Aircraft illustrations for publication, by John Ridyard: The F/A 18 fighter
Plan view of F/A 18 fighter drawn and painted for a book published by Harper Collins Publishers of London. It shows the aircraft loaded with a selection of weapons including lazer guided bombs, SMART air to ground missiles and air to air missiles. It was drawn on a wash and line board and painted in watercolour using both airbrush and dry brush techniques.
Illustration of an F/A 18 taking off from an aircraft carrier loaded with lazer guided weapons
A scale model was built and  then photographed using a long focus lense to obtain this action view of the F/A 18 loaded with weapons and taking off with the steam catapult.
 The Pilot climbing into his F/A 18 showing his 'G' Suit, overshoes etc. The image is drawn in pencil - to allow for close captioning and watercolour applied using wet into wet and dry brush techniques.
Above: This illustration of the pilot climbing into his F/A 18, was made to illustrate the pilots 'G' Suit.
It was to be close captioned so the aircraft was made a  ghost image in pencil to allow for legible overprinting.
Below: The F/A 18 aircraft loaded for a mission showing the ground crew, plugged in and the bar hooked over the 'shoe' of the steam catapult.
These Aircraft illustrations were drawn and painted  for Harper Collins Publishers of London for a book dedicated to the F/A18 aircraft.  A model was built then photographed using a long focus lense to obtain the otherwise impossible viewpoints and close detailing obtained from the manufacturers published data .
All are painted in water-colour on a wash and line board, using an 'Aerograph' Super 63 airbrush with brushed in  detailing.
 An illustration of the F/A 18 fighter in side view and hooked onto the shoe of the steam catapult. The huge centrally mounted long range fuel tank dwarfs the SMART and other weapons loaded on the airframe.
All images © Harper Collins/Janes
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