Knight26

The viper Mk2 in the new series is definitely a whole different animal then the original viper. They are designed along the same lines, but the new viper is far superior IMHO, especially since it is much more grounded in reality, with control thrusters, reverse thrust vents, etc... Also it corrects the biggest issue I had with the original viper, the truly horrible cockpit, making it much larger with a better Field of View. FOr comparison see these pics off sci-fi meshes: 1978 Viper: 2003 Viper Mk2:

DO we know yet if the VF-1D will require any trimming to the back seater or not in order for them to fit? Perhaps we should wait on a recast until we know that.

Actaully the fission generator on the plane never powered the plane, the plane still ran on old fashioned piston props. The point of the experiment was to see if they could take a reactor up and then later see if they could use it power the plane. As you stated of course the radiation it emitted and the amount of lead shielding required shut the whole thing down though, fission is just too impracticle to use to power an airplane.

Anybody recieved theirs yet?

No question DH that the Su-37 would still kick a MiG-29 OVT's burners back to Moscow but the OVT is still impressive. Now had MiG been able to make their super MiG-29, with the canards and TVEs, then I think it could have given a Su-37 a run for its money.

Holy mother of mercy, I just watched video, that was beyond awesome, I can't say more because DH beat me to it but hot damn that was awesome, man I would love to see that head to head against a raptor.

Up at Edwards Baby, and I'm all alone

ARRGH CURSE THE NMCI it won't let me watch the video here at work becuase it is on a .ru site, argh. Must get home quickly today to watch cool Mig-29OVT video. Oh and speaking of Edwards I was forced to school some stupid little JROTC or maybe he was CAP on the validity of the A-10B NA/AW they had on display, he said it was a model, ugh.

Hey all I took some nice pics at Edwards, but not enough really, I was too busy talkign with the folks I will be working with. A nice surprise they had the F-15ACTIVE flying for the show, but it didn't do much. I would ahve loved to have seen her go head to head against the F-22. I will post the pics when I get home.

Rid us of the evil vile MG

I second that

Actually the anti-canard lobby is not from the designers. If you look a large number of the ATF and JSF concepts had canards, it was the generals and admirals who didn't like them. Engineers and designers know the benefits of using things like canards, FSWs, TVEs, etc... So you will see them on test aircraft because those are concepts and tech demonstrators, because generals and admirals don't care about them. However you want to introduce a non-standard aircraft design into the main arsenal and they will fight it because they do not like change. The V-22 faced similar prejudices until the designers said it was just like a CH-53 turned sideways, and since the generals and admirals already knew and trusted the CH-53 series they okayed V-22. Now fast forward a few years when a US designed aircraft finally goes up against a eurocanard or warsaw-pact canard. After it gets its tail handed to it in combat and the canard and or FSW gets proven to the flag officers you will see some designs for them be approved. Unfortunately right now the flag level officers are jumping behind the UCAVs, and once those get slapped down by a human piloted aircraft we will see the paradigm shift back once again.

The agile was a nice concept, I knew an engineer who worked on it at China Lake. It was intended to be tube launched and manuever by thrust vectoring, what eventually killed it was the materials used in the TVE, they couldn't stand the heat. When RAM finally came around they used the lessons from agile to make a better missile that still used manuevering fins and was based more on sidewinder. If you look at Agile it short and stubby my A-A missile standards, somewhat like the missiles in macross.

Man that is some really bad artwork, especially the closest one to the camera.

I just sent in my payment cap'n-A but my paypal e-mail is different then the one you e-mailed me at, oops.

A-4 Mongoose? It's a SKyhawk man, or a scooter.

A-4 Mongoose? It's a SKyhawk man, or a scooter.

I think Roy may be losing it, all his recent posts have been odd.

I'll stick to real life thank you very much, 35 days and counting to Edwards.

Er, what? The Exo-Squad animated series had nothing to do with Harmony Gold or Robotech. Only the toys were used as a tie-in... 335232[/snapback] Yeah I actually liked Exo-Squad.

Can we get some alien aliens, come on.

When Aliens are designed and conceptualized correctly they work well. The biggest limitation when coming up with an alien for a show is getting around the human phsyiolgy of the actors who have to play them, and not getting rediculous. I've tried to stay away from the various alien cliches in my own writing as much as I can, but it can be difficult. In an animated feature creating realistic, and truly alien aliens shouldn't be as hard becuase you do not have to be limited by a human frame. However upon seeing some of the sentinels concepts they were horrid. The problem most live TV shows run into is that they are tight budgets and so you have to make the costumes as cheaply as possible. I will appluad B5 because they at least tried as much as possible to use full head appliances instead of just, hey add a forehead ridge or some spots to make a new race. Though they did fall into that trap a couple times, ST on the other hand did it as a matter of course, make the alien look completely human except for some brow ridges, or enlarge nostrils, pointed ears, or webbed fingers, things that can be created just inside human mutation and deformation. IIRC one of the sentinals races was basically a bear with anntenae and sunglass right? I mean come on use a little imagination.

I don't see any problem with a setup ala Spider-Man or Star Wars Jango Fett. Use a properly cast actor in a suit for most of the film, complimented with a well done CGI model for some of the special circumstances/action shots. Worked beautifully in both films as far as I'm concerned. 334467[/snapback] I agree that they worked well there, but when you really look at it those shots are almost all CGI, the sets, the characters, everything. It just looks really akward when you see an actor talking or interacting with a CG character, their eyes never quite look at the right area or their hand movements seem out place. A perfect example is in AotC when Mace jumps off the transport and the clone trooper reports to him. You can tell that he is not talking to a real person, not only from the troopers movements, but his own as well.

Unless the whole movie is CG, ala FInal Fantasy I do not care for all CG characters. TO me they just look too fake, especially when they are interacting with a real flesh and blood person. Besides have you seen some of the armor that fans have made, it looks great imagine what a studio with a budget could do. Myself I will in most circumstances always prefer a guy in a suit as appossed to an all CG character.

Wait you mean she is in her mid-fifties and preggers? Sheesh they've had twenty years to have kids by this point, why did they wait, and heck mid-fifties she'd be practically menapausal.