kalinin k7

The Kalinin k7 puts the ekranoplan to shame. A 144 scale model is available from anigrand.

All the fun of following instructions

Sean is on spring break and is kind of bored so I took him to the hobby store and bought him a Snap Tite model. The plastic model world has changed a lot since I was buying all those models for kit bashing just a few years ago. At that time you had to scrounge around for retro models, but today the store was stocked with reissues from Revell, Monogram and Moebius—cool stuff, like the vehicles from Lost in Space, the Universal Monsters, Tom Daniels creations like Rommel's Rod and the Red Baron. I bought a small Voyage to the Bottom of the Sea flying sub that included an accessory mini sub and observation sphere. It might look nice grafted on to the Lockheed jet bomber I found last year.

Plastic models pretty much exist only for nostalgia's sake now. Everyone I knew built them when we were kids and blew them up with firecrackers at New Year's. But today kids build Lego models. It's really strange to watch the change toward hyperreal aesthetics I think we would have found Lego figures too juvenile looking.

I'm trying to figure out the economics of models. I remember that when I was a kid models cost about $2.50 which was pocket change even back then. Now, a model costs about $17. I think the price difference is a lot higher than the cost of inflation. Maybe it's licensing fees. The dollars-to-complete time ratio also seems to be higher (inversely). Back then a $2.50 model would take maybe a few days to build. Now, a $20 model can be finished in an hour or two. So not only are models more expensive, they provide less entertainment value (e.g. keeping child occupied value) for the money. Talk about keeping kids occupied—I was thinking about the balsa wood and tissue paper airplane kits my neighbor's brothers would put together. The balsa wood cross sections imitated the actual structure of the airplane. The final step was to glue a tissue paper skin onto the frame. Then you'd throw the model into the air (they were aerodynamic) and it would usually crash land puncturing the tissue paper and snapping the balsa wood spars.

Today's models are more expensive, easier to build, more hyperreal (e.g., juvenile-looking) and more forgiving (even a Snap Tite is unforgiving compared to Lego). In models, as with everything else, the past generation thinks that the current generation has things too easy.

Star Wars redux—today's version

The main idea I had today was that the battle would be between extrapolated technologies and the cyborg technologies. The extrapolated, Ekranoplan-esque technologies are baroque puffery. The engines and war machinery are all visible, but some of them are only cosmetic. The cyborg technologies are bloody and meaty. They make our heroes queasy.

The story's question is whether our young child hero will go to war or not. There would be mundane dialogue like (as they eat):

Are you going to fight?

I don't know

My dad said he would if they'd let him

In the end he decides to go and he kisses his mom goodbye. We see wounded war veterans at the beginning and the end. At the beginning the veteran is wearing a fancy cage-like contraption like the image from Chariots of Fire. At the end, the veteran is wearing a contraption that looks pieced together from wire and cardboard. Economically, the war is not going well for them.

There are three things I hate about this version. 1) It seems like a parable about sending children to war (bad Iraq war commentary). 2) It seems like a parable about the Iraq war's debilitating effect on our economy. 3) It seems like a parable about the mistreatment of Iraq war veterans.

Above: I found the very kit-bashable Walrus MK at the hobby store over the weekend so I picked one up.

Circuit bent... er, Kit-bashed V1

I'm taking a bit of a breather after the semester and engaging in true hobby activities (sort of). This is my first kit-bashed model. I took a sideways Fieseler V2 rocket (the jet usually goes on top). I then took the tail wings from a B-377 Stratocruiser and stuck them on the sides. The 377, by the way, is an unbelievably cool early airliner. In actually had a lounge on a lower deck! I then took the wing motors and some brackets from the Ford Trimotor and stuck them on top.

Right now this thing looks pretty realistic I think. Having seen planes like the assymetircal Blohm and Voss BV 237, the incredible Dornier Do X seaplane and of course, the Erkranoplan, the design is fairly tame and looks like some sort of experimental buzz bomb from before WWII. So the next step will be to try to add more stuff to it and make it a little more over the top. That's where the performative aspect of the activity comes in. How far do you go?

The actual activity of building the model is pretty fun. When I was a kid, I was always getting glue over everything and every model seemed difficult and time-consuming. Now that I'm older, the models seem pretty easy to put together. I think when you're a kid, you also are trying so hard to get everything right. I used to follow the directions expicitly and try to create a perfect, clean model. Now I just fill and sand (it's like working with bondo) if it doesn't work right. I've been building my own pins out of spare parts and drilling holes where needed. And if I'm not interested in a part, I just leave it out (like the interiors).

So here's what I've learned about kit-bashing so far. First, I'm still having a hard time figuring out what scale to get. I tend to think of everything in terms of inches, but of course scale models come in scales like 1/72 or 1/100. So for some big models it's OK to get them at tiny scales like 1/100. But for some smaller items, you have to get them at larger scales. I think the V-1, for instance, is 1/48 and it still looks small. So I've actually been going to airplane websites, finding the dimensions of the actual planes and then calculating their size at the available scales.

Second, you can't be distracted by the model, you have to look for the parts. I got some really beautiful planes like the Junkers bomber, but there's not much you can take from it, maybe just the tail section. Maybe in the future they'll have the kit basher's special in which there are an assortment of individual jets, props and wings. But now, you have to carefully choose models or you won't have anything to bash! Most plane designs have engines built into the wings for example. But you can't transplant an engine like that. So it's been taking awhile to find designs where the engines and other parts are fairly discrete. That was why I picked up the Ford Tri-motor.

Finally, I discovered that if you use the wings from a batplane, whatever you do your model will look like a bat-something!

What's up with the planes

Last night I was emailing Susan (Guo). She wanted to know if she had the right site because it was all about airplanes. Then I spoke to Ben briefly today. He wanted to know what's up with all the airplanes. So it occurred to me that it's not clear to others what is the relationship between the airplanes and some future Super 8 project.

So here's what I'm thinking...

Maybe I might have some space scenes. We're surveilling someone on the ground then we pull out and see a satellite in space along with some rockets. Or maybe this is a science fiction film and the characters fly around in what is essentially a giant V-2 rocket. Or maybe this is a war mystery and the weird aircraft is part of the mystery. Or maybe the planes and rockets are in a junkyard set in back of our main character. Or maybe the character builds his own plane out of scraps. Or maybe this is Star Wars farm boy in space type show. Our character looks up in the sky and sees an Ekranoplan flying overhead or a squadron of modified batplanes. Or maybe this looks like cheap sci fi and a rocket crash lands somewhere. Or maybe our character is trapped in a rocket floating in space. Or maybe the plane is part of a top secret military installation and everyone treats the craft with wonder even though it looks to us rather stupid and dated. Or maybe our character is a kind of superhero who uses bricolage technologies sort of like MacGyver but even more primitive and stupid.

You know, it almost doesn't matter. When I get this interested in something there is almost always a payoff. But the payoff often occurs when and where I least expect it.

More models, cinematography and Super 8

I've gone absolutely psycho buying all sorts of plastic scale models. I've amassed a pretty good set of 50's Willy Ley era spacecraft including the hard-to-find Werner von Braun space station. I have several V-2 rockets on the way plus a couple of XV-1 Convertiplanes and a Mitsubishi Ki46 III. If it's stubby, awkward and circa 1950, I probably bought it. I must have looked through hundreds of models so far. I'll be happy if I never see another Starfighter, SR-71 or Messerschmitt again. Strange, the popularity of these items. I built the Starfighter and SR-71 when I was a kid and those kits are still easy to find. Part of what's getting me to pick up so many models is that I realized that these things don't have infinite shelf lives. Even models I bought in the last few years like the Glencoe Marsliner are no longer made. I'm sort of like the New Jack FM of plastic models. I'm not looking for the MOST popular stuff, but the second-most popular stuff. I like flying wings, Lockheed Constellations and DC-3s, but those planes are too iconographic. I tend to get things with a slightly more generic quality—things that have the familiarity of a hazy dream--like you can't remember if you ever saw it or not and you definitely don't know its name.

I've been investigating cameras lately. Fast forwarded through November last night. Shot on a dvx100. Really interesting look and a pretty sucky film. The cinematography shows incredible control and craft. But it still has the tell-tale pebbly dvx-100 grain. I'm beginning to realize that what shooting on HDV got me was better looking grain. The grain is smaller since I'm down-rezzing and HDV has a prettier grain than the dvx anyway. I also scanned through Episode II. The whole movie looks like it was made of plastic. I wonder if they used the Renderman renderer? Remember, Lucas used to own Renderman/Pixar. The one thing that stands out for me whenever I watch A Bug's Life is how plastic-y it looks. I always figured that was due to Renderman.

Been looking to get a Super-8 camera. David reminded me that 8mm cameras have to be threaded by hand in the dark. No thanks. I only know cartridges. It's cool that a lot of the Super-8 cameras do varying frame rates from 18 to 24 and even 36 fps. The last time I shot Super-8 was in high school and college. I still have my Super-8 roll from my UCLA undergrad sculpture project. But I'm too cheap to convert it to video. I still remember what's in it: walking down the stairs of Dykstra Hall, plastic robots on the loose, me bloodied in a car accident. SO undergrad and totally useless. For my project I projected it onto a muslin screen. You had to lie down on a bed and put your head in a covered frame to watch it.

Expanding the scale model idea

I've been working night and day on some school projects so work on the film has stalled for at least another week and a half. However, I've still been musing about what a future film project might look like. So far, it looks like this—

>grainy b/w, maybe shot in 8mm

>something to do with strange old aircraft or rockets, if only in the background. I did pick up a bunch of plastic models on Ebay (see below).

>looks like Guy Maddin's Eye Like a Strange Balloon but more mid-century than mid-1800's.

>Hanging miniatures and glass shots. No composites.

So what is this—weird_cold_war-aircraft.com?

Perhaps you recall that my current fascination with weird aircraft began when I started making satellite models with Sean. Whether I actually end up reshooting that one scene with the satellite in place is up in the air. Regardless, I find the thought of shooting models of anachronistic air and spacecraft seductive. Maybe for another film?

Stopped by Ben's house on the way home from work the other day. We ended up talking about possible future film projects. He wants to do a character-driven piece with unromanticized yet admirable uncool characters. Something exactly the opposite of what you'd see coming out of Sundance, the UN-Napoleon Dynamite. I think he's conceiving of it as an ensemble piece. I guess it's something he's going to have to write—the only ideas I ever come up with are high-concept ideas which is why they all sound like B-movies. Like the idea about the guy who wears special glasses and gains objective vision being able to see all sides of objects at the same time. Or the idea about aestheticized martial arts fighting in which persons, bred for the game, kill each other with one stroke. Life is short but intensely beautiful for these Jungerian creatures. Or the Prairie Home Companion-in-Space idea titled Space Station X-1. The main character would narrate from a wheel space station featuring big picture windows on the perimeter of the station... nostalgia, surveillance, physics contradictions, objectivity, romance.

Ushakov Flying Submarine + more

Above is the Ushakov Flying Submarine, a hard-to-imagine combat aircraft-sub. The planes on this page are all available as (not particularly well-made) resin models from unicraft models. Like the ekranoplan, I like the way that they all look simultaneously familiar and strange, like something conjured from a hazy memory of long ago.

The Ekranoplan

While searching the internet I found this hybrid airplane-hovercraft known as an Ekranoplan, affectionately known as the Caspian Sea Monster. The Ekranoplan skimmed across the sea at extremely high speeds using what's called the Wing In Ground effect (WIG). There's something so ingenuous, magical and awe-inspiring about the thing. I love the way it looks, like something that sprang from the mind of a delirious 10 year old boy. Want it to go faster? Just put more engines on it! It's sort of like those airplanes in "Things to Come" or the six-engine Russian Antonov AN-225 (below). Note the quirky double tailfin configuration.

A photo of another Ekranoplan for your viewing enjoyment appears below. Also, watch a documentary on the Ekranoplan at YouTube by clicking here.

I think what I like about the ekranoplan is that it's bricolage wrought gigantic. It's like they took whatever engines they had on hand and connected them to leftover wings and a fuselage. Then the thing looks like it was put together by a small committee who literally tried to fuse an airplane with a boat. It's easy to imagine this design deriving from communist era military officers sequestered in a room with no real budget given the task to create a secret military craft.

Scale modeling

I bought a magazine on scale modeling the other day at Borders. It was all about how to paint and age models. After working on the satellites, I'm rediscovering my childhoold interest in making models. When I was a kid, it was all about the number of parts and then blowing up the model at New Year's. But what rekindled my interest was how easy to make those satellite models were... and my growing interest in painting and aging things. The magazine had a really cool submarine model with only enough parts to fill one small parts tree.

Maybe Guy Maddin's Eye like a strange balloon would be a good model for a next film. Make and use cool models. Shoot using low-tech lighting. Build really primitive sets. And NO blue screen.

So where's the satellite?

As you recall, this was Ben and Erik's first question upon seeing the world globe footage. That shot was supposed to look like a space scene recreated. You'd see the stars from the spinner. Then you'd see a world globe and a model satellite in the workroom and then the spinner itself. The idea was to create the sense that we were flying in from space past a potentially malevolent satellite right to the spinner. At any rate, I nixed the satellite because I didn't have time to build the model and I couldn't find an inexpensive pre-built model.

The way it turns out, Sean has been bugging me to make the Revell Vostok model he found in the closet so that's what we did today. I bought the Vostok to use as a stand in for a satellite. I really wanted to use a model of Sputnik but amazingly, I couldn't find one after looking for months. Despite the fact that the Vostok was a one-person spacecraft, it still visually looks like Sputnik, especially if you display only the spherical portion. Building the model you get a sense of the MRI-like conditions within the craft. It's really small. An interesting fact about the Vostok era spaceships was that the astronaut did not land inside the craft. After reentry, the astronaut ejected from the falling craft and parachuted down in an ejection capsule. That had to be a terrifying experience.

So maybe I'll try to convince Erik to reshoot that sequence with the Vostok model. That's if I can figure out what color to paint it and if Sean doesn't break the antennas off of it first.