted by the Kariega Game Reserve because of a paper that came out of the lab on how rhinoceros horns are attached to the rhinoceros. The Kariega had several rhinos that had been brutally injured or killed by poachers. You always want your research to be useful, but you never want it to have to be used like this. We did what we could to help the gigantic efforts by the veterinary staff at the game reserve. The video above is an awareness video that we put together. I wish we had the power to stop this horror.
Breathing Life into Dinosaurs
This is another example of making raw computer simulations ready for public consumption. The narrative from the technical paper, and validated using computer flow dynamics, is that the nose and airway of the dome-headed dinosaur Stegoceras simply doesn't work as a nose should without the hypothesized soft-tissue structures that all "warm-blooded animals" living today have.
Nitrogen Cycle in the Home Aquarium
This is a snippet of a larger project on aquarium maintenance. There's not that much chemistry to worry about in freshwater aquaria, so why scare people away with the little bit of chemistry that's worth knowing? A little cartooning keeps it fun, while driving home the need for water changes to flush out the nitrates.
B-17G Flying Fortress Model and Rig
I've done a number of projects with B-17's over the years, as I've been fascinated by the men who flew them and their plight over Europe in the Second World War. This is a fully rigged model of a B-17G Flying Fortress. Wartime service manuals and blueprints were used to generate the model. All control surfaces and other moving parts have accurate ranges of movement. The plane itself wears the markings of the 381st Bomb Group. The name Tinker Toy comes from an earlier B-17E, also of the 381st. The name was chosen for this model as it was known as a "jinx ship" by the superstitious aircrews, as recounted in John Comer's excellent memoir Combat Crew . You can see an interactive version of this model on Sketchfab.
Human Skull with Brain Endocast
I work in Ohio University's Heritage College of Osteopathic Medicine. In this capacity, I’ve generated many learning and teaching aids over the years showing off human anatomy in an interactive format. Unlike many anatomical models that simply are “models”, I use CT scanning and X-ray contrast-enhancing techniques to produce 100% accurate assets. One of these assests that has proven very popular is a human skull model. The Sketchfab button below will take you to an "exploding" version of this skull which you can interact with.
Baby Tyrannosaur Restoration on Exhibit
It's a great privilege to work on some of the most famous beasts that ever walked the earth, namely Tyrannosaurs. It’s humbling when museums ask you to help flesh out their exhibits on these beasts. Beasts that started out very small as babies. Could we help the Museum of the Rockies in Bozeman, MT show what a baby Tyrannosaur (nicknamed, "Chomper") might have looked like based on some very scrappy fossil evidence?
We could try!
We took a model of another juvenile tyrannosaur, I tweaked it to match a baby Tarbosaurus that we had recently published on, and then I digitally sculpted the other parts we needed and finally, we digitally inserted the actual fossils. A 3D print of our file was done here at Ohio University's Innovation Center, which was sent off to the Museum of the Rockies where it was painted and put on display in an exhibit on Tyrannosaur growth.
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