The Evolution of a Commissioned Painting

Not too long ago, I was commissioned to do a painting of the P-51 “ Tiger’s Revenge”. It was during the mission that Bill Lyons of the 355th Fighter Group, shot down an Fw190-D in 1944. Being able to get firsthand recollections of these types of encounters from the very men who flew the missions has been the best part of what I do. Interestingly, after speaking with Bill, who had a remarkable and detailed memory of this encounter, found it particularly interesting to hear his recollection that the German pilot attempted to exit the stricken aircraft as it arced toward earth.

The above photo was my initial concept pencil sketch of how the painting would unfold…

The background begins to go in…In this photo, I am just roughing in some background color that will soon include clouds and landscape…

Clouds begin to form in this photo, as well as some lighting on what’s going to be the ground below. Bill recalled that a dark weather front was quickly moving in behind them that day over the German landscape below. 

Bill also remembered sunlight illuminating the ground in spots as the weather front behind rolled in. In this stage, I began roughing in some of the patchwork landscape, typical of the section over Germany in which this aerial conflict took place.

Now a bit more detail on the ground below. Soon, I will add more of the dark weather approaching, and shadowing over the ground.

In this stage, I have drawn an outline of Bill’s Mustang on a piece of tracing tissue, and experimented placing it in position over the background, to decide exactly where on the canvas it would soon be painted.

Once the Mustang’s position was decided, I added white gesso primer directly onto the painted background, in a P-51-shaped “hole”, into which I would soon draw the details of the plane.

In the step, pencil outlines of all the body details of the Mustang are added. Kind of feels like an old “paint by number” project at this point!

Before beginning to add the actual color of the Mustang’s skin, I sprayed the pencil outlines with a workable fixative, to prevent smearing, then added a wash of Naples Yellow & turpentine to add warmth and cut down the brightness of the stark white primer. Once this dried, I would be ready to begin painting the skin of Bill’s plane.

These next few photos show some of the progressive painting steps during the completion of a scene of painting Bill Lyons’ Mustang, “Tiger’s Revenge”, over the background shown in the first few steps. The background is masked off to prevent smudges, etc.

In this odd looking step, I have masked off the area around the airplane to prevent unwanted smudges on the background. Next, some shadowing, texture and highlight tones are added, using VanDyke Brown and Naples Yellow. As the plane takes dimensional shape in this step, these tones will serve as a sort of “underpainting” for the final colors to come.

Once the underpainting is dry, I begin adding some of the color to begin giving the Mustang its metal skin look and feel.

More color, more tones, And the beginning of fuselage colors and markings begin to take shape…

Somewhere along this stage, it was time to shift gears away from the plane in the background, and focus on the pilot himself!Once again, the face would be drawn in pencil, then yellow wash added before the final color

Could not have my pilot keep his jaundiced yellow look! Now the flesh tones, color and detail of flight helmet, etc. are added. I also started adding a bit of tone to the plexiglas canopy around him. Also of note are other details being penciled in, such as the lettering which was part of the plane’s nose art.

As the Mustang is really taking shape by this point, it’s time to add the Fw-190. Bill had recalled following his stricken adversary nearly down to ground level, at which time he and his wingman noticed the plane crash.The German pilot was exiting the plane, and Bill recalled at times flying in very close proximity to his foe on his way down, at times as close as 50 feet away. He recalled an awful lot of smoke, but minimal amounts of fire. I tried several different placement positions for the 190, and in the end decided to vary it slightly from the initial pencil concept sketch.

The Focke Wulf 190-D9 starts taking on more shape and dimension. Interestingly, in Bill’s original combat report, he had identified his victim as an Me109 in this encounter, though it was later confirmed to be an Fw190. Unfortunately, none of us could determine the specific German fighter unit, so a bit of “artistic license” was necessary for the 190’s markings.

I’ve always considered the Fw-190 To be one of the most sinister-looking up all the German fighters. It was arguably one of their best and most formidable.

As the Mustang is really taking shape by this point, it’s time to add the Fw-190. Bill had recalled following his stricken adversary nearly down to ground level, at which time he and his wingman noticed the plane crash. The German pilot was exiting the plane, and Bill recalled at times flying in very close proximity to his foe on his way down, at times as close as 50 feet away. He recalled an awful lot of smoke, but minimal amounts of fire. I tried several different placement positions for the 190, and in the end decided to vary it slightly from the initial pencil concept sketch.