Well well, "Plus ça change, plus c'est la même chose"

I am still here, kicking this blog around, but every time I come back it's "All change" - and still it's the same.

Just a very short post today, but  it'll do to keep things alive.

Emperor's New Clothes

The most sickening aspect of Flight is the large number of people who are saying the scenery looks so real. Better than FSX. As good as Google Earth.... These people are suffering under the "ENC syndrome" in a big, bigger, biggest way!

I ran both Flight and FSX (Megascenery Oahu) side by side today. Megascenery Oahu is a photo-real scenery for FSX. You only have to look once and you see how Flight really is NOT so wonderful. In the pics below, Flight is on the right.

All I hope for is that the Fligh-Blind gushers just stop, take a deep breath and come back down to earth. Yes, Flight has stunning scenery, but it is in NO WAY photoreal, nor even approaches Google Earth.

My Own Review of MS Flight and the Fooferaw Around its Release

Many, many words have already been said about Microsoft's return to the computer flying game genre. Many, or even most, of these words have been so full of vitriol, you'd have thought that Microsoft and the flight simulation community are at war - albeit one-sided and coming from the flight simulation community...

Microsoft have just done their thing, based on their homework and it really pees me off, when I see the hate that is being poured on Microsoft.

Oh... didn't I mak a few caustic remarks about MS myself? Yes indeed! I am just as guilty of MS Bashing as many others. I make no excuses, nor will I try to explain why I feel my approach is different to the rest of the hate mail aimed at MS.

So for the uninitiated: what the dickens am I on about?

Microsoft released their latest game to the market at the end of February 2012. It is called "Microsoft Flight!" and is being marketed as a game for anyone interested in flying. Please notice that four letter word: GAME. First and foremost, Flight is a game where you can score points, gain experience and even attack and crash into other planes when you are flying online. It is initially being offered on the Microsoft Live / XBox pages as a free download for which you get the completegame engine, scenery and terrain meshes for the Big Island of Hawaii and two aeroplanes: the Icon A5 float plane and the Boeing PT17 biplane.


Currently MS only offer just a few payware extras for the game - you can buy the rest of the (major) Hawaiian islands scenery (which includes the Vans RV6A Kit-plane) and two more planes - the Maule and the P51 Mustang. I think the total runs to around 20 dollars for the Hawaiian Adventure Pack, 15 dollars for the Maule and 8 dollars for the Mustang. Yes - there is a big price difference for the extra aircraft - Microsoft have taken a new approach in that they offer planes in Standard or Deluxe variants. This means that if you want a virtual cockpit, then you will have to buy deluce aircraft models in future, because the standard aircraft will not have a cockpit for you to "virtually sit in".

The picture above shows the Flight "marketplace" screen on www.microsoftflight.com I must remind you here, that you are looking at my page, signed in through my own Live ID. Anything you see will be slightly different.

If nothing else, then one thing that MS is good at is presenting themselves. The page is slick, attractive and clear. Whether I personally like that is not open to discussion. Once you have downloaded and installed the game, a new icon is added to your Windows games library. If you take an enlarged look at the small picture on the left here, you will see that Microsoft have chosen to depict Flight, the game, through the use of a very obvioulsy cartoon-like image, while in the web page window above, the aircraft are shown almost photo-real.

This little icon is probably the single biggest giveaway to the whole background behind the vitriol that has been aimed at Flight, the people behind it and Microsoft.


Yes. I am being serious here. Although I am looking at the situation from a wider perspective than you may be thinking. Most of the MS-Bashing has been by either the MS Flight Simulator franchise marketers and developers and their supporters and followers. i.e. everyone who likes to buy addons or install freeware addons for their flight simulator. And before you start to sharpen your quills, bear with me for a bit.

In developing Flight, MS chose to go a new way with their approach to PC flying (I say that as opposed to flight simulation). When the game was announce, they also told the whole world that all third party developers were going to be shut out from creating content for this game. Oh yes, there was an offer to allow some development if that developer signed over all copyrights to Microsoft and also gave them a swingeing cut of the turnover. I am not privy to the exact numbers, but the copyright signover is "bad enough".

So... Flight is now to be an MS only product? With a childish cartoon plane as an icon? The "big names" in the franchise scen were not long in starting a call to arms. Oh, it may not have been a real "call", but the tone of commentary from virtual airlines, developer shops, marketplaces, forum owners and the like was generally downbeat against Microsoft's Flight. True, most did state that FSX still has years of life in it and that FSX and FS9 products will continue to be developed and sold or given away as freeware, but the tone that came from the top tiers of the old FLIGHT SIMULATION community was generally negative.

...and it was THAT, dear reader, that sparked off the lower end of the community family to start spouting vitriol at MS. Just about every single Flight basher hates Flight because they will not be able to add planes, scenery, weather, ground features, terrain meshes of their own. And "...oh my God, what about all the stuff I have already bought for FSX - I will not be able to use that in Flight..."

The forums were overflowing with such pitiful comments by the worst kind of flightsim community member - the low IQ, selfish brat mentality that stands there, fat bellied and with a wide open mouth screaming "I WANT NOW!"

There were even a few "Forum wars" started and some fligh simulation community members resorted to low punching at the serious flight simmer. It wasn't just a case of calling Microsoft "FS Nazis" and many other bad-mouth terms... even forum managers and admins would get flamed as dictators if they "dared" to restrict a forum member's "freedom of speech".

Yes - I am digressing slightly from the main theme, but I want the reader to understand the "forum wars" side of the vitriol that has spiralled around Microsoft's Flight game. Would you believe that this even spread to the Microsoft beta forums? No? Well I was accepted as a beta tester for MS Flight and started to take a closer look at the game from January 4th this year (2012). There was even one betatester who was so "against" whatever anyone said pro flight that he resorted to swearing of the worst possible kind - even I was referred to as parts of the female reproductive anatomy because I dared to say that I found his manner offensive.

It's strange to think that with the coming of Internet, people seem to take the phrase "Freedom of speech" so literally. Yes, we are allowed to have an opininion, but inciting violence, hatred, prejudice and such is NOT freedom of speech. That is simply criminal behaviour and the plankton that surfaced in the flight simulation community has succeeded in only one thing - they have made the whole flight simulation community look bad. All because a flying game has joined the genre as a standalone entity. Flight is not intended to replace Flight Simulator programmes. It is merely a game, where users can hop into an aircraft, buzz around the scenery, killing "gold coins and hoops", earn "points" and generally play at flying.

If the new Flight users want more, they will soon be asking questions and wanting to know what alternatives there are. When they come to the Flight Simulation community for help, they are likely to take one look at the scum floating on top of the pond and turn away for life. And while I am on the subject of scum, it has no place on our dedicated flight simulation pond.

Now... let's actually take a look at the game...

Nope, it's definitely not a simulation, although when you turn off the "helpers" it is quite a blast to fly low level through the Hawaiian scenery, upside down and to be amazed by the prettiness of the landscape.

The colours are much richer than in FSX and the scenery really does make an excellent first impression that will last for the game player. Oh yes - that is a deliberately biased statement. It doesn't take long for the flight simulation cognoscenti to spot the fact that MS have reduced the level of detail of scenery tiles and landclasses. When you climb higher over the landscape, the knowing pilot will soon spot a certain checkerboarding of the landscape and at dawn and dusk, you can see that streeghtlighting effects on the roadsreally looks nasty (and not just cheap).

(In the screenshot above you can see repetition taking place. If you actually GoogleEarth this area you see a biiig difference to the real world)

But those feelings are based on experiences gained from what is possible in a true flight simulation. Microsoft have really screwed back on details so that the game is not a system hog - which was the biggest single problem with the Flight Simulator series - you always needed up-to-the-minute "power" computers to really enjoy computer flying.

Microsoft flight cuts away the unnecessary frills and lets you enjoy some pretty damn good flying straight out of the box! And at a very reasonable price for now...

Let's just do a small comparison by flying around Honolulu in FSX and in Flight. The Flight version costs $19.99 US. In the following four screenshot pairs you will see me flying around Honolulu in the Vans RV6A in Microsoft Flight and in the A2A Accusim Piper cub in FSX. Which looks prettier? That is up to the beholder. Personally I prefer my FSX Honolulu, but then again I paid $60 US for Flight Simulator and then I paid extra fro the Piper Cub and Accusim. Oh yes, the scenery was extra (Mega Scenery - Oahu). I also have FS Global meshes loaded to give me more realistic appearance to the terrain shape. Active Sky has been added to improve the way the weather is presented and then there is another addon or two (XGraphics and Flight Environment) for the various clouds, water, lights and goodies that make FSX look just a bit more real. All in all I think I may have as much as $500 US worth of FS addons affecting the way Hawaii looks in FSX. Here are the pictures, you judge...

From those four picture pairs, it doesn't actually take much to recognise that "my" FSX outclasses Flight by light-years. But even a low budget FSX usercan see that the Flight city landclasses are typically FS9 or even older (just look at the road grid style in the last pair). The Flight water looks pretty, but the "addon-adjusted" FSX water simply washes the flight stuff away... Street lights in Flight are painted onto the roads - and in a far worse style than even in FS9. In my customised FSX I actually have streeghtlights that are above the ground.

This does not mean that Flight is terrible. Not by a mile! Microsoft have improved a few things so that when you are flying low level up various canyons (as an example), you will be stunned by the rock faces...

But... if you are a flight simulation enthusiast, then sadly you will be disappointed. Flight does feel sterile after you have flown a highly modified FSX with traffic, AI aircraft, animals and watercraft...

One of my "wow" moments while testing Flight happened while taxying at an airport and suddenly realising that the trees were blowing in the wind. Very etherealistic ;) And then I discovered that FTX / Orbx have now introduced exactly this effect into their scenery addons. And to go one beat further, in the FSX addons, you now have leaves falling from the trees in autumn.

All in all, Flight is a pretty newcomer to the genre "Flying on a PC" in the sub-set "games" You can't even think of comparing it with FSX really, because the Flight Simulation side of the genre just has so much openness and extendability, that there is no way Flight can compete.It doesn't even begin to try. It is just another flying game that is politically correct for the "younger minded". It is not a war game and there is no "combat" element, so it won't appeal to the World of Warcraft faction...

...well, it might... already there have been reports of Fight users flying along, minding their own businesses, when WHAM! Someone rams them from behind and send them spiralling to the ground... Yes - I too, have been rammed by some ninja plankton who seemed to think it was totally hilarious to do that.

Ah well.

All I can say here is that Flight is here, you can use it free and forever (yes yes, within the limits of two planes and only Big Island) and at that it is worth a try.

I may add to this write up later - let's see if I get scummed up... ;)

Sighs of relief...

Well, I was lucky after my last entry... I recovered ALL the lost data from the backup - and the mercy of Corel's autobackup system, which saves all work in progress in a separate location.

Phew!

"It'll Never Happen to Me!"

Famous last words!

Shitbumfiddlearsepiddlewiddlestinktit!

Have you ever experienced that exquisite moment of pure "Ohhhh shhhh*****tttt"ness?

I have. Just these days!

I have been setting up the new PC and, in keeping with a promise, I have also been collecting the bits of my old PC for my cousin so that she can have a PC herself. Well... as one does... I moved all data from one disk to another, checked that the files were all there and clicked on delete.

"Are you sure that you want to finally delete 1234567 files?"

"Yes"... Click!

"Format disk"

Click!

I do not need to ask my intelligent readers what I did. I deleted the 'moved' files and formated the original storage disk... So now I have two lots of deleted files, don't I?

Anyway, right now I have an 'undelete' program running and with a bit of luck, I can recover at least those files that I altered since my last backup. That is the main thing.

It'll never happen to me... again... perhaps...

(fingers crossed)

2012 already?

Where did time go?

No excuses - just pain idleness. Oh, did I miss an 'L' there? If you think I did, sorry - it was deliberate. The pain in my wrist has made me idle.  But not that idle...

As your favourite EagleSkinner I am still in action, albeit in a 'not so busy' role. Towards the end of last year I modded my "Blades" repaint and gave the FSX Blades their four aircraft some individual tailoring. If you want to see them in action just look for them on Facebook:

The FSXBlades

Then I have also accepted another "paint job" - Scott from CareFlite liked my Bell 412 paint that I did with their paintscheme, so he asked if I would take their Agusta A109 livery and wrap it around an FSX model. Here's the real thing:

Here you can see some work in progress, only the stripes are proving to be "annoying" because I cannot spot a pattern that describes the line thicknesses with any sense - and, as is so common with flight simulator models, they are not true scale, merely modelled from fairly rough line drawings. This makes a truely accurate alignment of the diagonals somewhat difficult.

I still have a way to go in getting the proportions right. By the way - the red is wrong, I know. I have looked at their website and at many photos on airliners.net and the red is more orange. Actually I probably need the same orange I used for the heart on the 412...

It's weekend again!

Achieved this week?

Well, it's been a quiet one, so all I can admit to having achieved is having kept the lawn watered. But that despite strict 'instruction' from family. Don't you just love it, when everyone else plans your time?

WPR... (wrist progress report) - no improvement. It has now progressed to the stage where I am almost permanently 'retired' from active painting and testing of sim-flight planes.

Other news - George and Meek are behaving like cats now. Furious chases around the flat, waking me up for food.

All in all life's quiet. Too quiet perhaps. Oh well...

Well now, there's cheerful!

About time to commit to an update I think. Amongst other amazing things, I have discovered the www.stayfriends.de website. One of the members there uploaded a class photo from around 1963.

It won't be difficult, but see if you can find me

Other news:

I have moved home yet again. This is now something like the 65th postal address change I have undergone in my life. Busy, busy, busy... This newest address is the house my uncle and aunt built in 1963. We've got a big garden here so there's more than enough work to keep me out in the fresh air.

The wrist damage isn't improving and the white-coated faction have more or less given up. Basically, the only option left - according to them - is to fuse all of the wrist bones together. "That might stop the crepitus pain..." with the emphasis on "might".

Well, if you look on the Internet you can find all sorts of things, including fora where people with similar injuries tell there tales. The feedback there is not good and most people who hav had that operation say that if they had the chance again, they'd refuse. That's not exactly a good advertising program for the operation. I think I'll give it a miss...

Notable interest:

I am still beta-testing and painting aircraft for flight simulator, but with the wrist and all that garden, I am low key on the PC. Two aircraft are on test at the moment, but I am becoming disenchanted with the standards of some 3D developers. They use the word "impossible" too much and their quality of research could be a whole lot better. I get the feeling that some young 3D developers think they are "God's Gift"and only want professional hooray sayers to give their new model a "yippee" rating. But they are not prepared to correct errors, glaring errors to some trained eyes or those who look...

The excuse is almost always the same - impossible!

Total and utter BS! I have no real idea about 3D modelling, other than it is indeed time consuming. But I do know that to correct and re-map the wireframe model is neither impossible nor really all that difficult. And of course - enough "real" 3D modellers have fixed model and mapping errors after my beta reports for me to know what can and can't be done within the "pain threshhold".

My view is basically that if you (the 3D modeller) want to make a model and be paid for doing it, then you are honour bound to do good research, plan the project thoroughly and then make the best possible model for customer satisfaction. When I hear things like "impossible" I get really concerned about the developer's true skills. But most of all I get really upset by phrases like "The customer won't notice..."

OK - you can see I am better again - I am ranting over others about things I can't do myself. So I'd better sign off for today.

Your kitchin cynic

EagleSkinner

(Chairman o the irony board)

I've been away...

After a busy last year, I have not been online recently. A move to a new home, the wrist injury and a whole host of niggly problems have held me back.

But worry not - you can keep up with me on "the other blog" over at Facebook.

Murphy's Laws

(as remembered by Chris Brisland)

 

Introduction

Everyone should have heard of Murphy’s Law by now – you know, the one that goes: “If it can happen, it will.” You haven’t? Oh! Murphy’s Law proven again!

Who was Murphy anyway?

Does it matter? It certainly wasn’t the Robocop Murphy – although in the end he does prove a few Murphyisms in his films…

He was probably related to Kilroy (you know – that pair of eyes peering over the wall with the words “Kilroy woz ‘ere” written across the top…) In other words, Murphy is probably a Nom de Plume for anyone with a word to say about the probability of something happening being inversely proportional to the value of the part that can go wrong. I have read various tales that Murphy was a WWII aircraft mechanic, a building engineer, a worker on the Ford production line…

With the passing of years, the real Murphy has faded into legend. Like Kilroy and Odysseus Kostoglakis.

What? You’ve never heard of Odysseus? And yet you use his name thousands of times each day. OK, his real name might not have been Odysseus Kostoglakis, but he was a Greek gent with those initials who was chief of a Boston Newspaper many decades ago. Whenever he okayed a feature for publication he would do so by writing his initials of the reporter’s copy.

O.K.  Got it?

On the other hand – the Greek Words “Ola Kala” mean “All Good”… It makes you wonder, doesn’t it? O.K? Perhaps his name was Giorgos Mitsoglou? Perhaps he just couldn‘t write “all good” in English? So perhaps he just abbreviated Ola Kala?

But I digress… I was going to talk about Murphy. Like all good stories, there is a clear beginning” – there is one law, just like the one ring, to bind and form all other Murphy’s Laws. One Law to lead them all and in confusion bind them. I wrote that one law right at the beginning of this feature...

“If it can happen, it will.”

Six simple to understand words arranged in such a well known saying that anyone who reads them for the very first time immediately understands the total truth and depth they convey. And that phrase is something that engineers and designers have been trying to combat since the dawn of time. Our Murphy is reputedly a twentieth century character and his law, with all its amendments (just like the US constitution) is a twentieth century “life form”, but there was certainly some pre-historic Murphy who uttered the same sentiments as he tried to make a flint axe and ended up with a spark to ignite a fire.

Now quite a few readers might comment that Murphy’s Law really states “If it can go wrong it will.” A mere technicality of semantics – it’s just that the Law appears to cause more negative situations than positives… as you will see.

Murphy’s Law

If it can happen it will

First Amendment

If it can go wrong it will go wrong

(Written to the sound of snapping pencil lead and “Buggerit!”)

Section 1: Murphy’s Laws on Mechanical Engineering

1.         Murphy’ Law of Selective Gravitation

A dropped item will always fall in the direction of least accessibility

Example from real life:

An aircraft mechanic was part of the team replacing a main rotor gearbox on a Bell 47 helicopter (if you’ve seen the TV series M*A*S*H, then you know the one). The gearbox was suspended over the engine while the mechanic threaded washers onto the mounting bolts before he put these into the holes on the gearbox. Of course – he dropped the washer into the opening at the top of the engine. There was a sudden hush which came over the repair team… but not a sound could be heard of a washer falling “plink, plink, plink…”) (oh… see 2 below)  

…not a sound… except for “Phuket!!” (I went on holiday there once – a lovely island)

Extensive searching failed to reveal the hiding place of that washer. Everything was tried – even shaking the helicopter. Would you believe they even removed the engine and turned it upside down! In the end, they found the washer in the bottom most cylinder trapped between the piston and the cylinder liner.


2.         Murphy’s Law of (in)Audible Tracking of Falling Items

A dropped item will always bounce in the opposite direction to the “pling” sound it makes

amendment a: (If the dropper manages to call for silence before the dropped item’s first impact)

Rebound surfaces are noise absorbent.

Example from real life:

See 1 above

////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////

<<<  inserted during writing: Murphy’s Law of Selective Save Functionality)  >>> 

Discovered right now, at time of writing, this Murphy is apparently becomes effective whenever you are trying to write a feature article. 

The success of Ctrl S to perform an interim save during editing an MS Word document is inversely proportional to the amount of time expired since the last save.

Example from real life:

The more you write without performing an interim save, the less likely you are to actually saving your work. I lost the original draft of Murphy 3, below.

This law appears to have a few variations as well, so make sure you look out for the chapter on “Murphy’s Microsoftisms”

////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////

Continuation of Murphy’s Laws on Mechanical Engineering, 2.

Example from real life:

See 1 above

amendment b: (If the “Pling” is heard)

The rebound speed of dropped items is inversely proportional to the square root of minus one.


3.         Murphy’s Law of (in)Visible Tracking of Falling Items

A dropped item will always fall behind some obstruction to direct eye contact.

amendment a: (Effective if there is no physical obstruction to visual tracking of dropped items)

The likelihood of visual distraction increases in direct proportion to the square of the distance fallen under visual tracking.

Example:

You drop a nut from a typical “nuisance factor” height (i.e. you are on the top of a ladder). You realise immediately and switch on your visual tracking mode. But thanks to Murphy’s Third Law of Mechanical Engineering, amendment a, Sam Fox walks through the hangar doors wearing a big smile just half an inch before the nut reaches the floor. At this point you find that 1, 2, 2a and 2b all take secondary effect and the nut is lost forever – or at least until Murphy’s Law of Lost Items, amendment c.ii.a, subpara f takes effect.

amendment b: (In the event of eye contact being maintained until the dropped item comes to a standstill)

A dropped item will come to rest at a point one centimeter beyond reach


Murphy’s Laws of Motion

1.         To every action there is an unequal reaction in some direction
2.         A body might remain at rest or in motion in a straight line
3.         The mutual forces of action and reaction between two bodies are equal, opposite and collinear. Whenever it suits them; see the rebound examples above. 


Murphy’s Law of Female Selective Memory

(That’s memory you fool, not mammary!)

The strength of a woman’s memory is inversely proportional to the value placed upon the event by a male mind.

Example from real life:

Er… I don’t think we need one here fellows, do we?

Look out for the Kitchen Cynic!

You know... it has a relationship to a 'Stoic' - exept that the Stoic is what brings the babies, but the cynic is what you wash then in.

With me so far?

Good!

Well, the Kitchen Cynic is going to be an offensive little oik to some folk, or maybe not. I don't know. But keep your eyes open - I may address topical current affairs with the Kitchen Cynic's viewpoint.

For instance - why are TV producers so unintelligently unimaginative? "Hells Kitchen" For God's sake! (and everyone else's) Who the hell is this Gordon Ramsey fellow who can't even criticise a lousy apprentice cook's offerings without swearing most foully?

Just because it's "modern" to use foul language in public does not mean we need it on TV where we can force our next generation to learn that swearing is good.

Dear Gordon effing Ramsay, your effing language is so effing puerile that you deserve to be effing kicked in the effing jacksie you effing excuse for an effing third rate effing caterer! Effing swearing using effing eff words is NOT effing clever you stupid effing effnose!

It merely shows a lack of intelligence on behalf of the swearer. It shows that he paid more attention to the window in school (if he ever went there) than to the teachings of men and women still far wiser than he ever will be. Swearing is a sign - even today - that that person has lost the game.

Now being the Kitchen Cynic, I also know that if anybody reads this I am likely to get an "eff off" from about half the population. So let me just say that there are far more clever ways to run someone's performance down without resorting to such language. I for one would comment something like:

"Obviously you have a deep flaw in your character if you would refer to burnt as “slightly toasted,” you snotty-faced heap of parrot droppings! Your type really makes me puke, you vacuous, toffee-nosed, malodorous, pervert! Call yourself a cook? You couldn't even cook a pulp fiction comic book!"

...well, actually I wouldn't, but maybe Cleese, Chapman, Idle and co. would.

Oh, and if you're looking for a good curse that you can use in the presence of young children, then perhaps you could try:

Shitbumfiddlearsepiddlewiddlestinktit!

So anyway, "Gordon Ramsay's Hell's Kitchen now rates lower than the Kitchen Cynic cares to have imagination for. I'd sooner watch Baldy Man re-runs...

An Autumn Roundup

Hi there all you faithful followers of the EagleSkinning muse! It's been a while since I rummaged around for something to add to the blog. Let's just start with the fact that I have updated the website quite considerably...

...ooh lookit! He's gone and got a Facebook link on his website. And... he's even working on a "tailored" Facebook page...

Don't everyone get all excited at once please.

I have even created an aircraft livery design service. If you have an aeroplane, I'll prepare the pimping papers... And there's even an EagleSkinner logo that I could get used to - we shall see.

 No, this 'ere E isn't the logo. It's the "favicon". You know when you visit websites, you often see a mini icon in the address bar? Well they're called "favicons" and this one is the Eagleskinner's.

Well I guess that's it for this entry. Oh no, I will add some prose with, of course, humble apologies to  John Masefield...

I Must Go Fly my Beaver Again

I must go fly my Beaver again, the lonely Beaver in the sky
And all I ask is Limp for P2 and a bucket of 'Five' to steer by,
And a slick paint and the Pratt's growling song and a wabbit's tail shaking,
And to get p… MISSED! on a face full of Elmer's great brew - that's the making!

I must go fly my Beaver again, for my beautiful… terrible… 'Bride'
Has a wild call and a clear call that pulls me outside;
And I care not what the task, whether storm clouds are flying,
And not even fuel lines a leaking or sick passengers crying.

I must go fly my Beaver again, or my Havilland Gypsy Moth,
Or the Red Bull's BO or the SAAB Safir and fly on the Edge of a knife;
And all I ask is a merry yarn from a laughing fellow-rover,
And quiet sleep and a sweet dream when the long trick's over…

(The last two lines were kept - for the same reason Masefield wrote them)

And then ther'es my little iconic budgien in a couple of different formats below:

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...

Something to read...

Many years ago - more than a gog's lifetime in fact - I wrote a story on behalf of my dog...

You can read it here

In it, Sam tells a fictionalised version of a true story.

You can read that story here

Enjoy!

The Saturday Cynic...

While I am waiting for my wrist to be repaired so that I can get on with my hobbies...

Here are my satirical Non-PC thoughts for today:

Gulf of Mexico fishermen can now can their catch without an in-between step. Shrimps or Tuna or sardines in oil - from net to tin in one go... and maybe even provide a laxative dolphin-sushi for the Japanese market.

I used to be proud that BP was British... but now BP means blackened pelicans...

And guess what - some eejit has seriously suggested that the US NUKE THE LEAK! So not only will you get instant sardines in oil, you can even open a can and have a nightlight that will glow in the dark for the next 350 million years....

Listening to the financial news... Oh dear... BP announces that there will be no dividends on their shares this year. Oh dear - better check your portfolios!

The quickest way to plug the leak would have been to wad last year'sprofits into the hole. There were enough dollar bills to stuff into the hole and make a paper mache plug. Or an even more non PC suggestion would be to send the management down as plugs... Oh no - hot air wouldn't work.

Instead of hair, perhaps they could use shredded dollar bills to absorb the mess?

Cynic's thought: what do we do with all those poor dead seabirds? Wick them and light a chain of mourning candles all around the oil multi's head offices?

The swamps used to be hotbeds of illegal bootleg stills during the prohibition... will we soon see bootleg oil refineries?

Heyyyyy - beach holidays with free sun tan oil...

Maybe now we'll see fewer mutts down on the beach, cr@pping in the sand... YAY!!! Let's hear it for dog-free beaches.

Aha! It's SLD - and no, that's not a Mercedes sports diesel...

I went for an MRI scan recently and now I have the doc's report... What a read! All medical-speak with hundreds of long words like "Scapholunate Disassociation" I Googled that and other terms. Isn't Google wonderful? Anyway, the upshot is that my wrist isn't "just" sprained and I don't have so much a tendon inflammation problem. There is a definite need for surgery.

So now I join the waiting list and wait and wait and wait...

Oh well.

A New Blog

I am currently still plagued with several inflamed tendons in my wright wrist, so my FS stuff is sadly way into the background. My hand has been splinted for simply ages and using a mouse is a pain.

But I have dug out my graphics tablet (an old Wacom A5 tablet) and pen, so why not pay George a visit? Who's George? Go see:


Accidentally George