TetZooCon 2023

I’ve long been a fan of the general work of paleontologist extraordinaire Darren Naish, though I’ve featured embarrassingly few of his projects on this blog thus far. For those somehow unaware, it’s hard to understate his influence on the landscape of both traditional and online science communication, in addition to his more standard scientific work. Most visibly he runs the Tetrapod Zoology blog, and hosts the associated TetZoo Podcast with paleoartist John Conway, but he has also personally authored numerous books & scientific papers, as well as advised for countless other books, documentaries, and additional media. (Prehistoric Planet is perhaps the most high-profile project he’s worked on recently.) It’s fair to say that a good chunk of the “paleosphere” generally falls into his orbit as well, even other subcommunities that are technically organized around other people. Such is his pull that not only has he managed to establish an entire convention around his TetZoo brand, TetZooCon has now reached its tenth year running!

I’ve been wanting to attend ever since the first event in 2014, and after experiencing major FOMO seeing coverage of the ninth one last year, I resolved to finally visit for myself in 2023! The three (and change) day extravaganza was everything I expected to be: a rush of fascinating talks, gorgeous art, awesome swag, and endlessly enjoyable individuals from all points along the spectrum of science enthusiasm. While I’m pleased to see the convention succeed as much as it has, TetZooCon has grown so much in recent years that it now features multiple events running concurrently at any one moment throughout the weekend, so that no one person (not even Darren himself!) can visit everything the convention has to offer. My impressions here then are of course my own, perhaps even more so than in a similar event, though I struggle to think of anything I can quite adequately compare this to.

For my own lecture schedule, I attended Judyth Sasson’s “Plesiosaur Semiotics”, Luis Rey’s discussion with John Conway on “The Past and Future of Paleoart”, Dean Lomax’s recounting of the exaction of the “Rutland Sea Dragon” ichthyosaur, Steve Allain’s survey of Midwife Toads in Great Britain, Luke Muscutt’s demonstration of “Flip” the robotic plesiosaur, and Nigel Marven personal recollections of favorite moments from his career (not to mention the panel discussion that kicked off the event on Friday). I do a disservice to anyone whose pictures I didn’t feature here, as I genuinely don’t think I could pick favorites, though I think it’s safe to say that Nigel Marven was the fan-favorite “celebrity guest” this year. His documentaries and other science specials are just about universally beloved by anybody who has watched them, and he was utterly drowning in autograph hounds after his talk was over!

I might have been able to squeeze a few more lectures into my schedule, but apart from missing an hour or two of Sunday that also kept me from the Lost World (1925) and Prehistoric Planet watch parties, I kept myself occupied by spending a good chunk of time in the paleoart workshops! The most engaging activity in this track was James Pascoe‘s “Paint A Pliosaur” event, a separately ticketed session in which several dozen people got to paint their own 3D printed pliosaur model that James provided. I got a bit cheeky with mine, and tried to base it off a creationist illustration I saw in a book I had as a kid, though I got the design a bit wrong! I did like how my paper fire turned out though! (For those not as deep in the weeds as some of us, many creationists like to claim that the Biblical Leviathan is a prehistoric creature of some sort. The flame-throwing Parasaurolophus is the most famous version of this idea, though Ken Ham also commissioned a lesser known illustration featuring a Kronosaurus in the role, inspiring my own creation.)

A “show & tell” time hosted by Joschua Knüppe (author of Europasaurus) allowed several paleoartists of all stripes, from famous to obscure, to present some of the projects each of them had been working on. From more “typical” paleoartworks, to roleplaying guidebooks, to video games, there was a fascinating array of works on display. It continually amazes me how creative this community of people can be!

Speaking of, it was the people that REALLY drew me to this event. I’ve felt a great sense of community with the fellow paleonerds I’ve met online, and a good portion of the ones I feel the greatest affinity for happened to be attending! I happened to tag along with most of the Love in the Time of Chasmosaurs team for much of the weekend (with Natee Himmapaan in particular playing tour guide for me outside the event), but I dropped in on as many other attendees as I could, as well. I can’t believe I didn’t take more photos with people, though I suppose that’s just a testament to how much I enjoyed simply being in the moment there. A few even arranged with Darren to set up vendor booths in the convention’s reception area, selling (mostly paleoart themed) merchandise in between events. (The majority of selfies I took were actually with a few of those who had booths; I suppose because it was easier to track them down when it occurred to me that I wanted a picture! Even among the vendors I didn’t get everybody I would have liked, though…) Between the rush of the events and my own introverted nature, I feel like I didn’t get to spend quite as much quality time with as many folks as I would have liked, but at least I can claim to have met some of my favorite people IRL, now!

This of course applies to the man of the hour, himself! I am still flattered that Darren was just about as happy to have me there as I was to attend. I indulged my inner autograph hound and enacted a silly idea I have had for some time: having him sign Stevens & Parrish’s entry in Thunder-Lizards about sauropod life posture with a reference to his own paper with Taylor & Wedel that responded to it. Trust me, it’s (almost) funny if you’re in the know.

That nearly wraps up the proceedings, though as with most years, for those who didn’t have to rush home afterwards, there was an informal field trip the Monday after TetZooCon proper had ended. (There was an even more informal gathering at the Natural History Museum before the convention started, but that was more a random twist of fate as many people apparently independently had the same idea to get a museum visit in beforehand. I was excited to see the Patagotitan display there!) This year’s destination was the London Zoo; I was mildly disappointed that it wasn’t the Crystal Palace Dinosaurs again this year, as I ultimately did not end up getting the chance to see them, but the zoo proved a delightful outing anyway! There were several species I had never seen in person before, and I was particularly impressed by how integrated some of the human and animal spaces were. This allowed for a couple memorable events, in particular. One, in which a young, not-yet-Scarlet Ibis repeatedly attempted to assert dominance over us, nipping many a shoe and fingertip; as well as a curious Two-Toed Sloth that made a dramatic eye-level stroll past our group right in the middle of the walkway!

All in all, I had a fantastic time. TetZooCon was just about as great as I expected, apart from the heater failures that left certain rooms freezing during the whole event. I might have liked a little more “breathing room” between events, but I’m not sure that I have any suggestions on how to accomplish that without diminishing the overall convention. I can certainly appreciate the desire to pack ever more into each TetZooCon; my mental switch is stuck in the “Consume” position, and I simply want to absorb it all! …and buy it all! I concerned my wife with how much I bought, so I suppose it’s technically a good thing I didn’t get EVERYTHING I wanted this time, though I am pretty satisfied with my haul of goodies overall (including copies of De första dinosaurierna, The Bone Cabin Chronicles, and Dippy: The Nation’s Favourite Dinosaur). I do hope to make a habit of attending in future years, so here’s to getting my fix at TetZooCon Yet To Come!

For some other convention-type events I’ve attended, see my articles about Fossilmania XL, Permian Fest 2023, and PaleostreamCon 2024.