Aces High Bulletin Board
General Forums => Custom Skins => Topic started by: Aubrey on January 06, 2005, 07:49:16 AM
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I have a request that would mean a lot to me if someone could help me out.
My Grandmother's brother flew B24s during WWII. He was a very important person in the course of my life. When I was a boy, he lived with us for a while. He went to the university I did, which is in my home town. When I was little boy we would get on the bus and go to church on campus. He would walk around the university and tell me stories about the university and the guys he went to school with.
It was this influence that made me want to go to school where I did. I would love to fly with a skin from his bomber squadron and the name of his plane on my bomber.
He flew in the 487th bomber group and in the 839th squadron his plane was Chief Wapello he was the co-pilot
Lt. George R. Balthazor
http://members.aol.com/lhauenstn/487th/487thB.htm
http://www.geocities.com/CapeCanaveral/1393/markings.html
I guess there is a picture of the plane on p 140 of freemans mighty eigth book
Is this possible? Can anyone help me?
I could never in a million years do this for myself.
Please help.
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I'm working on a B-24 at the moment, but don't have that book. Can you post that picture? I'll do it if there is enough information to go on.
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I will try to get a picture somehow. I would like to thank you in advance for anything you can do. This means a lot to me.
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Aubrey, where in Wisconsin are you located? Milwaukee here.
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Stoughton
Grew up in Madison on the East Side
My Great uncle was from Fond du lac
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Could this skin be done if another 487th bomber group / 839th squadron B24 image was found and the nose art image of the Chief Wapello was found?
I know this would mean tons to Aub and it would be really cool to have skins in the game that relate to real pilots related to our community members.
Tex.
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I found a picture of the nose art. what else do you need I have the tail number and what squadrons it was in when it was flying. I can get the crews names and when it was transfered etc.
tell me any info you need and I will get it.
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Here is the picture Aub found.
(http://www.riha.nu/ah/chief_wapello.bmp)
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I reckon I can reproduce the noseart from that photo.
Ideally what is needed now is a picture of the whole plane. Failing that a picture or profile of any 839th BS Liberator would be a big help, preferably another olive drab one. Something that shows how the 839th squadron markings were done on their B-24s. Also, the 839th's squadron code was "R5" but the individual plane letter for the Chief Wapello would be handy.
Finally you should realise that the current B-24 skin has a high gloss finish. This suits aluminium aircraft but looks silly on matt olive drab skins. HTC have said they will introduce a matt/gloss switch option on the next major AH update however.
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Thanks very much for your effort, Greebo. Aub is a good friend of mine and I know it means much to him.
I was wondering whether it's worth doing it now, or when the glossy switch is introduced along with the new model... then I thought about it and realized "2 weeks" might be a while. :)
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Well all, I've decided to try this as well. This is my first ever skin attempt. Any/all comments are welcome.
I have some of the places I did my reasearch written at home, but I'm not there, so no luck with that. MOST of my research has been done based on the 2 weblinks that Audrey provided, the nose picture of the Chief Wapello here in this post, a LOT of surfing the web, including this link http://www.awon.org/awairfor.html
which has a picture of Gashouse Gus, another B-24 of the same squadron, and just throwing in what I think I know.
Unfortunately, much of what I've found relates to the B-17s of the group, and not the 24's, so I've been having a hard time seperating the information.
I'll likely use this base model as a starting place for other squadrons, especially those with olive drab color schemes as well. It's actually being created in Illustrator, so even if HiTech decides to go to 4096x4096 textures, I can resize as needed, since so far, everything is vector/shape. As you tell by the pictures, I have not even completely gotten all the coloring done. Mainly just the wings with detail. Tail fin detail/color, and fuselage coloration. Still pretty early but...
Here's some screenshots of how far I got....
SHOWING THE UNDERWING DETAL
(http://syn_knite.home.mindspring.com/aceshigh/screenshots/v4-1.jpg)
SHOWING THE TOPWING DETAL
(http://syn_knite.home.mindspring.com/aceshigh/screenshots/v4-2.jpg)
SEMI-RECREATION OF THE LIBERATOR PICTURE found on an earlier link
(http://www.awon.org/liberatr.JPG)
(http://syn_knite.home.mindspring.com/aceshigh/screenshots/v4-4.jpg)
Again, any suggestions/help is appreciated. Also, any informational help is also appreciated.
If you all do NOT want me to post updates, let me know.
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Originally posted by Engine
Aub is a good friend of mine and I know it means much to him.
you liar you have no friends. how much you paying him? :D
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This is what I've done so far. I've had to guess the colours on the noseart and also assumed there would be a group letter on the upper wing. Sorry about the low light, I had to adjust the arena time to dawn to cut out the worst of the glare reflections on the skin.
(http://www.gfg06.dial.pipex.com/chiefwapelloscreenshot.jpg)
(http://www.gfg06.dial.pipex.com/chiefwapelloscreenshot2.jpg)
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Originally posted by Furball
you liar you have no friends. how much you paying him? :D
Same thing you paid that 29-yr old. :)
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Here's a webpage with some pictures of a model that someone based off the same bomber group.
http://modelingmadness.com/reviews/allies/us/cleaverb24j.htm
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I've got the Freemans Mighty Eighth War Manual and I can't find anything on Chief Wapello. I'll keep looking though.
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Originally posted by Engine
Same thing you paid that 29-yr old. :)
you pay him in man-juice?!
you're SICK!
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Another progress update.
I have mostly everything colored. Have the tail fins, 70% of the fuselage, and wings with detail. Insignias are in place, including noseart.
Not done yet is weathering, the other 30% of the fuselage detail, the tail itself detail.
Greebo, I hope you don't mind if I continue working on this one too ;-). I am enjoying it.
I'm not sure how accurate my coloration for Wapello is either. I based my coloration on a painting of the Chief, found at this webpage
http://www.donaldheald.com/prints/prints_list.php?cat=Native%20Americans&aut=&wrk=&sortfield=&pg=3
He's in the middle of the screen, third row down. I know it says Wa-Pel-La, but I found 3 other webpages with a black and white print of this calling it Chief Wapello (I wish I could remember the links.
Anyway, here's my progress shots so far. As always, recommendations/suggestions are welcome.
(http://syn_knite.home.mindspring.com/aceshigh/screenshots/v7-1.jpg)
(http://syn_knite.home.mindspring.com/aceshigh/screenshots/v7-2.jpg)
(http://syn_knite.home.mindspring.com/aceshigh/screenshots/v7-3.jpg)
(http://syn_knite.home.mindspring.com/aceshigh/screenshots/v7-4.jpg)