John W Reid

The bottom wing layout is the same as the top except for the engine/pilot area.

Edited by me

I painted the bird all white and the base all black as I wanted to direct the viewer's attention to the overall piece not just how the feathers were done or how it was painted. The Flyer will be its natural wood color with black fittings. I don't want any distracting brass fittings showing.

This is my interpretation of a female Peregrine falcon.I have used some artistic license here.This is a puffed up bird as we often see them in the winter in Canada she is doing this in order to ward off the cold.Her crop is obviously full and she is relaxed and kind of just surveying the sky.I have accentuated these factors as I wanted to show the power and strength and mood of the bird.I have given her a curious look which I will explain later.The female is a third larger than the male among raptors, they believe that this may because she needs the extra strength for egg laying and tending to her youngsters.

Later I will experiment with forced perspective by sitting the bird on my garden table and the Flyer on the clothesline

This is about where I am now with the Flyer.

I want my Flyer 2 to be in Dayton after the initial flights at Kitty Hawk. This was a functional airplane capable of sustained flight where a Peregrine may have encountered the Flyer for the first time.

The Peregrine is what you may call the worlds first fighter. He usually attacks his prey in what is called a stoop, out of the sun, diving at over 200MPH not always in a straight on attack but often at an angle timing his strike on the fly. He rolls his claw into a ball and strikes knocking his prey off its flight path continuing he then catches his prey in mid-air with his claws. Anyone who has witnessed this believes that it is one of the greatest displays of flight that they have ever seen.

Mine too! Thank you.

I started this life-size bird about 20 years ago hoping that one day I may find a good home for him. I got into making dioramas for many years and he stood on my bench waiting to be finished. Now I think that I have found his home in a diorama that I am now planning to build.

I made my Peregrine from the picture that you see here. His head is looking skyward and I have raised the opposite foot as I think that it better suits the composition.

For millions of years long before man, the birds ruled the skies and foremost among them are the Birds of Prey, in particular, the Peregrine Falcon the great predator of the sky. I often think of what he must have thought of our early attempts at flight. The balloons were bad enough but now there is a noisy, rickety, smelly contraption that seems to want to share my sky he may have thought. Unfortunately little did he know that this weird thing would challenge him and win the battle for aerial supremacy often sucking him up into one of its engines.

"Stranger In My Sky" This has been an on and off again project of mine for years. Maybe this time I will finish it.

Something a little different.A diorama of a full-size Peregrine Falcon and a Wright Flyer.

The Chuckwagon was also a fun build.