1:48 Pilot Swedish Airforce 1950s to 1970s

The man who gives an aircraft scale

A figure in a flight suit, with a helmet and an oxygen mask works on a finished model in a way that the finest engine detail never will. The viewer sees at once how big the machine is, and that is information the aircraft alone never conveys. At a reduction of 1:48 an adult man comes out at roughly thirty-seven millimeters, so beside the cockpit of a fighter he takes up exactly as much room as he should.

The period it belongs to

The flying kit matches the Swedish Air Force from the early 1950s to the mid-1970s, that is the era when the barrel-shaped Tunnans, the slender Lansens and later the Drakens with their double delta wing flew over Scandinavia. Sweden built its own aircraft at the time and its pilots trained for operating from road strips, which is a rewarding setting for a model scene.

How to stand it in a scene

A standing figure takes more positions than it seems. It looks most natural a little way from the cockpit, turned toward the aircraft so that a relationship arises between the two; set in the middle of an empty area it looks lost instead. It pays to try the placement before gluing and to look for the direction of the gaze, because that is what decides where the viewer looks as well. A pin sunk into the foot holds it on a base.

Before painting

The casting has to be cleared of sprue nubs, the mold parting line run over with a blade and the surface degreased. The face is painted first and decides most about the result. Only after it come the flight suit, the harness and finally the helmet, where it pays to leave the visor glossy, because that single highlight brings the whole figure to life.