My Artwork

[s10sakota]

When I was a kid, I used to build plastic model airplanes constantly. I haven't built any model planes in about 25 years but I get the same satisfaction by building 'digital' planes! A lot of Air Force bases sell these illustrations and I've always wanted to learn how to make them. The problem is that the computer programs are so difficult to use! I was really lucky that a guy named Pat Cherry taught me how to make these using PaintShop Pro. Pat draws some really really nice caricature airplanes.

I thought I would share some of my art with you all and also show you how they are made. I'll use the F-16 as a sample since it's my favorite airplane.

The first step is to either take a good quality photo, or perhaps find one on the internet to use. The photo is just used to trace the profile. Here's the traced profile of an F-16 just about ready to touch down. This 'tracing' part took 8 hours on this drawing.



After the profile is traced and the panel lines and rivets are drawn, then I add the basic colors to the jet. In this case, it's just two tones of grey. As you can see, the airplane is still very much a 2D drawing.



Now that the base colors are added, the really fun part starts. That part is adding the very subtle highlights and shading that give the airplane a 3D look...



After the highlights and shading are done, I'll start on some of the details like the canopy, wheels/tires, lights, etc...



Next more fine detail is added. Here I have added some landing gear color, hoses, and colored the 'turky feathers' or rear exhaust nozzle.



Now at this point I can add any paint scheme I want. This one here is A/C 494 from the Michigan Air National Guard. This is the unit where I worked in the Egress Shop so I'm making some prints for my friends there.



Then once the airplane is complete, I try to make a nice background to include squadron patches or any other info. Here's what the finished illustration looks like...



Here's a couple other airplane I've made. These are all a lot of fun to make and I enjoy searching online for photos of cool paint schemes to add to the planes.






Hope you all enjoy them. You can see all of the plane including a lot of kitplanes at: http://www.flickr.com/photos/aerodraw

Tip: if you view the flickr photos, if you right click on the photo you can view larger sizes!

[Thomas Richards]

These are great! Thanks for sharing.

[iFLYblog]

Mark,
That's awesome! Thanks for giving us a rundown on how you did this! I am always amazed when I see artwork like this.

Great post!
Brent

[David Pavlich]

Terrific artwork! One of the most impressive take offs I've seen was an F15C do a full on afterburner really short take off at NAS Belle Chase. One thing, the F15 you have in the picture isn't the Strike variant. The Strike Eagle has a weapons officer in the rear.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:LAKENHEATH.JPG

David

[s10sakota]

David, you are 100% correct! I actually didn't know the difference between the Strike Eagle and Eagle when I made the illustration. I post all of my illustrations on my facebook page and when I posted this one, others commented on the error also. I fixed the error but posted here the original version by mistake. Here's the correct Eagle version (I also added the red covers and Remove Before Flight streamers too)...



I was very fortunate to fly the F-16 in 2007. I did a lot of extra work for the Michigan ANG and they thanked me by giving my an hour in the F-16. We did the AB takeoff with a vertical climb which was quite impressive! I'm sure there's a lot of fighter guys on the forums here that can give more info than I can, but it was pretty awesome to go up and do loops, rolls, vertical climbs, Mach 1.2, and 9 G turns, etc...! What a blast-I still love watching fighters do the AB takeoff, especially at night!



Of course I had to make an illustration of the exact airplane I flew...

[David Pavlich]

Maybe I missed it in the text, but what program do you use? Whatever it is, it does a terrific job. Very nice work, indeed!

David

[s10sakota]

Thanks David! I use Paint Shop Pro. It's probably not the most powerful program for drawing illustrations, but this is the software that the guy that taught me how to draw these uses so that's what I learned. Adobe Illustrator or Coral Draw are actual illustration programs....IF you can figure out how to use them!