Capstone Project - Natural History Museum

Warning: This post contains images of preserved deceased animals.

 Research -

For my birthday I went to the Natural history museum, while there, I got some photographs of some prehistoric creatures to help gather references and inspiration relating to my project. [It was very busy and we didn't have much time before our tour so I didn't manage to do any sketches :(]

Standing next to these specimens helped see the scale of these creatures, and really get up close to see details.

Fossils of a giant sloth and an ichthyosaur 

A wooly rhino

There is a whole exhibit on early humans which was of  great interest to me regarding the theme of my project. They had many reconstructed Neanderthals on show which was massively helpful to compare my own work to. The collection of artefacts also proved very important to gauge how Neanderthals constructed tools. 

Most of the artefacts were constructed either of rock or bone, with sharp points chiselled into them to transform these simple materials into versatile tools. In the image below you can see a sharp flint tool that likely would have been used to cut meat or separate hides from animals. Although primitive, it was altered in a way that allowed them to do more with their raw materials. It really made me think that our perception of our ancestors is probably very misinformed, we regard them as being unintelligent and that we are far more advanced they they are, however this isn't the case, they were resourceful and had the intelligence to know how to survive in their harsh environment. They had thriving communities and knew how to provide and care for themselves and those around them, much like we do today. 

A flint tool, Neanderthal skull, Stegosaurus skeleton, and a collection of skulls illustrating the evolution of humans.

The collection of tools in this one was really interesting, the tiny sewing needle made of bone was fascinating. This really shows that they were quite intelligent [as someone who can barely sew myself this is so interesting to see that they had such good dexterity to be able to join garments together]. When walking through this exhibit I noticed the statue I had used for reference was on display, The image I drew from didn't show the full body, so seeing him in his entirety allowed me to judge my observations on the proportions of Neanderthals a little better.

Another Neanderthal skull, two reconstructions of Neanderthals, a collection of tools made of bone, and evidence of prehistoric cannibalism

Here are the photographs of the reconstructed heads based on some skulls that were found, both of a male, female, and a child. They also had examples of other ancient humans which was very interesting to compare them to. [I couldn't get many pictures of those as it was very cramped in this area].

Reconstructed Neanderthal heads and more flint tools

Seeing these exhibits in person and being able to read about them gave me a lot of inspiration of things to implement into my project, particularly regarding the hypothetical construction of furniture and the materials they may have used.

Other cool exhibits -

While I was there, I also got some photos of some other exhibits I found interesting that might not directly link to my studies. I would have liked to have visited the dinosaur room, however as the tour guide told us it is the most popular room of the museum and as such on a Saturday midday it is often very busy in there.

quartz fishtail, Giant tortoise shell, rock formation, Fossilized tree bark, owl taxidermy, taxidermy dodo, and a tropical bird taxidermy

Hummingbirds, Giant wasp, butterfly, scarab beetle, fossilized tree trunks, Mastodon, Shells

More shells, Hope the blue whale, Dinosaur skeleton, Giraffe skeleton

Mastodon, Panda bear skeleton, taxidermy red panda, Blue whale model, Horse taxidermy, [I'm not sure? but i really like this creature]

Prehistoric rhino, Horse taxidermy

The spirit collection -

Much like the section above, this doesn't link to my project in any way but I wanted to talk a bit about this section as I found it absolutely fascinating. The following images were specimens on show in the Natural History Museum's spirit collection, which is a part of the museum which is mostly hidden from public view. I was taken on a tour through it and got to see some really really cool specimens. It was somewhat similar to the Hunterian museum we visited last year, however all of these specimens are still actively used in scientific research. 

There was 3 rooms we visited, the dissection room, the tank room, and the archives. Most of these images were taken from the main tank room. The dissection room is where specimens are inspected by many different scientific teams who investigate tissue samples, stomach contents, and environmental impacts on the creature. Alongside this, they create digital scans of specimens to upload to the public, the guide told us that some of the specimens uploaded are special because the museum wants to give them back to the country of origin [some of the practices used to get the older specimens were very frowned upon so the museum wants to try to do the right thing and give them back] however the specimens are in such a bad state that they would not survive the journey home. By scanning them and uploading the information to a database, the vital information can help inform scientists all over the world.

Below are some images taken from the archives, which store specimens of animals by taxonomy, across various years to allow scientists to compare specimens and how they change over time. What i found really interesting was the development of the whale fetus, which apparently develop very similarly to human fetuses.

Bat, Sloth, Grey whale fetus [at differing stages of development], small monkey, coelacanth, platypus head

These next few images were taken from the main tank room. This is just one of many that the museum has [I believe the guide said theres 7 floors, with over 84 million specimens in the museum in total]. This room had floor to ceiling shelves on all 4 walls that contained specimens in either Spirit [ethanol and methanol], formalin, or glycerin [which accounts for the different clarities in specimens]. In the center of the room was a massive Perspex tank [went up to my chest height] containing two HUGE specimens, one being a giant squid, and another being a colossal squid. This was so cool to see, especially since these creatures are so rare. Across from is was a salamander and a Komodo dragon that once belonged to Joan Procter, The salamander actually helped identify 3 separate species of giant salamander that has gone on to help conservationists understand how to conserve the species more effectively. On the bottom row, the first and third image show a Coelacanth specimen, a rare fish that was once thought to have gone extinct along with the dinosaurs. There is another picture of a Coelacanth specimen further down [you can somewhat see the edge of it's tank in this photo] however that specimen was preserved in glycerin. It used to be on display in the main hall which unfortunately led to its degradation over time, the new coelacanth is not allowed to be displayed upstairs due to the volatile nature of spirit.

Gulper eel, Giant squid, Salamander & komodo dragon, Coelacanth, Fish, another fish and the coelacanth, Squid beaks

Here is the giant squid again! It is also in a glycerin mixture as both formalin and spirit causes Perspex to warp. They couldn't find anywhere that would make a glass tank big enough to house it. There's actually a colossal squid the other side, however it is just the lower half of it as when the fishermen pulled it out of the sea, the lessened pressure caused the mantle of it to break off and sink back into the water. This makes the Giant squid the bigger of the two specimens.

I tried to get a photo of the whole tank, it was huge though so I couldn't fit it all in. The giant squid was 9m in length from mantle to tentacle however there was also the bottom half of a colossal squid in there too. Safe to say the tank was absolutely massive.

Heres some more photos of various specimens within the tank room.

Nautilus, Shells [both of these had been found inside the stomachs of whales], a football fish, a hairy anglerfish with another fish in it's stomach, the head of a sawfish, the tank room, and a male anglerfish.

This cabinet was very special. This is Charles Darwin's collection from his trip to the Galapagos islands, some of the original writing on these tags might be his handwriting. This is an absolutely priceless collection, and was genuinely just so incredible to be able to see. That little tortoise in the background was actually his pet, it was taxidermized and turned into a storage box that contained a note that revealed the true importance of this collection. Originally, the Natural history museum had no idea this was Charles Darwin's collection at all.

Charles Darwin's collection from his trip to the Galapagos islands, the tortoise shown in the first image was his pet.

And heres some more mammal specimens. A lot of these were blocked from the main path so I couldn't get a closer look. They actually had to move a lot of this collection to parts that not even the tours go to because it made a lot of guests feel unwell. I understand fully why this may have made people feel queasy, but I do wish I was able to see more of their collection. 

Fox, Echidnas, and a lemur.

I was very grateful to be able to see all of this, and while not relevant to my work I thought it was interesting to share. Especially from an artist standpoint, these specimens played a big role in some of the scientific artists their documentation of a species. Its so interesting to be able to see these creatures up close, especially things like the giant squid, coelacanth and some of the more exotic species as i may never have gotten the chance to ever see them. Much like I did when I went to the Hunterian, i do feel quite inspired by some of these specimens.

Trello -

This post falls into the general research section which is now 50% complete, I would like to carry on looking into Neanderthal tools and crafts which will help with my furniture and cave designs. If the weather improves over the next couple of days, I hope to take a trip to Creswell crags which is a Neolithic settlement near me. They have a lot of cave you can have tours around so that might help me gather some inspiration for my game. In the meantime, I have some other written aspects I desperately need to cover such as the pipeline/industry research so I will do that next.