Ken Cartwright

FlightGear is a free, open-source simulator available for Windows, Mac and Linux: http://www.flightgear.org/

On the whole "American" meaning from the U.S.A., I think Duty Cat summed it up pretty well, but I'll expand on the aspect of people in other countries using the term. I think people around the globe refer to people from the U.S.A. as Americans all the time, and not always those that are friendly - how many times have we seen footage of signs and chants in many countries that say "Death To America!" I doubt they're referring to Canada, Mexico, Brazil, Venezuela, etc., when they say that. I think part of it comes from the fact that the word America is actually in the country name, and I can't

Quite the selection of aircraft there, and some really good captures - good angles and not too many people around them.

I used Avon Electric Pre-Shave - it worked great on removing goo off of just about anything with adhesive left over from stickers, etc., and I'd used it on plastic with no problem, just not clear plastic.

Mine was very similar - years ago I was building a Revell 1/32 F-14, and had masked the canopy for painting and noticed I had messed something up with the mask and had to remove it. I was using scotch tape because I didn't know better, and it left some adhesive behind. Not thinking, I used the same stuff I use to remove adhesive from left over price tags, etc., and it frosted the canopy.

Congrats! I haven't submitted anything to them in a long time, but back when I did their criteria seemed inconsistent, so I wouldn't take any rejections as having much meaning. That's a great photo, and my guess is the others they rejected were great too, they just didn't meet some specific requirement the reviewer had in mind.

That's very cool - great pic!

Great story, thanks for the link!

Seeing all the great photos here inspired me to post a few of my non-aviation photos:

I don't know if this helps at all, but here's a shot I took of one recently:

Generally speaking, what's probably the toughest part about taking a photo of a model is getting all of it in focus. What you want is as much depth-of-field (DOF) as possible, and when shooting small objects like models, that's more difficult to achieve. Depth-of-field increases as the camera's aperture is reduced. The aperture is a hole that lets light through to the film/sensor, and most cameras have an iris-like device that can open or close to increase or decrease the size of the opening, kind of like pupils being dilated or constricted. Most point-and-shoot cameras have less control o

Very nice photos David! Nice prop blur, and I'm particularly jealous of the Dauntless with the mock loadout and the Lancaster - I never get to see that in SoCal.

I'm not sure how the explanation of flyaway costs changes the equation, but according to this web site: http://www.dollartimes.com/calculators/inflation.htm $30M in 1994 is the equivalent of $44.43M in 2010.

I'll be at the Wings Over Gillespie air show that day, so hopefully I will have time to head over at some point.

On the jet sea-plane topic, I'm sure most people have seen this, but just in case: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Convair_F2Y_Sea_Dart

Not to belabor the point, but again, I wasn't trying to defend the P-51, but more point out that the 12-month time involved didn't result in a flop. Given that those fighters were the best anyone in America had produced at the time means it was at least as good as its current competitors (remember, we're talking about the P-51A here, so it's an early model as well). More on topic, they were using an existing engine and fairly standard fabrication techniques, so things like aerodynamics, weight distribution, and structural shaping were probably the most complex parts of designing it. Compare

Mark M., while I agree with your conclusion about rapid aircraft development in the current age, I have to admit that I'm not sure I agree with your supporting argument. I think it's a factor of complexity today that keeps the development time up, not that speedy development resulted in sub-par designs in the past. At the beginning of WWII, aircraft were not really much more complicated to build than cars of the day, with not much in the way of electronics like radar, targeting pods, electronic countermeasures, etc., and I think that is more what kept development times low. And to support t

In what way does your post answer or help the original poster in any way? You really should see someone about your condition -- your inability to keep from posting in computer threads where you can't offer any assistance but have the opportunity to bash Windows/praise Apple. http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmedhealth/PMH0001926/

Both shots are sharp and focused, which was probably tougher to do on the Tora! Tora! Tora! shot than the Avenger, as it looks like it was shot at a lower shutter speed (although it's harder to tell with side view shots like that one). Like everyone else has mentioned, the lighting is not great, but there's not a lot a photographer can do about that. You've managed to get the exposure to not silhouette the aircraft but not blow out the clouds, which is not easy to do. The colors look slightly unnatural, at least on my monitor, but not distractingly so, and I probably wouldn't have really no

Yeah, the B-24J and the Apollo stack look very interesting to me, definitely picking one of each up. I bought a B-24J kit off ebay a few years back and have been waiting until I had enough time to do it right, but some pieces were broken so I'm looking forward to being able to get a new one.

Amazing detail - most impressive.

Very nice, HomeBe - the first one in particular is well lit and a great angle, providing a nice view of the aircraft. I hope one day they'll have a Eurofighter fly in a U.S. air show that I can attend, as I'd love to see one in flight.

Yep, I work in the Torrey Pines area right under the Miramar flight path, and have seen them fly by more and more lately.

That was me - the V-22 article. I don't know anything about Loren Thompson, and just thought the article might be of interest.