Above is the JP3 depiction of a bipedal Spinosaurus, though this creature is both terrifying and enormous, the filmmakers got it wrong. some of the worlds closest living relatives to "Spino" are the modern day crocodiles and most likely they were more fish eaters than anything else rather than the ferocious land stalking animal that they were portrayed as. Spinosaurus probably spent most of it's time in the water hunting it's prey in the same manner as a crocodile would. More than likely the Spinosaurus also stood on all fours rather than being bipedal as the JP3 suggest. Many theories suggest, that the sail on the back of the Spinosaurus was used to attract mates, but it is my theory considering that dinosaurs were most likely warm blooded instead of cold and Spino seemed to be more of a water beast that the sail on it's back was a sort of solar heat collector to keep it warm while it swam through cold waters. The image below gives us a more accurate depiction of how Spinosaurus would have actually looked like in reality from the film. 
Spino Specs:
Name: Spinosaurus aegypaticus (pronunciation: "SPINE-oh-SAW-rus") - The name means "Spine lizard of Egypt"
Taxonomy: Dinosauria (Dinosaur) - Saurischia (Lizard Hipped) - Theropoda (Beast Footed) - Spinosauroidea aka Megalosauroidea (Superfamily) - Spinosauroidea (Family) - Spinosaurus (Genus) - S. aegyptiacus (species)
Age: Mid Cretaceous
Spinosaurus lived during the Cenomanian and Albain ages 94-110 million years ago.
Spinosaurus became extinct 30 million years before T-rex appeared.
Discovery: Stromer, 1915
In 1912, Richard Markgraf found a partial specimen in the Baharia Oasis of Egypt. He sent the fossils to Ernst Stromer in Germany for study, and in 1915 this dinosaur was named Spinosaurus.
Distribution: North Africa:
Other Spinosaurid dinosaurs have been found globally, from Brazil, Asia, Europe, to Australia, but S. aegyptiacus is only found in Northern Africa. Fossil locations include Egypt, Morocco, Algeria, Tunisia, Lybia, and even Kenya.
Body Size: The Biggest! 15 meters (49 feet)!
With a skull of over 4 feet in length, Spinosaurus a. wins the record as the longest theropod. It was a full 10 feet longer than T. rex, and about 7 feet longer than Carcharodontosaurus, a T. rex like theropod that lived alongside Spinosaurus.
However, Spinosaurus had a very long tail and a long neck, so Carcharodontosaurus and T. rex would have been bulkier!
Diet: Fish
Spinosaurs teeth and jaws were designed for eating fish
Designed For the Water: Unlike other theropods, this dinosaur is very specialized.
Some of the specializations that Ibrahim's paper discusses (Ibrahim, et al. 2014) include:
* A crocodile like head with a long, slender snout that had many interlocking pointy teeth for grasping large fish
* Pressure sensors in the snout to detect moving prey in the water, just like crocodiles
* A long tail that moved from side to side for propulsion in water
* Possible webbed back feet
* Hind legs that were better at a paddling motion (for swimming) than a walking motion
* Front arms that were very robust with rigid hands; probably to support its weight when walking, since it had to walk on all four legs.
* Nostrils that were positioned further up on the skull, enabling it to breathe while mostly submerged
* A dense bone structure, just like cetaceans (whales) and other aquatic mammals, for better buoyancy for swimming and diving
Formations that S. aegyptiacus fossils have been found in is shown in the table below:
Mid-Late Cretaceous Formations Locations
Bahariya Formation Egypt
Aoufous Formation (Kem Kem Beds) Morocco
Tegana Formation (Kem Kem Beds) Morocco
Chenini Formation Tunisia
Cabao Formation Libya
Turkana Grits Formation Kenya
"Gara Samani" Algeria
www.fossilguy.com
Spinosaurus fossil skeleton mount showing it's aquatic posture.
A reconstructed Spinosaurus on display at the National Geographic Musuem in Washington D.C. This is the new, corrected mount, showing its aquatic posture, as it probably could not have walked on two legs.
Discovery / Paleontological History of Spionosaurus
Stromer on an expedition in Egypt in the early 1900's Richard Markgraf on an earlier expedition with Osborn of the AMNH in 1907
LEFT:Ernst Stromer on the expedition in Egypt in either 1911 or 1912
RIGHT:Richard Markgraf on an earlier expedition with Osborn of the AMNH in 1907.
1911: Stromer and Markgraf: The Spine Lizard of Egypt
In 1911, Stromer, a German paleontologist, launched an expedition to collect fossils in the little explored deserts of Egypt. He met up with Richard Markgraf, a European who lived near Cairo, and hired him as his fossil collector and expedition guide. The expedition set out to the Baharia Oasis in Egypt; there, they explored and collected fossils. Stromer returned to Germany in 1912 while Markgraf continued to excavate and ship countless fossils back to Stromer. In late 1912, Markgraf came across a partial skeleton of a large and bizarre shaped dinosaur (Smith, et al. 2006). He shipped the material back to Stromer for study, and in 1915 Stromer published a paper describing the specimen. He coined the dinosaur: Spinosaurus aegyptiacus, the "Spine Lizard of Egypt."
1936: The First Reconstruction
As time went by, more and more fragmentary material of Spinosaurus was discovered and sent to Stromer. By 1936 Stromer had enough material to make a reconstruction. He published the reconstruction of Spinosaurus in an additional publication. Spinosaurus was reconstructed into a huge, lumbering, bipedal carnivore with a giant sail on its back.
1944: The Complete Destruction
The Spinosaurus material had been on display at a main museum in Munich. When WWII began, Stromer tried desperately (to no avail) to get his specimens moved out of Munich, away from Allied bombings. Unfortunately, in 1944, an Allied bombing run obliterated the museum and all of Stromer's fossils.
This dinosaur was lost for years. Fragments of this dinosaur and its relatives would be found from time to time. Based on these fragmentary findings, paleontologists concluded Spinosaurus had a crocodile-like snout, ate mainly fish, probably spent its time in/near the water, and had unusually robust forearms for a theropod. Some proposed the giant sail should be a hump, like on a buffalo. However, nothing substantial enough had been found to do a more accurate reconstruction. Spinosaurus remained enigmatic for over 50 years.
2008: Enter Nizar Ibrahim - The New Specimen
Spinosaurus Fossil Illustrations from Stromers first spinosaurus publication in 1915
Spinosaurus Fossil Illustrations from
Stromers first spinosaurus publication in 1915.
This is plate 2 from his publication.
In 2008, Ibrahim was doing fieldwork in the Cretaceous Kem Kem beds near Erfoud, Morocco. While there, he bought a small box with an unusual looking dinosaur bone. It was in an odd purple colored matrix with yellow streaks. The fossil also had an unusual looking cross-section. When at the Natural History Museum in Milan, Italy a year later, Ibrahim was shown a partial dinosaur specimen. He immediately realized it was a very rare partial Spinosaurus and that the specimen looked identical to his small unusual fossil with the purple/yellow matrix he purchased in 2008. Realizing that it might be the same specimen, he thought he may be able to find the exact location and uncover more of it.
Now, Ibrahim had to track down the fossil dealer in Erfoud that excavated the finds. He returned to Morocco four years later and began to track down the dealer. With many false leads he was about to give up. On his last day in Morocco, Ibrahim was sitting at a cafe and miraculously recognized the fossil dealer as he happened to walk by. The dealer brought Ibrahim to the dig site, showing where the Spinosaurus was dug up. Ibrahim, with the help of Paul Sereno (an expert on Spinosaurus), returned to the dig site with a dig team and uncovered more of the associated specimen. Ibrahim and Sereno then took digital measurements of their new specimen, measurements from Stromer's pictures, and digital measurements of other fragmentary finds. They did an in depth analysis of all these fossils and came up with the most accurate reconstruction of Spinosaurus to date. In 2014 they published their findings; a highly specialized, sail-backed, semi-aquatic dinosaur that was designed for swimming.
The Baharia Oasis in Egypt where the first Spinosaurus was Discovered These are casts of Stromer's original Spinosaurus fossils based
on images of the fossils before they were destroyed.
LEFT: The Baharia Oasis in Egypt where the first Spinosaurus was Discovered.
Image Credit: Saladin (C.C BY)
RIGHT: Looking at casts of Stromers' original Spinosaurus fossils. These are on display at the National Geographic Museum. br class="clearboth">
Aquatic Adaptations of Spinosaurus: Designed for Water
Members of the Spinosauroid family had some aquatic adaptations, but it appears Spinosaurus took those adaptations much further. Changes in the skull, legs, feet, neck, tail, and even the bone density made Spinosaurus look more like crocodile or an early cetacean (whale) than a theropod dinosaur. Below are details on the aquatic adaptations:
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