The appropriateness of malapropisms

 I know medicine can replace hips and knees... when will they be able to do wrists? Oh fine, I can type - but there is an effective word to add - "still". I am down to well under 20 wpm now (used to peak at 40 once). And while they are doing my wrist, I certainly could do with a right knee, a new neck, some ankles...

Whinge whine...

Oh! There's another anachronism of the English language - the letter H
in "whinge" adjusts the letter "G". Try pronouncing this pair:

Whinged - winged

...But take away the wobbleyou and you get the condition a door needs to be to open:

Hinged.

But the guilty murderer was hanged in the past in England...

Hmmm... that letter H is a right little sod! Doesn't work the way it should. Try this word pair:

Ginger and Gingham...

Oh deary me - and then there are words that work both ways. For instance:
...
Lunged and Lunged

In the one case I mean that sport with pointed sticks and what was done
to put the point in the opponent's lungs (ooohhh groan!) and in the
other case as a descriptive:

"Lunged organisms breathe air" (as opposed to gilled ones that breathe water)(unless they're newts I guess) (Later edit: of course, the GILL - as pronounced for the alcohol measure would easily describe why we say "I am pissed as a newt" - probably one had far to many gills).

Which is why I get soooo scratchy when folk can't rite proper like and
fill in their text with so many misspooled words. They haven't really
misspelt the word, they have just used the wrong one. Examples:
...
"... ring his neck"

"... welcome to my websight"

‎"ICQ" and all thos other little SMS shortcuts (groan!)

"... icey roads"

"... I've bean to ..."
...
Of course one can forgive the odd malapropism, but lately I have been
reading a few e-books by writers who probably submitted their work and
got rejected... Some of these stories are just hopelessly full of
malapropisms and that really spoils a story.

Oh well. That's my wing for the day. Doesn't it make you cring?

(Do not call me on the phone for the next hour or so - my tung is firmly stuccoed in my cheek)

Have you ever wondered...

...just how many little details you need to remember when painting a 2 sim-flight model?

Take my current work in progress. I foolishly approached the owner, Jason Newburg, and asked if I could adapt his Pitts "Viper" livery to the Iris Christen Eagle for FSX. The gent said yes.

...and now the problems start. That gorgeous snakeskin livery has to wrap between fuselage side and top. Hold on, let's rewind and show you a picture of the real Viper (by the way, if you want to see more, then visit Jason's website here).

Incidentally, many of the photos on the Viper site were taken by Jon Nash - if you have followed my paints, you'll see his Eagle's livery on my site somewhere too.

Anyway, the problem with wrapping the snakeskin around the 2D textures for a 3D model can only be described in pictures. So here's one showing a first flight trial:

Do you get the picture? Some of the lozenge shaped scales stretch where the 2D texture is curved around a 3D model. I am afraid there is only one way around that and that is to draw each single hexagon as a separate object and stretch/distort each one to allow for the curvature of the plane's 3D shape. Here's a shot from Corel Draw, where I am currently struggling along:

Why the yellow? to act as contrast when I take the paint to ther model. I don't worry about colours yet, that's going to be the next bit of fun - Chromalusion flip-flop...

See now what I mean? Probably not, but by repositioning the first row of yellow hexagons to wrap the side ones to the top, there is now an offset when I adjust the next row. I'll be adjusting each single node of every single hexagon around that curve for a few days more yet... and that with a bad wrist (the right one of course).

Oh well, it'll take time, but I'll get there in the end. I certainly couldn't do it for the money if I were being paid; no boss would live with my speed.

More news as and when folks...

Variations on a theme

I just took a look at the last shot of the 412 in the post below. Not quite happy with the out of focus effect. Needs something. What do you say?

What say you? Or perhaps:

Long time no see...

The wrist has been fixed, but not as well as I'd hope. In fact there are some aspects that are much worse - especially for a right handed person.

Anyway, I am back on the other end of the paintbrushes and doing some sim repaints. One particularly interesting livery is the air rescue livery used on some of the Intensive Care heli-transports in Germany. These are different insofar as they are primarily used for the transport of patients in need of intensive care in flight. These aren't the normal crash rescue helis - there is a slight mission difference.

Still, as I say, the livery looks good and was a bit of a challenge. See what you think...