Illustrations of a different sort

 

Not all drawings are done by starving artists with tortured souls. Before the advent of cameras naturalists had to draw their subjects to record them. Even with cameras some views: sectional cut-aways, internal structure, and extinct species to name a few, are often best illustrated by drawing them.

The site Scientific Illustration has a wonderful collection of these types of drawings. Each has some notes about the drawing, as well as a link to the source of the drawing. 

This page has three examples of their collection. There are more examples after the jump.