Hi guys. I actually started this one a while back, but I thought I might catch up here and post the WIP as it stands up to this point:

Two Birds With One Stone

Here's the skinny, straight from the combat log:

Squadron: No. 20
Date: 6/9/18
Time: 8:30 to 9 am
Type: Bristol Fighter E'2181
Locality: Cambrai - St. Quentin
Pilot: Capt. H.P. Lale
Observer: 2/Lt H.L. Edwards
Height: 18,000 to 14,000 feet

Remarks: About 40 Fokker Biplanes

Narrative:
"... the remaining E.A. had, in the meantime, made off. Capt. Lale had collected his formation and, flying South, saw formations of DH4's, Dolphins and SE5's going towards St. Quentin, about 2,000 feet below. Following them over, the Bristol Fighter formation arrived just as about 30 to 40 E.A. dived on the Dolphins.

One Fokker Biplane passed within 30 yards of Bristol Fighter E2181 (Pilot - Capt. Lale, Observer - 2/Lt Edwards). Capt. Lale put about 50 rounds into it and sent it down in flames. The observer (2/Lt Edwards) was in the meantime firing with double Lewis gun at another E.A. about 40 yards away on the left. This E.A. first spun, then appeared to gain control, but a few seconds later burst into flames. Both these E.A. appeared to be falling into the middle of St. Quentin."

This is third of three projects that I'm juggling right now. Stormchaser and I began discussing this one over a year ago. We both really like the idea of the simultaneous victory scored by one aircraft.

Stormchaser's specifications were simple: make it the same size and dimensions as Wolff's Requiem as it will hang in close proximity to that piece. The final dimensions will be 44" x 28.5". Those of you who have seen Wolff's Requiem in person know that its going to be a big boy (the Bristol itself will be approximately 33" wide on the canvas).

As for my own initial goal, I simply wanted to choose a view of the Brisfit that would highlight some of the unique lines of the aircraft (in addition, of course, to telling the story correctly).

A few weeks back I finally got an opportunity to sit down and sketch out some ideas for the composition. This is the one Nick chose, and I have to say that I too felt that it best described the action.


Of course, with a flight of Brisfits, 30-40 Fokkers, and a bunch of Dolphins, SE5s and DH-4's, there is going to be a LOT going on here. My goal is to make it action packed and exciting, but not busy, and in addition to the Bristols and DVII's I would like to include at lest a few of the other types back in the background.

Reading through the combat log you'll see that it specifically states that Edwards was firing at a Fokker on the left. However, in this composition I imagined that aircraft as having already been hit and zooming past the Brisfit so that he's now on the right. Lale's victim is already going down and he's turning the Brisfit to give chase to Edwards' victim just in case he needs to.

Yesterday I managed to sit down and work out a rough draft of the Brisfit perspective drawing. It actually isn't quite finished. There are still some details that I'm trying to narrow down - specifically what letter E'2181 carried on the side. 20Sq's markings consisted of the letters "A" through "S" located approximately below the pilot's cockpit. I've posted inquiries on a couple of forums to see if anyone might have information that might be able to help us out. I've found photos of "K" & "P", but neither of those are our bird. If I come up dry, I'll just choose a random letter.

I'm also holding off on the guns and the crew. I'd like to get the DVII's in place before I aim the Lewises.

The Bristol F2b carried 2 different exhaust configurations - a short pipe and a long pipe. I chose the short pipe configuration since a majority of photos I've seen from around that time show short pipes. Chances are, our bird carried them too.


I'll be updating this thread as I progress.

The perspective for first DVII. This is the DVII on the lower left. I changed his angle slightly from the original sketch by bringing his tail around closer to the viewer. He's now moving into the painting more than across the painting as he was originally. This will help draw your eye in more. I think a smoke trail leading back up and behind the cowl of the the Biff will really help the front end of the Biff pop out nicely.

I sat down and tried to figure out who our victims might have been and I think I've found a unit that will work well. Jasta War Diaries report 1 loss for Sept. 6, 1918 - a pilot with Jasta 71. That can't be either one of our guys as J71 was based too far South at this point in time to be in this action. By this point in the war the Germans pretty much knew that the war was lost, and many unit commanders were keeping poor records, so the fact that there is no report of these 2 victories doesn't necessarily mean anything. The fact that Lale & Edwards both report their victims as having burst into flames is pretty strong evidence that their claims are legitimate (A claim of "out of control" or "probable" could be considered speculative as it was based on what the pilot thought he saw, but to actually see flames and smoke coming out of a victim is a little more substantial).

Since I was coming up short on losses, I checked on what units were in the area. Turns out there were many to choose from - Jastas 4, 1, 59, 46, 6, 10, 42 and 5 to name a few. That didn't really narrow things down, so I then took a look at German claims for that day. Lo and behold, 2 units - Jasta 11 and Jasta 31 - put in claims for Dolphins over St. Quentin at 9:45/9:50 (the German clocks were 1 hour ahead of the allies). That puts these two units in the right place at the right time, and we know from the combat report that there were Dolphins involved in the fight.

The combat report describes our victims as "not camouflaged". In my mind, that kind of rules out the possibility of Jasta 11 with their brightly colored a/c. Besides, Jasta 11's records were pretty solid, and we would probably know if that unit had lost any aircraft that day. In contrast, Jasta 31's records are comparatively slim. In addition, there is only 1 known photo of Jasta 31's DVIIs, and its very blurry. In short, I think we can safely go with Jasta 31 and mark the DVII's with some fairly conservative markings. It would probably be fun to include some J11 DVIIs. The J11 claim was from Lothar himself, so I may try to squeeze him in somewhere in the background.

For this DVII, I went with a 4c lozenge scheme and a simple white striped pattern on the side of the fuselage. I'll do something similar for the other victim.

My next step will be to play around with the position of the 2nd DVII. I think that perhaps I can find another angle that might work a little better.

As for the lighting, my original thought was that the sun would be roughly at the the viewer's 9 o'clock high position. I thought that this would give us a good mix of warm colors contrasted against the cool tones of the backdrop. I also find that the shadow of the upper wing sweeping slightly backwards along the fuselage really helps to guide your eye towards the observer.

Russell

It looks very promising. As for the Biff's exhausts, I recall reading a piece by a former BF pilot (probably W F J Harvey) where he complained about an airworthy BF in the 1960s having 'pansy long exhausts' which certainly suggests that short exhausts were the norm on the Western Front.

Cheers

Gareth

Thanks for that Gareth. The few photos of 20Sq Bristols that I've seen seem to show the short exhaust, so i figured that would be a safe bet.

Here's some more on the project:
The positioning of the upper DVII had been nagging at me, so I decided to re-think that one. According to the combat report, the DVII spun first, and then caught fire. That being said, I decided to depict the DVII just as he is going into his spin (I've actually set the control surfaces to put him in a spin). I also decided to flip the composition so that the DVII is seen attacking from the left (as stated in the report) rather than having passed the Biff and now being on the right (as I previously imagined). I think this contrast in directions is going to create better dynamics for the piece, as well as be more accurate to the combat report.

Here is how I now imagine the scenario:
Lale has scored his kill and has started to follow behind when he notices the 2nd DVII attacking from the left. He turns to the left, into the direction of the attack, as doing so will drop the port side wing of the Biff and give his gunner, Edwards a clear shot. I'll indicate some hits on DVII in the final painting.

There are no good photos of J31 DVII's, so I simply put some generic markings on the side of the fuselage. I'm creating my values studies in reverse order on this piece - the DVII's first and then the Biff. The reason for that is that the positioning of the DVIIs needs to be final before I finish out the Biff by adding in the crew and the guns (remember that the guns have to be aimed at a specific spot to be scoring hits on the DVII).

Russ






I got the second DVII filled out. Now its time to break off of this one for a few weeks and get a couple other projects finished up. The first step when I got back to this one would be to work on the pencil study for the Bristol.

Russell, this is superb, the 'Biff' is one of my favourite aircraft.

Dolphin, there's also a reference in 'Flying Minnows' by Vivian Voss, from what I remember the long exhausts were used on Biff's used as training machines but short exhausts were the norm on Biff's on active service - I can't remember the reason why however. The pansy Biff is probably the one with the Shuttleworth Collection which has long exhausts - and a post-war radiator too

I finally got the Bristol finished and dropped in. Now its on to the background elements and compositional adjustments.




The composition with the background completed:

Good to see the twin Lewis fitting represented

Yes, that was one aspect that particularly intrigued the client as well. He wanted to make sure that the twin configuration was visible.

Coincidentally enough, I had the opportunity to ride in the TVAL Bristol down in NZ in April. What really struck me was how strong the prop wash was in the machine. Maneuvering a single Lewis around must have been difficult enough in those conditions. I can't imagine the brute effort it must have taken to swing the twins. I guess when one's life is on the line, however, adrenaline tends to kick in.

After a hiatus of a few weeks (working on other projects), I finally got a chance to get this one moved along again. I adjusted the position of the 3 main aircraft slightly and added in the background aircraft.

The background aircraft were really a challenge. According to the combat report there were a lot of aircraft of many different types involved in this engagement - Bristols, DVIIs, Se5s, Dolphins and DH4s. I wanted see how far I could push the idea of a large, intense dogfight without crossing into the dreaded realm of chaos. Of course, the background aircraft should help the flow of the piece as well as establish the idea of the huge fight, but they must not distract from the main subject.

To make things a little easier, I decided not to show the formation of DH4's They wouldn't have really added anything to the overall story or feel of the piece, and in fact, would have been distracting. Instead, I decided to focus on the fighters.

Each background aircraft has a purpose. If a particular aircraft didn't guide the eye or provide balance, then it didn't make the cut. Final count - 19 aircraft in this painting (some are really small).

I finished the color study (studies) for this one a couple of weeks ago. The original lighting scheme came out pretty well, but as I got closer to being finished with it I realized that it had some problems. I had re-shot the lighting references just prior using the Wingnut Wings Bristol F2b. The "new" references had more light on the tail, and thus, the tones were lighter. As a result, I had too many midtones on midtones in the color study. The study wasn't bad, mind you. The color and lighting was nice, but the aircraft didn't pop out of the scene as well as I hoped. Also, with all of the action and dynamics going on in this scene, too much color could make it too busy.

Upon nearing completion with the study. I began to realize that the strength of this composition lay in the lines and the shapes, not the color (which is almost always the case in any composition). The study didn't really emphasize those aspects. I began to play with other option in my head and realized that the image would be much more effective if it were backlit. I gave it a go, and sure enough - much improved! The backlit scenario not only is more dramatic, but it emphasizes the lines and shapes of the aircraft (particularly the Bristol) much more effectively.

The client agreed with me and chose the backlit version. I've already begun blocking in the big painting. I'm warming up the clouds a little more from the color study, as the color study is slightly cooler than I would like, but it should still give you the general idea.

Two Birds With One Stone
color study #1
10.5" x 16.25"
oil on Illustration board


Two Birds With One Stone
color study #2
10.5" x 16.25"
oil on Illustration board

And so as of yesterday, I've finished blocking in the local color. This layer will serve as a base for additional layers of transparent and semi-opaque glazes, which will be added in a couple of weeks after this layer is sufficiently dry. Right now, most of the tones are more neutral than they'll be in the end and the background is actually a bit light. The glazes will enrich both the colors and the values. and give the whole thing a real sense of depth.

I'm going to change the gunner's position slightly. I blotted out where I had him painted in and I'm going to adjust him so that he's standing a little higher in the gunner's position. He'll also be leaning back more against the tilt of the aircraft. I might also possibly add an additional a/c in the background too, but that's yet to be decided.


I took an quick reference shot in the mirror to give myself an idea of how I wanted to change the gunner.


(and no, the Lewis isn't real. Its a replica that I use to paint and draw from)

I've gotten the next layer of paint down, this layer will make up a majority of what you will actually see on the finished painting. Everything is progressing well and I've reached a stopping point. There are still some areas that need to be worked, re-painted, touched-up, adjusted, etc., but for now I'm going to set it aside for a couple of weeks to let this layer dry in and to let my eyes have a rest from it.

I'm happy with the way its progressing. This is sort of a poor digital shot as the lighting is uneven and you can't pick up some of the little niceties. One thing in particular that you can't really tell here is that I'm trying to keep the background a bit more loose and painterly. Its providing a nice contrast to the aircraft. In the sky I'm borrowing a technique from the Western Artists that I admire - I'm brushing in strokes of light reds and yellows into the blue of the sky. They're subtle, but it really infuses the sky with a sense of warmth and light. I'm doing a bit of the same in the clouds, too.

I've also gotten the observers repositioned and repainted. I might crop the vertical dimensions just slightly, but I haven't made up my mind about that yet. I'll wait until the painting is finished before deciding that.

Thought you might be interested in a detail from a 1920s illustration.

BTW all the photos I've seen of a F2B with twin guns in the observers cockpit have the Lewis Mk III not the Mk II. Do you have a specific reference (not that I'm objecting to artistic license).

You know, embarrassingly enough, I'm afraid to say that I'm not familiar with the visual differences between the Mk II and the Mk III. When I rode in the TVAL Bristol back in April it was carrying a single Lewis, but the Wingnut Wings site has photos of the same machine carrying twins. I've been using the WNW site as my reference.

I admire the historical accuracy in your work Russell - stunning works.

Regards,
EoB.

Superb work - the attention to detail is awe inspiring.

I had to look twice as the pencil study looked like a black and white photograph...absolutely incredible skill and talent!

Expecially as you claim to do it with a with a replica lewis gun as opposed to brush and pencil (read it again)

I will get my coat

I find that the barrel of the Lewis works quite well for holding both pencil and brush.

I believe the types of Lewis shown here are the Mk II, as used by 22 Squadron



It's hard to tell in my photograph, but on the original you can make out the other Lewis

As an aside, the twin mount appears to have a ring and bead sight in the centre of the pair.
What is the other item on the r/h gun with the red bit on the top?

With apologies for the lack of technical description..............

From what I see, the ring sight was actually mounted on the right side gun. The contraption up front is a vane sight which would pivot against the prevailing crosswind. As the vane sight pivoted in relation to the amount of crosswind, the gunner would line up the little red bead with the ring sight and that would give the gunner the necessary amount of correction for the crosswind.

A simple but effective measure - then all he has to do is allow for deflection.

Thanks Russell.

FINISHED!
Two Birds With One Stone
44" x 27"
oil on linen

Excellence in rendering and composition.

Regards,
EoB.

Russell,

A great picture.....The detail is amazing and reflects the hours of effort you've ploughed into the piece.

cheers, ET

Russell

Brilliant! Another fantastic effort.

Gareth

Thanks so much, Gents!

Superb as ever