by Joel R. Simpson

Artwork Description

CHALLENGE ACCEPTED

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Based upon actual accounts from the Great War to today, it was very common for opposing aircraft to pass one another at high speeds. Sometime their distances from one another may be very close, as in this case, or up to a hundred meters or so. Once the pass occurs, the pilots will begin to pull their aircrafts either straight up to gain the advantage of altitude or to the left to get on, what pilots referred to as, the enemy’s “Six” which is the six o’clock position of the aircraft. Here, we see a US Air Force F-4 Phantom passing a Volunteer People’s Air Force (VPAF) (North Vietnam) MiG-17 Fresco. The MiG-17 had the advantage of maneuverability versus the raw power, speed, and thrust of the Phantom. The MiG-17 also carried two 23mm cannons and one 32mm cannon whereas the Phantom, up until 1972, only had air-to-air missiles to defend itself with; the AIM-9 Sidewinder and the AIM-7 Sparrow. By 1972, the F-4 final obtained an internal 20mm gatling cannon which gave the Phantom the added firepower it so desperately needed. When drawing and then painting and aircraft in motion it has been a task to properly add in the aircrews. The size of the images makes a huge difference in the amount of room I have to play with in order to paint the men in a realistic fashion with a proper perspective to the rest of the painting. In many of my earlier paintings I just simply painted the sun glaring reflection coming off the aircraft's canopy which eliminated the need to paint in a pilot.

Artwork Details

Medium: Painting Acrylic

Genre: Figurative