| | | Jon Spayer | | Final Scene | | | Memory Flight | |
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| | Inspiration
A flight logbook is one of my most valued possessions. I saw Mt. St. Helens erupt from a United Airlines Boeing 727 on August 7, 1980. Air India was transferring my Father so my parents and I were flying from the San Francisco Bay Area to Seattle looking for houses. As it turned out we soon moved to Kirkland, Washington to spend my junior high years. Flying home we left Sea-Tac International Airport at 4:28 that afternoon. My image commemorates this historic flight in my memory. One – hundred miles south Mt. St. Helens began to erupt at 4:30.
We leveled – off and as we reached cruising altitude. By now what was left of the volcano during this, I believe third largest, eruption is all up in the air and spewing giant pieces of the mountain. The ailerons and flight crew must have had to compensate. The head flight attendant was attempting beverage service with everybody on one side of the plane. A flight attendant seated, or staring with me said not to worry about it; this doesn’t happen everyday. With my thirteen – year – old nose pressed – up against the window the mushroom cloud was at least twice our altitude by the time we completely lost sight. Ok, so then we landed and lived happily ever after.
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| | Problems and Solutions
If only taking a flight on Lightwave was as simple as flying an airplane. Originally I wanted to depict an old airline logo with an airplane flying around the globe. I achieved this in early test flights. I was using the Lightwave moon and planet texture on ball objects. For this I created an eclipse set – up in layout.
To get back down to earth Microsoft Flight Simulator II offers a good three – dimensional view of Mt. Rainer and the Pacific Ring of Fire to the south in the distance. There is actually a Kilauea eruption simulation flight on Flight Simulator II. In reality I love to fly. I have become a pilot using Flight Simulator. I flew my Lear Jet to those exact coordinates before snapping the print screen shot to import it into Adobe Photoshop. In Photoshop it is saved and becomes a jpeg file to be imaged mapped on polygons in Lightwave for my backdrop. My original idea was to use landscape and water tutorials for background.
I used the stretch and magnet tool to elongate and streamline my tutorial aircraft. Sub patch, knife, and band saw were my original tools of choice and advice from a classmate in lab. You helped me with ideas to manipulate points. I like this airplane, though one could practically simulate an aeronautical engineer if each component of the aircraft is tweaked before assembly.
I want to create detail with the array tool for the engine turbine. The engines would be enclosed in a capsule. Boolean subtraction could create a cock – pit flight – deck. An actual windshield would go here and an image of the controls imaged mapped from behind. Rigging creates my pilot if I get really carried away. I’ve drawn planes since I was a kid, so the rest of the detail would be left to the 3D Cybercorp UV Imaginator plug – in (Albee, 2003). With this I could detail and paint my plane in Photoshop. Inside illumination and landing lights would compliment as well as running lights would accent and adorn my plane in flight.
Lighting is an issue with the images. In Layout I experimented with many lighting variations. My image is displayed using extreme antialiasing and low ambient light. Global Intensity should be at a hundred percent. The only shadow in this case should be on the ground. So, like Deja – Voo I’m lifting off from Seattle – Tacoma… Seeing this, the viewer imagines the image animated automatically.
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| | References
Albee, T. (2003). Essential Lightwave 3D 7.5 The Fastest Way To Master Lightwave.
Plano: Wordware.
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