This kind of follows on from a couple of points brought up in art threads recently, and I thought you might be interested to see this, as it shows the process of sorting out composition and perspective and choosing what to portray. Below is a photograph showing how I've gone about planning all that for a painting I'll be starting this weekend:
It will depict an incident from late August 1917 when
Edward Mannock was flying Nieuport scouts with 40 Squadron. I wanted to paint Mannock in a Nieuport particularly, as there seem to be a dearth of paintings of him in SE5as and few of him in the little French scout on which he learned his craft. I also wanted to have his face in the picture, as a lot of paintings depict this or that pilot in action, but it is only really the aircraft markings which convey that normally. Because of this, I chose an incident where Mannock's good friend 'Mac' Maclanahan, a fellow 40 Squadron pilot, related actually seeing Mannock's face during a dogfight, which he wrote about in the 1930s in Popular Flying magazine. The incident itself is also significant for the way it coloured Mannock's later preference for removing the Aldis sight, so it is biographically interesting in nature too.
40 Squadron had been ordered to reconnoiter a German airfield, much to the Squadron Commander's annoyance, as it was merely to confirm that it appeared unoccupied, based on a report from an earlier recce flight. So two flights from 40 Squadron set off in the early evening sunlight to make the recce, one flying high and one flying low, and they pretty much knew they were flying into trouble. They indeed confirmed that the airfield was unoccupied, but predictably, being over the German lines, a dogfight ensued against several Albatros fighters. During the fight, Mac relates that he passed within a few feet of Mannock's tail, who was pursuing an Albatros and aiming at it with the Aldis, but something made him turn around when he sensed the presence of Mac's aircraft, and for a second he thought it might have been a German, Mac remarking that he remembers the split second look of shock on Mannock's face before it registered with him that it was an ally. Mannock and Mac both claimed Albatros fighters during this fight, but neither was confirmed, however, they were more concerned with the fact that one of their fellow pilots, Canadian, Harry Kennedy, or 'Ken' as they called him was shot down in the fight, Mannock and Mac seeing the Nieuport fall in the swirling dogfight, but being unsure until they landed who it was, as the RFC flights involved were widely separated. This led to a few arguments upon the ground after the fight, but Mannock countered with a good explanation of why he had placed himself where he did as the fight commenced, indicating his early leanings toward the tactical thinking for which he would become famous.
Because of the moment I have portrayed, and the oft quoted remarkable ability and situational awareness some flyers displayed, I shall be titling the picture, The Sixth Sense.
As to the composition, the fact that I needed to have Mannock looking around toward the viewer has dictated the limited possible viewpoints I could portray his Nieuport from, but as it turns out this is quite fortuitous in some ways, as there is some debate as to the serial number of the Nieuport Mannock was flying on this occasion, so having the rudder end on, osbscuring the serial solves that problem, and it will be Mannock's face and not the markings on the aircraft which show it to be him.
I wanted to also convey the speed and proximity of the incident, so decided to use Maclanahan's viewpoint as an L shape to frame the composition, since there is no other way to do it without Mac's aircraft obscuring Mannock's to a large degree, which would prevent it from being the focus of the event. Doing it the way I have presented the opportunity to have Mac's scarf flying in the turbulence as he crosses Mannock's slipstream, and I shall be dirtying up his face a little to depict the cordite residue from his guns, which although mounted above his wing, would probably have been fairly thick as he actually had twin Lewis guns mounted in that position and the airflow downspill would likely have swept a fair bit of smoke into his face.
A problem with choosing to do that, is that Mac's wings could have obscured Mannock's aircraft too, so to work out the composition, I did several drawings which I was able to shift around until I came up with a satisfactory solution, which is an oblique view across Mac's Nieuport cockpit, with his head turned looking at Mannock's aircraft, so the only bit of Mac's craft that will be seen - the cockpit coaming - will serve as the bottom part of the L which frames the composition, his head being the other part of it. Also depicted, to accentuate the proximity of the two Nieuports, is the more distant Albatros that Mannock was closing on, but I have deliberately put Mannock's controls the opposite way to that which the Albatros is turning, to help convey Mannock's shock and possibly his instinct to turn away from the target if he though an enemy was lining him up for a shot.
The horizon is deliberately shifted to an angle to add to the feeling of it being a busy turning fight. The time of the incident and the fact that Mac wrote that he saw Kennedy's Nieuport glinting in the sun as it went down trailing smoke is also useful, as it means the lighting can be made interesting too, especially falling on silver doped aircraft.
All these elements should make for an interesting painting.
Al