A lot of people ask how I create my scale drawings for the profiles I paint. Whenever possible, I start with source material like original manufacturer engineering drawings, erection and maintenance manuals for the airframe, and detailed ‘walk around’ photos of the plane. These are all combined to create a detailed scale drawing to base my illustration on. The album at the bottom is just a tiny sample of the images and drawings that went into the P-47D-11-RE scale drawing (the total number was in the hundreds.)
In many cases the original factory drawings have inconsistencies between them, not to mention scanning issues with folds, creases, and paper stretch which means each one must be compared to measurements I take off of actual aircraft to ensure accuracy.
