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Episode 0
"It is your Destiny!"
For the Velocity XL, this is the genre that will launch it all. Several ideas came together all at once regarding this arcraft and idea. I had the FengZhu Star Wars Pin-Up art on my desktop at the time, I had just completed the exterior of the Velocity XL, and in my web travels I had come across a builder who had registered his Velocity with an NC- number and made his own Starfleet badge for it. Being based on the Rutan canard wing design, which the STARSHIP is also, and which the VXL builder dubbed his Velocity a "Starship"... it hit me. The Velocity XL is the "Starship" custom that I would have designed, but already pre-exists. The sports car style cockpit, the low flat pusher tail mounted engine, and the full retracts so there's no "bird feet" protrusions.
So enamored with and inspired by the Feng Zhu Star Wars Pin-Up artwork, and Chris Vollherbst being such a valued member of the art team with his work on numerous other paints, I asked him if he'd like to try his hand at an aircraft paint based on the two Feng Zhu style Star Wars style art pieces. I know it's in-authentic for may of the die hard SW fans, but I think it's better this way, as I think the special Feng Zhu designs provide excellent deviate-from-actual inspiration for Criminy for those paint designs he came up with first for the VXL_SW.
Beyond that, Chris was really excited with a lot of other design ideas. The charter of the genre here is to break free of the "GA" goofy and swoopy paint stripes of modern design styles and push this futuristic aircraft design into futuristic paint jobs. The charter for this theme is to devise paints that are either inspired by specific craft in that SW time & space world, or some that are appropriate that would fit in and look right if they were seen at that time, and place. The thought is that space, for those fiction series, still connects real habitable worlds with atmosphere and similar needs of transportation, survey, engagement and shuttle. Also similar to the style of design you'd expect to find then and there, for some craft that are for use in atmosphere and not for space travel, but the designs and themes can carry through.
My biggest hope, and I underscore that my biggest hope (aside from the Velocity aircraft being better seen and excite some people to look into the real kit.) is that this aircraft design exploration may give some people, any people, aircraft manufacturers, aircraft builders and painters, some ideas on how to get outside the box, outside the goofy & swoopy, and really do some interesting and fun things with paint jobs.
As in any SciFi fantasy series, everyone is going to find themself predisposed to one flavor over another, maybe you like the Empire, maybe you like the Stormtroopers, maybe you side with the Rebel Alliance, maybe you like the first generation series of Nubian style craft. Even within the flavors, maybe you like the TIE fighter more than the Bomber or Interceptor.. or in any order. Maybe you like the Y wing more than the X wing. In any regard, Criminy has done a great job playing with so many design themes that there's something here for everyone. And best of all, it's real and authentic. A real Velocity aircraft could easily be painted in these colors. Flying an aircraft "in-atmo" is the same today as it would be at any place and time in the future, or on other worlds. So why not today?
This is the first in a series of SciFi style design themes. So if SW isn't your forte, watch for the others soon to come. If Star Wars IS your brand of choice.. by all means, hop in that T47 speeder and go tour the glaciers of Winter World on Hoth.. I mean.. Alaska.
"It is your Destiny!" |
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