Dear Denizen of the Internet,

Thanks for stopping by my Patreon page. I'm a palaeontological artist, author and researcher who you know from my website, blog, or books. You may also have seen other projects I've been involved with, such as my creature design and consultancy work on palaeontological films such as Walking with Dinosaurs 3D, the BBC's Planet Dinosaur, and Prehistoric Planet, or perhaps you've read some of my scientific papers on pterosaurs (flying reptiles which lived alongside ancient dinosaurs) and palaeoart? However you've found me, thanks for stopping by and I hope you enjoy my work.

Speaking of which... I'm on Patreon because making a living writing about, researching or illustrating fossil animals - even really cool ones - is not always easy. It amounts to being a specialist freelancer, which means paying projects can be rare, workloads are unpredictable, and vast spans of time can exist between being paid (e.g. book royalties are only paid annually). Patreon is one solution to this. As a crowd-funding scheme for online creatives, it gives you a method to support your favourite authors and artists with micropayments each month. In return for your money, you get access to exclusive content and rewards. The more you pledge, the more you receive in rewards: prints, books and so on. But for starters, a $1 per month donation entitles you to:

• In-progress and exclusive artwork related to upcoming books, blog posts and papers
• 'Behind the scenes' insights into creative projects
• Insights into new research
• Excerpts from upcoming books
• Competitions

Your pledges support the production of my art and writing, enabling me to tackle more detailed and involved projects, produce content at a higher rate, and improve the quality of what I can produce. Hopefully, this will make what I'm doing more sustainable for me, and more interesting for you: to that end, any donation you can offer, however small, is hugely appreciated.

Thanks for reading, and I hope you enjoy my Patreon feed if you take the plunge.

Dr. Mark Witton