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Dino Codex
TroodonAI image
AI imageCreated with GPT Image 2 by OpenAI on Oct 31, 2026

Note: This dinosaur is known from only part of a skeleton. The image fills in the missing parts from close relatives, so the real animal may have looked quite different.

Match with prompt

100% (9/9 items)

See the checklist, prompt and sources
  • ✓Bipedal, back horizontal, tail held straight out off the groundหลังขนานพื้น คอชูขึ้นเล็กน้อย
  • ✓Mouth closed, lips covering the teeth so none are visible
  • ✓Palms facing each other, not turned down or danglingมือพับอยู่ใต้ขนปีก กรงเล็บงอเข้า
  • ✓Slender long-legged predator about 2.5 m long, narrow head, large forward-facing eyes
  • ✓Fully feathered, wing-like arm feathers, long feathered tail
  • ✓Enlarged curved claw on the second toe, held off the ground
  • ✓Whole animal visible in side view
  • ✓Scene matches the period and the fossil site
  • ✓No text, people or modern objects

Checked by Claude Opus 5.5 (checked item by item from the image) on Oct 31, 2026. The score is the share of checklist items the image gets right; it is not an expert scientific review.

Prompt used to create the image

Scientifically accurate paleoart of Troodon, a omnivore Troodontidae dinosaur from Campanian–Maastrichtian times (83.6–66 million years ago). Bipedal with the back held roughly horizontal and the tail held straight out behind for balance, never dragging on the ground. NOT standing upright like a kangaroo. Mouth closed with all teeth fully hidden behind scaly lips, like a monitor lizard. NO visible teeth. Hands held tucked in near the chest with the palms facing inward toward each other, like clapping, claws curving inward and forward. NOT hanging down, NOT palms-down, NOT claws pointing at the ground. A slender, long-legged, lightly built predator about 2.5 meters long with a narrow head and large forward-facing eyes. Reference: Troodon is a controversial genus of relatively small, bird-like theropod dinosaurs definitively known from the Campanian age of the Late Cretaceous period. It includes at least one species, Troodon formosus, known from Montana. Discovered in October 1855, T. formosus was among the first dinosaurs found in North America, although it was thought to be a lizard until 1877. Anatomy: fully feathered, with wing-like feathers on the arms and a long feathered tail; an enlarged, curved claw on the second toe, held off the ground. Full body in side view, whole animal visible, standing in a Late Cretaceous coastal floodplain like the Dinosaur Park Formation of Alberta, with conifers, ferns and early flowering plants by a river, no grass. Natural history museum illustration style, realistic textures and natural daylight, muted natural colors. No text, no labels, no humans, no modern objects.

Facts in the prompt come from Wikipedia (en) and Paleobiology Database

Troodon

Name meaning: From Greek, meaning "wounding tooth", for the serrated tooth it was named from.

Omnivore

📏 About 2–2.5 m long and around 50 kg.

Find it in a game

Troodon was a bird-like dinosaur from Late Cretaceous North America with large eyes, a big brain for its size and a small sickle claw on each foot.

Fun facts

  • The name Troodon was based on a single tooth in 1856, so many scientists now place the skeletons once called Troodon under other names, such as Stenonychosaurus.
  • It is often called "the smartest dinosaur" for its big brain, though it was still less brainy than many living birds.

Who lived alongside it

Dinosaurs found in the same rock formation as Troodon (Dinosaur Park), so they lived in the same region at roughly the same time.

Formation data from the Paleobiology Database, counting only each genus's main formations. One formation can span hundreds of thousands to millions of years, so this doesn't mean any two of them ever met.

Scientific details

Classification
Theropod (two-legged predators)
Family
Troodontidae
When it lived
66–83.6 million years ago
Geologic stages
Campanian – Maastrichtian
Named by
Leidy, 1856
Fossil occurrences
103 sites

Countries with fossils

  • Canada
  • China
  • Russia
  • United States

Data from Paleobiology Database and Wikidata