Pilot's Log

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Scale models, comics (tho' not like I used to), movies on DVD, and loads of books and magazines related to aviation and aerospace.

On Facebook I "Like" the Giveaway Of The Day--free software downloads. Among the offers this past week: RonyaSoft's Poster Printer, which I'm playing with. I'm not so much interested in posters as such, tho' that looks fun...I'm blowing up paper models. And so far, it looks like the RonyaSoft program is going to save me both effort and money, by cutting down the number of pages I'd need to print to get the same results.

I haven't decided which model to start with. Tho' that 1/72nd scale Colossus-class aircraft carrier project is the most tempting!

Wings of War.

I'm obsessing.

A part of me wants to buy up some LITKO bases and some HBM model planes to go on them.

Another part of me just goaded me into calculating how many Triple-Size bases can be made from a 24" by 48" sheet of Acrylite Plexiglas. (27, more than enough for my existing WW2 1/72nd scale airplane model aviary.)

I want to play.

I don't know anybody near me who plays.

I'll probably be stewing in my own juices for a while longer.

Bought it at HobbyTown in Knoxville at the IPMS meet Tuesday; got the usual club discount on it. With my Internet service interrupted badly by storms yesterday, I put it together and painted it tootsweet. Photos after more paint and decals.

Lessee...

* Mum had a good Mother's Day weekend. Lynn, Livingston and Egan were over on Saturday and we did Spaghetti Feast. I got Mum a pair of garden gloves and two bags of Russell Stover chocolates. Livingston returned our VHS player after repairs; we haven't had the opportunity to try it out yet. We sent Ollie's old toaster oven back with them for Geneva, as we heard she needs a better one than the one she has.

* A game store in Knoxville had a sale so I bought three Wings of War planes (an SE5A, a Wildcat and a ZeroSen). There are a lot of downloadable resources on the WWI game but not on the WW2 game, so I'll probably need to get the WW2 deluxe sets in the future.

I'm already planning out larger architectures for mainstream scale models. A double-size set would work for 1/72nd scale WWI and 1/100th scale WW2 planes; a triple-size is right for 1/48th WWI and 1/72nd WW2 models; a quad-size set would be needed to play using 1/32nd~1/28th WWI or 1/48th WW2 planes. A quad-size card would be roughly the size of a board of the kind used to stiffen packs of comic books.

I'm also adapting my ex-clicky Crimson Skies planes to the Wings of War system, but I'll need more info about the WW2 game before I can complete the porting.

* Mum's garden is beginning to recover.

* We got a box of goodies from the Winterization program, in addition to the work that will eventually be done upgrading Rather Manor's infrastructure. Basically, we got a supply of flourescent squiggle lights (which we've been already using for about ten years), thermometers, aerator faucet and shower heads, a duct cleaning brush, and a smoke detector (the source for yesterday's DRAMA TAG).

* Model meeting is tonight. Oh boy.

If that's a scale model I have serious scale model skillz envy.

Kaoru Shintani, the creator of the mangas Area 88, Cleopatra DC, Sonic Deserter, Alice 12, Desert Rose, Hidari no O'Clock, Futari Taka, Phantom Burai, Christie Hightension and others--and model for the character Yattaran in Leiji Matsumoto's Captain Harlock, turns 60 on Tuesday.

Did the Knoxville IPMS meeting tonight and the Judging exercize and my main lession: I have no hope in Creation of winning a prize in competition with my own work so long as Mike Driskill is around.

Maybe I'll feel like Judging the show this year. I took some years off because of that one disastrous show we had.

Played phone tag with Mike Birchfield. Be glad he still doesn't know his way around a computer yet.

I don't sing Paul Francis' praises enough, and I suppose it is impossible to do such a thing.

He is an artist who spent a good share of his career working on make-up and special effects in Hollywood, only to have his future shoved aside by the advance of computers in the filmmaking field. Didn't stop him, tho'. He came back to his Tennessee home, erected a pleasure dome of corrogated steel in the hills, and builds monsters, monster cars, and tiki gods.

His current projects include reproducing the Terror Dog puppet from the first Ghostbusters movie. Exact copies of the ones actually used by the effects studio. Today I watched as he and an assistant were in the process of assembling silicone molds. When he's finished, the completed molds will go to a factory and a horde of Terror Dogs will be cast.

But that isn't his only project. Or even his scariest or weirdest.

At the modeler's meeting a man showed up with diecast scale models that he wanted re-done in his racing team's paint livery. That said livery was DESIGNED by Paul about twenty years before...and Paul had forgotten it in the years since. Paul and the man had known each other back then, and Paul had even hung out at a few races.

Paul didn't want to do the job, but quoted him a price anyway in the hopes that the man would refuse to pay and go away. The man decided the price was reasonable and they shook hands.

Right now the models are sitting on a table in Paul's garage as components, the paint sandblasted off the bodies.

I tell Paul that Aleks would have loved to do the job for him, and that Aleks is probably laughing at him from Heaven--and cheering him on.

Some years ago I heard that some scale modelers and gamers use disposable champagne/wine glasses as the raw material for display stands. I'd had the idea in the back of my mind ever since. Today, when I was in a Dollar Tree in search of liquid Super Glue and an eyeglass repair kit, I saw that for New Year's Eve, they had six-packs of champagne glasses. So I scarfed up three.

Will do some experiments soon. Meantime, I have a few models to build.