Any aviation art collectors here?

Differnet pics, stand out from Taylors et al style

All this has finally paid off and prints of my work are now available through:
http://digitalaviationart.com/Olsthoorngallery.html

Also my latest artwork can be found here.

Thanks for the help, folks! 🙂

Many thanks for the interest and comments!! 🙂

The contrails… like Damien said it very much depends on the atmospheric conditions. Sometimes they start a hundred yards behind the plane, sometimes they come right out of the exhaust, as on the attached example. I chose the latter as it was more interesting. Although not mentioned, contrail colours is also a nice one that always provokes discussion 🙂 They can be anywhere between reflective white and pitch black, and lots of colour variations too, all depending on weather and sun angles. Check this photo…
http://skyraider3d.military-meshes.com/reference/contrails_reference_01.jpg

Displaying propellers… a very subjective thing and a never ending discussion on aviation art forums! 😀
For these images I chose for a bit of a photographic look. Being an airshow photographer myself, this is what I’m familiar with. But on future artwork I will experiment with “bent” props as seen on some wartime photos as well as full-circle props that, apart from the yellow circle, are nearly invisible.

RobAnt, I am not sure what you mean about the two-dimensional thing. My artwork is three dimentional to start with 😉 I build a virtual scale model replica of the aircraft in 3D CAD software and then use that to make the images.

Really very good indeed. I too share Robant’s concern regarding propellors in paintings, in which the artist so often simply replicates the effect of a photographed propellor, though there seems no compelling case why this should be the case, since to the eye they are generally unseen.

Having said that, I would not invite viewers to ‘paint by commitee’ since given the chance people will try to tell you how each rivet should be portrayed, and even then they will not reach a consencus. Nobody knows better than you what you are trying to achieve.

As an aside, I have found in my own painting endeavours the great value of good b/w photos as reference material. During the war, there were fewer telephoto lenses in use, and so the images do not have the ‘compression’ which looks so unnatural when painted. As b/w images, they often needed strong contrast and highlights, which can be a great help to the aviation artist.

Having said that, painting aeroplanes should be more than slavishly reproducing a photograph.

Hi Skyraider,

You might remember I’m a big fan of your work, but as you’re so open to constructive criticism (and I’m donning my aneorak for this one, after my comments on frozen propellers 🙂 ), somethings just clicked with me as I’m looking at your excellent artwork.

Do you think there’s a chance that the contrails off the P51s should start a little later, perahaps about a fuselage length behind the aircraft? IIRC when looking at video footage of aircraft making contrails, I seem to remember seeing this. As mentioned above, it wouldn’t stop me hanging it on my wall 🙂

Please folks, don’t fly off the handle. Skyraider digs the feedback (I hope!)

I really like them, but if I have to be critical I would say that the fuselarge of Hubert looks just a little bit two dimensional, especially around the cockpit, it seems to lack a little depth to my eyes (maybe I’m crosseyed). The plane above Hubert looks perfect to me.

Having said that, I wouldn’t chuck it out if it was offered 😉

I much prefer Daddy’s Girl, though.

Just had a browse through your website – WOW – very impressive.

Absolutly brilliant. These prints will easily be the centre of attention in any gallery. Well impressed. I would proudly hang them on my wall here in the office or at home.

As regards to the font, I believe that whatever style you use would be irrelevant due to the superb, attention-grabbing picture.

Spot on Ronnie – as ever! Now all you need to do is get your pitch for Legends….

🙂

TT

Thanks Marty!

After I’m done with my Corsair, I will do the Fw 190 A-6/7/8/9 series. Maybe a Dora in the future but not currently planned.

Great pics there, would be great to see something similar with FW190D9s, print them up with a cpl of signiatures and I’d buy a couple!

Thanks very much Davski and Paul! I’ll give a shout as soon as they’re available.

Skyraider, I like those so much I want prints of them! Let me know by PM when they’re available etc.

Brilliant! Having the text centred has done the trick. I don’t mind the typeface at all, they seem to use that style a lot in the ‘States and it does kind of have retro feel to it, shame there’s no lower case…

(Nice website too!)

Thanks Davski. I agree about the poor legibility and have undone the justifying of the text. It’s centered again and additionally I have decreased the spacing to improve legibility further.

Frutiger is a commercial font which I don’t have. Personally I’m not too keen on it either. It’s a bit too plain to my taste.

The font I use is BankGothic. I always liked it (using it on my website too) and today I noticed was used on some 359th FG reunion material too, funnily enough. I guess I’ll stick with it. In the end I got more people commenting how much they liked and only very few wished for something else. This whole thing could keep me busy for months, but in the end it’s the artwork that counts 🙂

So here are the latest incarnations of the prints.

And a vertical one. Unfortunately the print format is fixed, as I would’ve liked more space at the bottom.

I’d centre all the text – justification plays merry hell with legibility, especially with a font such as this (Square 721/Eurostyle…?) with inter-character space. Try a simple, classic face like Frutiger, a heavier weight for the title, roman or light weights for the rest.

The painting is beautiful – you’re very talented and yes, I’d happily hang it on my wall as well!

Davski (graphic designer and former typographer)

I’ve made some final tweaks. I’ve also filled out the text as a block, so it looks a bit neater. Do you think this looks better or worse?

I haven’t found a more pleasing looking font yet. If you have any font suggestions, I’m keen to hear them 🙂

Thanks for the support!

Thanks for the replies, guys!

I will look into substituting the font. I never was quite sure of this font myself, though I quite like it. It reminds me a bit of the RAF style fuselage codes. I tried some curly artsy fonts but they looked too girlie 🙂 I also tried more classic typewriter style fonts but they looked a bit amateuristic. Will investigate further 🙂

Very nice indeed. I’d buy a print like a shot!

Looks Stunning to me, be pleased to have it hanging on my wall.

Are there any aviation art collectors here? I would very much like to hear your opinion on the following image. It’s the first time I am selling prints of my artwork and I would like to do it right. I would like to know if this is the kind of print style you’d like to see.

What do you think of…
– The layout
– The text
– The font

Any comments & suggestions are extremely welcome 🙂

The size of the print will be 20×16 (the image being 18×12).

Many thanks for your time!

Ronnie Olsthoorn

Its a good strong image well presented, in other words I like it!

Be warned someone at some stage will tell you that you have not got this or that quite right, I remember seeing two guys having that sort of discussion about a Taylor print some years ago, I think they missed the point its art.

Regards

Eric