"Diamond Lil" Nose Art returning to the CAF's B-24.

[Bcook]

camo scheme will be as is albeit with a flag on the right

This sounds like a good idea.

[Lynn Allen]

Ober, you going to chime in.....

[mustangdriver]

I personally have mixed feelings on it. However I will say this. The CAF, and the B-24 Squadron owe someone one hell of an apology.

[Flashonyrsix]

Didn't the original art have Lil sitting on a finger, before they painted on the Stoll?
Norm

[Trey Carroll]

Pardon if I missed it, but what was the base behind this decision?

[Steve Nelson]

Didn't the original art have Lil sitting on a finger, before they painted on the Stoll?

I had always wondered that myself, but looking at the original Vargas pinup referenced by Pathfinder, it appears to be the lining of the mink coat she has draped around her (pic sanitized so hopefully Photobucket won't delete it.) I didn't realize the pinup was that modern, but it makes sense. That issue of Playboy would've been current about the time AM997 was repainted in military markings from her old Pemex colors.

SN

[wingman1]

Didn't the original art have Lil sitting on a finger, before they painted on the Stoll?

(pic sanitized so hopefully Photobucket won't delete it.)
SN

is it just me, but i kinda want to see the unsanitized one!

[JDK]

Just think, in the UK, they are always re-painting their historic aircraft in new schemes to keep things fresh. I think we should see more of that around here!!!

Think something got lost in the Atlantic, there, Jerry. Most warbirds in the UK offhand remain in the same schemes through most of their careers. The greatest repainters were the Old Flying Machine Co, and most scheme changes were for film and TV work or related, not 'freshness'. That's no longer the case, after that work dried up and the loss of Mark and Ray Hanna.[EDIT: To be fair, thinking through the scheme changes I can remember, some repaints were for the hell of it.]

I think you may well be thinking of the Battle of Britain Memorial Flight's Spitfires, Hurricanes, Lancaster and Dakota, which are normally repainted every major service into a new scheme, i.e. every year or so one of the nine aircraft appears in a much anticipated new scheme. However these schemes are not fictional versions of W.W.II schemes as both Ol 927 and Diamond Lil's nose art depictions, but are carefully researched depictions of accurate W.W.II schemes, chosen for visual appeal AND to commemorate (I think most WIX members would say 'honor') particular units and airmen.

(And a footnote; the BBMF is an RAF unit, and the aircraft always retain their own serials rather than the one of the aircraft depicted in the scheme.)

It's a good point to make, I agree, but actually tells a different story. The US equivalent would be the Collings' regular changes of the B-24 and B-17 schemes.

On the original question, it seems an odd thing to do, frankly. I'd like to know what's so important to "need" do that.

And as a sidelight, in the endless minutiae of the English confusions, we have an odd homonym: Lil wears a 'stole' not a 'stoll'.*

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Homonym
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stole_%28shawl%29

*(And yes, I looked some of that up...)

Regards,

[Chappie]

I personally have mixed feelings on it. However I will say this. The CAF, and the B-24 Squadron owe someone one heck of an apology.

Who? For what?


Chappie

[Invader26]

Invader26 wrote:
genuine insecurity on behalf of the current CAF Board methinks....


Considering the CAF Board had nothing to do with it, why don't you keep your thinly veiled attacks to yourself?

No thinly veiled attacks pal. I was a paid up CAF member in the mid-'70's when the place was FUN and seeking to get these babies going. The then "diamond Lil" was a fine gal. Have it your way and we should remove all of Gary's great work and re-install a few winda's too.

You won't get raise one extra buck or recruit one extra member by changing the name back. The Emperor has new clothes.......

[Bcook]

This is why warbirds should be painted correctly the first time.
Museums are just throwing money away when they repaint these things a few years later.
What a waste of money that could be put towards another warbird.

However these schemes are not fictional versions of W.W.II schemes as both Ol 927 and Diamond Lil's nose art depictions, but are carefully researched depictions of accurate W.W.II schemes

We need more of this.

[Django]

First, let me say congrats to Gary Velasco for getting the project. He's a great artist and I know he will do a great job.

I would be lying if I said I wasn't extremely saddened by this, as are my Dad, Sean and Mikey. As I said before in the other thread though, we will always have that weekend together, working with Gary, enjoying his hospitality and his friendship and the B-24 will always have a place in our hearts. I'm really proud of what we did. I was really no one in the Warbird arena, and Gary (and the CAF) took a chance on me. For that I am forever grateful. It gave me a chance to prove myself and started me down the path I'm on today with a C-47 under my belt, and a P-51 up next. I learned A LOT, made lots of friends, and discovered that because I am a graphic designer by day, I am completely obsessed with period correct typography and artwork on Warbirds today. At this point having studied the books, like Fighting Colors for years now, I have a style that is mine but still completely period correct too. In the museum at Midland, Flamin' Mamie was always one of my favorites, which should be obvious to anyone that is really paying attention.

Thanks fellas for all the love going my way. It really means a lot to me. I think I am going to find a big piece of aluminum or a scrapped out chunk of airplane and repaint the Ol 927 art for myself and slap a RAI sticker on it.

Dave Miller told me about the return to Diamond Lil and asked me to submit some concepts. It certainly was going to take the sting out of the repaint if I could redesign Diamond Lil how I thought she should be done, in a more period correct style than prior. I submitted 5 sketches based on a couple Petty girls, and some others which I don't remember the artist at the moment. All of which were from the war years. For non-historial nose art, I am very adamant that if the aircraft is depicted in markings from say Aug '44, then you simply can't use a pin up girl that came out in Feb '45 for your reference photo. It wouldn't make sense. For this case though, since it's all made up anyway, I just kept the restriction to girls from the war years. The 5th concept was based on the very first Diamond Lil as I always liked that one better than the second version. I did some research and the wartime pose was done by Alberto Vargas originally, and which he repurposed years later by adding the fur in Playboy. Which is of course what ended up on the plane, and why it always looked like something out of Playboy. It was! So I combined the original wartime version with the '60s fur and came up with a good compromise.

Dave asked me to work up #5 because the squadron wanted it to be the same as before basically, in color so I did. As a nod to the original artwork, my lettering (which I designed from scratch) was desert tan. He and Don loved it. So I was hopeful. But it was not to be.

If you click on the link below to my Facebook page (which is open to anyone whether you are on FB or not) you can see my design. There's no point in it being top secret at this point I guess.

Edit: added the FB link: http://www.facebook.com/pages/Django-St ... 7612120651

Last edited by Django on Mon Nov 21, 2011 12:57 pm, edited 2 times in total.

[Speedy]

Thanks fellas for all the love going my way. It really means a lot to me. I think I am going to find a big piece of aluminum or a scrapped out chunk of airplane and repaint the Ol 927 art for myself and slap a RAI sticker on it.

Like I said in an earlier post on this thread...they can't take what you've already done 'away' from you. For better or for worse, 'you' were a part of that airplane for a portion of her career. And the fact that you know you did it will live on forever!

No go out and create the next masterpiece!

[Pogmusic]

Takes me to your webpage. Didn't see the link to your Facebook other than the base platform...

[Django]

Sorry, I added the link to my original post. Guess it had been awhile since I clicked on my own link. The FB link used to go straight to my page. Looks like they changed that in their updates. Glad you said something!

Edit: I fixed the FB link on my website. It will now take you to my Django Studios FB page.

Last edited by Django on Mon Nov 21, 2011 1:15 pm, edited 1 time in total.