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Issue 80 March 2014

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Front cover this issue isPeter Nield’s“Yak 9 andBf.109G”

Editorial

If any member has an objection to the Society holdingMembership records on a computer and using the informa-tion for society purposes deemed suitable by the Commit-tee, eg; the production and distribution of a membershiplist, please notify the Editor

Rear Cover ImageIs Peter’s “Glider overMountains”

A rather strange issue covering as it does theDecember meeting. Last year seems alongtime ago even though this is written earlyFebruary to meet our printer’s deadline.

Our featured artist is Peter Nield. Peter iscontribution editor and does a great jobproviding articles and images. Due to othercommitments it was the beginning of Februarywhen we realised we had no featured artist.To my delight Peter volunteered (he is usuallytoo modest) and provided a great feature.

Steve Kerry also surprised me by sendingan article based on the book I was reading.We both were looking ahead to October andlooking at WW1 aviation other than theWestern Front. It is so full of relativelyuntapped incidents - well worth a look if youhave D-Day organised.

Happy and successful painting.

Dave

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Contents

Lighter Than Air with Rob Knotts 4

Roger Markman on Colour and Light 9

The MAvAS Trophy 12

Featuring Peter Nield 16

December Meeting 20

January Meeting 21

Steve Kelly reveals some Hun Chivalry 22

Ossie’s Acrylic Painting Demonstration 24

Newsround 26

Diary Dates - keep up to date 27

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Airships, or dirigibles, were developed from the free balloon. Three classes ofairships are recognized: the non-rigid, commonly called blimp, in which the formof the bag is maintained by pressure of the gas; the semi-rigid airship, in whichto maintain the form, gas pressure acts in conjunction with a longitudinal keel;and the rigid airship, or zeppelin, in which the form is determined by a rigidstructure. Technically all three classes may be called dirigible (Latin dirigere,"to direct, to steer") balloons or airships.

Count Ferdinand von Zeppelin was the inventor of the rigid airship. He wasborn July 8, 1838, in Konstanz, Prussia, and educated at the LudwigsburgMilitary Academy. He entered the Prussian army in 1858. Zeppelin went to theUnited States in 1863 to work as a military observer for the Union army in theAmerican Civil War and later explored the headwaters of the Mississippi River,making his first balloon flight while he was in Minnesota. He served in theFranco-Prussian War of 1870–71, and retired in 1891 with the rank of brigadiergeneral.

Lighter than Air ArtBy Rob Knotts - part 3

Airship TypesInflatable envelope

Non-Rigid Airship

Inflatable envelope

Rigid Keel Semi-Rigid Airship

Inflatable Gas Bags

Rigid Envelope Rigid Airship

page 5Zeppelin's first expressed ideas for large dirigibles in 25 March 1874. Inspiredby a recent lecture given by Heinrich von Stephanon the subject of "WorldPostal Services and Air Travel", Zeppelin outlined the basic principle of alarge rigidly-framed outer envelope containing a number of separategasbags. In 1887 the success of Charles Renard and Arthur Krebs' airship LaFrance prompted him to send a letter to the King of Württemberg about themilitary necessity for dirigibles and the lack of German development in thisfield.At the age of 52 Zeppelinresigned from army in 1891and devoted his fullattention to airships. Hespent nearly a decadedeveloping technology. Thefirst of many rigid dirigibles,called Zeppelins in hishonour, was completed in1900. Zeppelin LZ 1 was thefirst truly successful experimental rigid airship. It was first flown from afloating hangar on Lake Constance, near Friedrichshafen in southern Germanyon 2 July 1900. The water colour shown below shows the scene

In 1910, a Zeppelin provided the first commercial air service for passengers.By his death in 1917, he had built a Zeppelin fleet, sadly some of which wereused to bomb London during World War I.

Many artists havecaptured themagnitude andelegance of CountZeppelin'smachines. Thepainting leftshows an earlyZeppelin in flightover the Germancountryside.

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The illustration left is ofa 1917 watercolour byFelix Schwormstädt. Itstranslated title is: "In therear engine gondola of aZeppelin airship duringthe flight through enemyairspace after asuccessful attack onEngland." Strain andanxiety is shown on thelookout's face whilemechanics concentrate onkeeping the engines fullyoperational.

In World War ISubmarine Scouts werethe first of several typesof airship used by theRoyal Naval Air Serviceto escort merchantshipping convoys and todeter submarineattacks. Here, twoSubmarine Scout Zerocraft hand over patrolduties over DoverHarbour, with DoverCastle in the background

Kenneth A McDonough's painting in 1978 effectively captures the disciplineof hand over as one airship patrol ends and another begins. You can feel thewind on the faces of the two sailors as they exchange semaphore messages.The painting hangs in the Fleet Air Arm Museum at RNAS Yeovilton,Somerset, England

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In 1919 His Majesty's Airship 'R34' flew from Britain to New York and back,achieving the first east-west flight over the Atlantic; the first double air crossingand achieved by a dirigible (airship) with a world endurance record for the flight.'R34' had two stowaways, a young aircraftsman and a cat. The R34 painting waspresented to the UK's Fleet Air Museum by the Airship Heritage Trust in 2006.

'R34'

The striking illustration shown on the right"London from an Airship", was painted byAlfred Egerton Cooper (1883-1974) andpublished in 'The Sphere' magazine on 6November 1920. It shows the airship NS11above London; apparently it was fairlycommon for airships to be flown over thecapital for official and semi-officialreasons.The artist gives the outlook from one of theairship's cabin windows. Blackfriars Bridge,with its sister railway bridge, is seenspanning the river, whilst Temple lawns andtrees are seen in the left foreground. Thetraining ship “President” is seen floatingoff the Embankment, a vessel from whichmany naval volunteers passed for serviceat sea during the war.

One the airship’s mechanics is precariously perched on one of the stays leading tothe engine.

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See part four in issue 81 June 2014

Most likely Cooper used a photograph for reference for the painting. Thisimage shows the photograph and painting side by side. While the gunnerhas been removed so many of the details and reflections in the photographhave been included in the painting.

http://flyingmachines.ru/Site2/Arts/Art4720.htm

F type Enclosed AvroMonoplane.I spotted this on thesite linked below. Itis an indication ofthe intense interestin flying machinesand the wide rangeof designs being triedout before WW1.

Jane's All The World Aircraft 1913 at

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Light is a form of electromagnetic radiation. It is the same form of energyas radio or radar, infra red heat or x-rays.

It was Newton who first demonstrated that white light is composed of allthe colours of the visible spectrum by shining white light through atriangular prism and he then further demonstrated that any colour thusproduced cannot be further split up. Thus blue light emerges from a prismstill blue.

It was later shown that reflections and refractions “obey” “laws”, suchas a reflection is as far behind a reflector (mirror) as the object is in front.Interestingly the connection between the angle of incidence and the angleof refraction of a beam of light passing through a transparent medium isthe sine of the angles (Snell’s Law). This gives us the refractive index ofany transparent material, vital in the understanding of optics. This is thephysics behind the observation of a stick seeming to bend in water.

The first practical colour photography was devised by the outstandingScottish physicist, James Clerk Maxwell. His system used threemonochrome cameras each fitted with a primary colour filter. Theresultant images were then projected together through three projectorseach with the original filters in place. Theprocess works very well but is not veryportable. Later nineteenth centuryphotographers used the system to goodeffect, most notably the Russian SergeyProkudin-Gorsky. Such images can now bedigitised and viewed on computers withastonishing results! Not until the latenineteen thirties did conventional colourphotography (Technicolor and Kodachromein America and Agfacolor in Germany) beginto equal the results obtained by Prokudin-Gorsky although the modern systems arevastly more practical.

Tolstoy in 1908. Colour photograph by Prokudin-Gorsky

“Harry Lime” (Orson Wells) in “The ThirdMan”. Perfect example of a film noire shotfrom one of the very greatest films of alltime!

Ciaroscuro is a technique using a strongly lit centre with anotably darker outer portion of the field of view. It creates a very dramaticatmosphere and draws attention strongly to the centre of attention in apicture.

A most notable exponent of this technique in photography was the famoussports and crime photographer of the 1940s Weegee. Real name ArthurFellig, he was a free lance newspaper photographer who lived and worked

mostly in New York. His nickname came fromhis seemingly uncanny ability to arrive at acrime scene or car crash before the policeor anyone else. It was said that he must haveused a Ouija board to get hot tips fromsupernatural sources!! The reality was moremundane! He cruised around in his car withall his cameras whilst listening in to theemergency radio traffic using a trunk (boot)full of large and weighty tube (valve) radiointercept gear of the period!

The origin of his trademark chiaroscuro style was very mundane! Therelatively slow speed of the film stock of that period coupled with thelimited power of the flash guns then available, necessitated wide apertureshots thus producing the observed effect!

An interesting spin off from his photographs was (and still is) “film noire”,literally”dark film”. This genre uses lighting in the same style as Weegeephotographs. It is a style of cinematography associated with 1940’sHollywood but is used world wide andhas never completely disappeared.Steven Spielberg’s latest film,“Lincoln”, uses this technique veryconsiderably. Because it is a mood thatis created, not just a lighting effect, theterm “film noire” also refers to thedarkness of plot and characterisation ina

A very typical Weegee picture.

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Joseph Wright ofDerby painted severallarge groups withstrong chiaroscuro,like The Orrery

Probably the most famous artist, insofar as the use oflight is concerned, is Turner. Below is an example thatshows the chiaroscuro style is his Dutch Boats in a Galepainted in 1801.

Light in paintings might be compared to the contrast grey scalein TV and computer monitors. The more the “contrast” the moreis the ciaroscuro effect. Artists can learn much from the photosof Weegee and the cinematographers who are masters of filmnoire. Add to this the use of perspective and composition thenthe resultant work becomes considerably more interesting andeye catching.

Roger Markman 12/12/13

Ciaroscuro is a technique using a strongly lit centre with anotably darker outer portion of the field of view. It creates a very dramaticatmosphere and draws attention strongly to the centre of attention in a

A most notable exponent of this technique in photography was the famoussports and crime photographer of the 1940s Weegee. Real name ArthurFellig, he was a free lance newspaper photographer who lived and worked

mostly in New York. His nickname came fromhis seemingly uncanny ability to arrive at acrime scene or car crash before the policeor anyone else. It was said that he must haveused a Ouija board to get hot tips fromsupernatural sources!! The reality was moremundane! He cruised around in his car withall his cameras whilst listening in to theemergency radio traffic using a trunk (boot)full of large and weighty tube (valve) radio

The origin of his trademark chiaroscuro style was very mundane! Therelatively slow speed of the film stock of that period coupled with thelimited power of the flash guns then available, necessitated wide aperture

An interesting spin off from his photographs was (and still is) “film noire”,literally”dark film”. This genre uses lighting in the same style as Weegeephotographs. It is a style of cinematography associated with 1940’s

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February`s meeting was the first of three painting competitionsper year and, on this occasion, there was no specified challengesubject. Fifteen members attended and fifteen paintings wereentered by thirteen artist members. Significantly, at leastfourteen other artist members failed to enter work for thiscompetition.The winnerof the event,chosen byconsensus,was PeterGrove for hisexcellentpencildrawing of aRAE FE2b inaction.

Mavas TrophyMeeting

04 02 14

BelowRon Sargeant’sP-38 Noses In,Storm Bird,Air Sea Rescue,Snowy Dak

LeftLady in Red byPeter Nield

BelowA.v.Roe by Terry Jones

Bottom the massiveIt’s the Red TailsBy A. Bramham

Below Australian HalfFlightby David Bates

Above Flak BaitBy C.G.Taylor

Left Simply the BestBy C.Jones

Below Farewell to VC10By J.D.Williams

Left S.Kerry’sEindecckera digital print

AboveFlying HighBy D. Taylor

RightFiat Cr42

By K. Stancombe

Paintings wereassembled on theMuseum displaypanel next day byColin Taylor, PeterGrove and KeithStancombe.

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Percival Mew Gull

Fairey Firefly at Woodford

Ringway ‘39

Supermarine Spitfire Mk.XII

Avro 748 Prototype

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1936 was a good year. The Spitfire made its first flight, the QueenMary made its maiden voyage to New York and Eddie VIII causedmajor ripples by chucking his hand in as potential King. It was alsothe year I was born in Oldham. Oldham was a dump but it was mydump so that was OK. I attended Werneth School on the Coppice. Itwas a bit rough but we got the basics. I remember well on the firstday, drawing stick aeroplanes on a blackboard with my little friendKel. German aircraft had crosses everywhere and received a thor-ough going over with red chalk as they plunged to earth. The aviationbug and a desire to draw was already there and has continued eversince. In fact, probably earlier as shown in the photo taken on thesands at Blackpool. I often wonder what I was looking at.

Around that time, my dadjoined the RAF (security)and went off to war to killHitler. He failed of coursebut at least he had a go.

Our Hero Meets the Enemy

Featuring

Peter NieldOur Hero

of the Issue

I hardly saw him after that untilhe returned home a disturbedman in 1946. I realise now whyhe was troubled as he hadwitnessed some terrible eventsincluding the opening up ofBelsen. Meantime, in my formativeyears, I had been dragged up bymy mother, two aunts and a

dominant grandma. Then my little sister came along. Bossy womenall over the place, a bit like enduring a permanent strident rash.Couldn`t avoid them. No hiding place. Probably explains a lot.

Shortly after, I moved to Hathershaw Junior School and then, insome mysterious way, I ended up at the Grammar School where,apart from art classes, I didn`t enjoy the experience one bit. Gotflogged for laughing which I though was really the pits. Got thesame again for fighting and wrecking some lockers which I supposewas fair enough. Anyway, I sat some exams and scraped throughon the minimum – but enough to get me an engineeringapprenticeship at Avro`s at Chadderton. To me, this was like goingto Heaven and I couldn`t believe my luck. After going through themill and studying atOldham Tech for 5 years Ielected to work in theStructure Test Section ofthe Research Department,eventually becoming aSenior Engineer. This wasa great job and involved acertain amount of drawingand sketching. Anothercouple of years braindamage at night schoolbrought a decentqualification and I was happy with that.

Avro Anson at Woodford

Messerschmitt Bf.109E

Then, in the early 1980’s, the Airand Space Museum opened inManchester. Wow! things werereally looking up. As with manyMuseums, a Society of Friends wasorganised and started with around600 aviation minded members.They also ran a Newsletter and, asI felt that we should have moreaviation art in the place, I

submitted an article requesting interested parties to attend ameeting in the Conference Room. This was one of the more usefulthings I have done in my otherwise boring life and, as a result ofthat meeting on 25th October, 1983, Manchester Aviation ArtGroup was born. Later on we happened to sell a painting at anexhibition of work on the premises but this is not allowed in acharitable organisation and, in order to keep the books legit, wewere unceremoniously booted out by the management. For thisreason, we became an outside body re-named Manchester AviationArt Society. In practice, little changed but we were then able tosell paintings.

In 1988, I was obliged to take early retirement because of healthissues but membership of MAvAS allowed me to pursue my avia-

tion interests in otherways. My association withMAvAS has brought memany good friends and isan invaluable source ofknowledge and advice. Aself taught artist, my pre-ferred medium is oils andone of my main regrets isthat I can`t paint quicker!

Jodel D.117 at Barton

Spitfire over Ringway

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December`s meeting was ourannual Xmas social event. As usual,books, CDs, video tapes and the likewere brought along for sale or swap.A supply of mince pies was to handbut these didn`t last very long. The9 members attending were intriguedby Colin Taylor`s small Stirlingclosed cycle hot air engine whichhappily chugged away for a goodpart of the evening. Colin, of course,is known for his interest in rubberpowered ornithopters so it was also fascinating to see thelightweight wooden model of a typical functioning wing that hehad designed and constructed himself. This was generally a verypleasant evening involving much discussion about currentprojects and future plans.

In some subtle way, the scheduled Quiz night byPeter Flitcroft developed into a video show whichincluded some great images of Peter aboard acivilian North American T6 Texan flying out ofKissemmee Gateway Airport in Florida in the late90s. This was much appreciated by the 9 memberspresent, as were the follow up videos that showedsequences of the RAF in action taken by officialfilm units during WW2.

December Meeting 03 12 12

January Meeting 14 01 14

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ONE can well believe that the discerning public, after havingbeen severely inoculated with the thousands of wonderfulphotographs from above of the surface of this sphere of ours,will look for work from the bird's-eye point of view, from thebrushes of our leading artists. It should become quite a businessto hire out to artists some of our sausage balloons to enable themto correctly record on canvas what the pilot sees when passingthrough the air, and instead of a series of moored punts at some,very favourite artists' bit on the river, it may well become acommon object of the landscape to see half a dozen " sausages" bending to the wind in the more picturesque districts of England.

Not in our Backyard ?

AIRISMS FROM THE FOUR WINDS -

Flight Archives December 1918

December Meeting 03 12 12

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Here's a snippet from "Wings Over The Desert: In action with an RFC pilotin Palestine 1916-18" by Desmond Seward

After landing, they were horrified to learn that one of the BE2Cs, pilotedby Lieutenant Floyer with 2nd Lieutenant Palmer as observer, had failedto return. If shot down, they might have burned to cinders (since the RFCflew without parachutes); if they had made a forced landing, they woulddie from thirst or perhaps be tortured to death by Bedouin. Everyone knewthey themselves might go the same way. T. E. Lawrence, who saw a lot ofthem, realized that airmen were bundles of nerves - like his Arabs, they‘lived for the day and died for it'. A plane set off to search for Floyer andPalmer, but found nothing. The Colonel suggested that everybody have ‘adamn good lunch’, which was code for drown their sorrows in drink.Three days later, on the morning of 8 March, while the only six machinesof No. 14 Squadron now serviceable were out bombing Junction Station,north of Arak el Menshiye, a two-seater Rumpler dived down from 4,000ft over the landing ground at Kilo 143 and dropped a ‘smoke ball’, followedby a message bag. Then it flew off. Because this was mistaken for abombing attack, two Australian aircraft from No. 1 Squadron, which wasalso based at El Arish, took off to attack the Rumpler, but it was too fastfor them. The message was a letter from the Germans, saying they regrettedhaving to inform their British opponents that they had shot down one oftheir machines. Luckily, however, pilot and observer had survived to enjoyan excellent lunch in their mess. The bag also contained requests fromFloyer and Palmer for pyjamas and shaving tackle, with a note from theircaptors promising that these might be delivered in safety. That afternoon,a British aircraft dropped the items at Beersheba, with a message of thanksand also an apology from the Australians for trying to intercept the

Hun ChivalrySteve Kerry looks ahead to October’s AVRO Trophy, gettingaway from the mud of the Western Front to the sand and fliesof the Middle East.

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Rumpler. German fliers, some in white tropical uniform, stood outsidetheir mess waving up at the pilot.On 13 March another enemy aeroplane visited Kilo 143. Again, the pilotsignalled with a smoke bomb, shut off his engine, came down to 1.000ftand then dropped a satchel. This contained a photograph of Floyer andPalmer surrounded by German officers, including Gerhard Felmy andRichard Falke, the two fliers who had delivered the first message. Withthem were two Austro-Hungarian pilots.In addition, there was a letter from the German commander, HauptmannHellmuth Felmy (Gerhard's brother), to say that No. 14 Squadron'smachines were always welcome to deliver messages and prisoners' kit;he gave his word that the German artillery would be ordered not to fireon British aeroplanes so long as they followed an agreed course at 1,000metres and signalled with a smoke ball over a specified point. He alsoinvited everybody at Kilo 143 to stay with him at his house in the countryin Pomerellen, ‘as soon as this boring war is over’.

How the camels sniggered

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As his subject, Ossie had chosen the 6,500 ton Monitor “Marshal Ney” gunship and portrayed it in action off the Belgian coast in WW.1 with a RNASFarman overhead acting as a gunnery range spotter. As usual, he hadprepared an original A4 pencil sketch which was then transferred over byeye to a larger canvas. The painting took approximately 4 hours to complete,excluding breaks, and the result was a very dramatic representation of theland bombardments that took place off shore in those days.

Ossie’s demonstration was attended by R. Sargeant, R. Rumbold,P . Grove, K, Stancombe, P . Flitcroft, C. Taylor and P . Nield.

Stage 1

Stage 2

Stage 3 Stage 4 Stage 5

Stage 6 Stage 7 Stage 8

08 02 14

Ossie Jones`acrylic painting demonstration

Ossie Jones`acrylic painting demonstrationpage 25

Next Workshop is onSaturday 9th Augustwhen Ron Sargeanthosts a watercolourpainting session.

Roger’s LZ48 Keith’s Buccaneer

Ossie Jones`acrylic painting demonstration

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Newsround

ASAA Success for MAvAS Member

Probable Cause

Good News

There has been no firm outcome of the investigation into theCasa of the Disappearing Brew Kit. Our investigatorstendered the following conclusions.

1 The kettles probably ended up in some back street antiqueemporium.

2 The cups, sugar box and coffee and tea containersprobably fell foul of a random sweep by the Hygiene Branchof the Health and Safety Police.

3 The biscuits were probably collateral damage from theabove raid.

The investigation team recommend that we quit while weare ahead.

Those of you who are interested in the technical drawingprocess when planning your next masterpiece, will bedelighted that Peter Nield has finally managed to getversion three of the APM (Artist’s Perspective Modeller)program back on the market.

Aviart.info will get you onto the website.

The Mavas Committee is proud to inform members andfriends that Roger Markman is a worthy winner of theAero Brush name that plane competition.

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Diary DatesMeetings are held from 7-00pm to 9-30pm in the Conference Room inthe Air and Space Hall at the Museum of Science & Industry inManchester on the first Tuesday in the month unless otherwise stated.

Tuesday 1st April“D-Day Operations”

A talk by Colin Taylor

Tuesday 6th May“Life Drawing”Model – Peter Grove

Sat/Sun/Mon, 24/25/26th May“East Lancs Wartime Weekend”

Exhibitions Officer Peter Grove

Tuesday 3rd June“Jim MacKendrick Trophy Competition”

Subject – “D-Day, 6th June 1944”Adjudicator TBA.

Editor: Dave BatesTel: 0161-284-3467Email: david-bates@ntlworld.comSociety website: www.mavas.co.uk