Developed in the early 1960s by Vickers and in service with the British army from 1965 until 2016. The type also saw service with the Indian army.

Indigenously developed surface-to-air supersonic Akash missile System was successfully test fired from complex-3 of the Integrated Test Range (ITR) at Chandipuri in Odisha.

Test:

 

2 rounds of Akash missiles were fired against Pilot less target aircraft (PTA) Lakshya, Unmanned Aerial Vehicle... www.sharegk.com/technology/akash-missile-system-successfu...

 

‪#‎gk‬ ‪‪#‎EntranceExam‬ ‪#‎OnlineTest‬ ‪#‎Aptitude‬‬

Como,Vincenzo Castella's exhibition. 180x300cm LightJet prints: scans by CastorScan

 

N3 LightJet prints 180x300 cm on Kodak Endura Paper

Scans by CastorScan

 

Stampe digitali LightJet 180x300 cm su carta Kodak Endura.

Scansioni da negativi colore Kodak Portra 160NC 12x20 pollici (30x51 cm) realizzate da CastorScan su scanner a tamburo.

  

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CastorScan's philosophy is completely oriented to provide the highest scan and postproduction

quality on the globe.

 

We work with artists, photographers, agencies, laboratories etc. who demand a state-of-the-art quality at reasonable prices.

 

Our workflow is fully manual and extremely meticulous in any stage.

 

We developed exclusive workflows and profilation systems to obtain unparallel results from our scanners not achievable through semi-automatic and usual workflows.

  

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CastorScan uses the best scanners in circulation, Dainippon Screen SG-8060P Mark II, the best and most advanced scanner ever made, Kodak-Creo IQSmart 3, a high-end flatbed scanner, and Imacon 848.

 

The image quality offered by our Dainippon Screen 8060 scanner is much higher than that achievable with the best flatbed scanners or filmscanners dedicated and superior to that of scanners so-called "virtual drum" (Imacon – Hasselblad,) and, of course, vastly superior to that amateur or prosumer obtained with scanners such as Epson V750 etc .

 

Dainippon Screen SG-8060P Mark II exceeds in quality any other scanner, including Aztek Premier and ICG 380 (in the results, not just in the technical specifications).

 

8060's main features: 12000 dpi, Hi-Q Xenon lamp, 25 apertures, 2 micron

 

Aztek Premier's main features: 8000 dpi, halogen lamp, 18 apertures, 3 micron

 

ICG 380's main features: 12000 dpi, halogen lamp, 9 apertures, 4 micron

  

Some of the features that make the quality of our drum scanners better than any other existing scan system include:

 

The scans performed on a drum scanner are famous for their detail, depth and realism.

Scans are much cleaner and show fewer imperfections than scans obtained from CCD scanners, and thus save many hours of cleaning and spotting in postproduction.

Image acquisition by the drum scanner is optically similar to using a microscopic lens that scans the image point by point with extreme precision and without deformation or distortion of any kind, while other scanners use enlarger lenses (such as the Rodenstock-Linos Magnagon 75mm f8 used in the Hasselblad-Imacon scanners) and have transmission systems with rubber bands: this involves mild but effective micro-strain and micro-geometric image distortions and quality is not uniform between the center and edges.

Drum scanners are exempt from problems of flatness of the originals, since the same are mounted on a perfectly balanced transparent acrylic drum; on the contrary, the dedicated film scanners that scan slides or negatives in their plastic frames are subject to quite significant inaccuracies, as well as the Imacon-Hasselblad scanners, which have their own rubber and plastic holders: they do not guarantee the perfect flatness of the original and therefore a uniform definition between center and edge, especially with medium and large size originals, which instead are guaranteed by drum scanners.

Again, drum scanners allow scanning at high resolution over the entire surface of the cylinder, while for example the Hasselblad Imacon scans are limited to 3200 dpi in 120 format and 2000 dpi in 4x5" format (the resolution of nearly every CCD scanner in the market drops as the size of the original scanned is increased).

Drum scanners allow complete scanning of the whole negative, including the black-orange mask, perforations etc, while using many other scanners a certain percentage of the image is lost because it is covered by frames or holders.

Drum scanners use photomultiplier tubes to record the light signal, which are much more sensitive than CCDs and can record many more nuances and variations in contrast with a lower digital noise.

If you look at a monitor at 100% the detail in shadows and darker areas of a scan made with a CCD scanner, you will notice that the details are not recorded in a clear and clean way, and the colors are more opaque and less differentiated. Additionally the overall tones are much less rich and differentiated.

  

We would like to say a few words about an unscrupulous and deceitful use of technical specifications reported by many manufacturers of consumer and prosumer scanners; very often we read of scanners that promise cheap or relatively cheap “drum scanner” resolutions, 16 bits of color depth, extremely high DMAX: we would like to say that these “nominal” resolutions do not correspond to an actual optical resolution, so that even in low-resolution scanning you can see an enormous gap between drum scanners and these scanners in terms of detail, as well as in terms of DMAX, color range, realism, “quality” of grain. So very often when using these consumer-prosumer scanners at high resolutions, it is normal to get a disproportionate increase of file size in MB but not an increase of detail and quality.

To give a concrete example: a drum scan of a 24x36mm color negative film at 3500 dpi is much more defined than a scan made with mostly CCD scanner at 8000 dpi and a drum scan at 2500 dpi is dramatically clearer than a scan at 2500 dpi provided by a CCD scanner. So be aware and careful with incorrect advertisement.

 

Scans can be performed either dry or liquid-mounted. The wet mounting further improves cleanliness (helps to hide dirt, scratches and blemishes) and plasticity of the image without compromising the original, and in addition by mounting with liquid the film grain is greatly reduced and it looks much softer and more pleasant than the usual "harsh" grain resulting from dry scans.

 

We use Kami SMF 2001 liquid to mount the transparencies and Kami RC 2001 for cleaning the same. Kami SMF 2001 evaporates without leaving traces, unlike the traditional oil scans, ensuring maximum protection for your film. Out of ignorance some people prefer to avoid liquid scanning because they fear that their films will be dirty or damaged: this argument may be plausible only in reference to scans made using mineral oils, which have nothing to do with the specific professional products we use.

We strongly reiterate that your original is in no way compromised by our scanning liquid and will return as you have shipped it, if not cleaner.

 

With respect to scanning from slides:

Our scanners are carefully calibrated with the finest IT8 calibration targets in circulation and with special customized targets in order to ensure that each scan faithfully reproduces the original color richness even in the most subtle nuances, opening and maintaining detail in shadows and highlights. These color profiles allow our scanners to realize their full potential, so we guarantee our customers that even from a chromatic point of view our scans are noticeably better than similar scans made by mostly other scan services in the market.

In addition, we remind you that our 8060 drum scanner is able to read the deepest shadows of slides without digital noise and with much more detail than CCD scanners; also, the color range and color realism are far better.

 

With respect to scanning from color and bw negatives: we want to emphasize the superiority of our drum scans not only in scanning slides, but also in color and bw negative scanning (because of the orange mask and of very low contrast is extremely difficult for any ccd scanner to read the very slight tonal and contrast nuances in the color negative, while a perfectly profiled 8060 drum scanner – also through the analog gain/white calibration - can give back much more realistic images and true colors, sharper and more three-dimensional).

 

In spite of what many claim, a meticulous color profiling is essential not only for scanning slides, but also, and even more, for color negatives. Without it the scan of a color negative will produce chromatic errors rather significant, thus affecting the tonal balance and then the naturalness-pleasantness of the images.

  

More unique than rare, we do not use standardized profiles provided by the software to invert each specific negative film, because they do not take into account parameters and variables such as the type of development, the level of exposure, the type of light etc.,; at the same time we also avoid systems of "artificial intelligence" or other functions provided by semi-automatic scanning softwares, but instead we carry out the inversion in a full manual workflow for each individual picture.

 

In addition, scanning with Imacon-Hasselblad scanners we do not use their proprietary software - Flexcolor – to make color management and color inversion because we strongly believe that our alternative workflow provides much better results, and we are able to prove it with absolute clarity.

 

At each stage of the process we take care of meticulously adjusting the scanning parameters to the characteristics of the originals, to extrapolate the whole range of information possible from any image without "burning" or reductions in the tonal range, and strictly according to our customer's need and taste.

 

By default, we do not apply unsharp mask (USM) in our scans, except on request.

 

To scan reflective originals we follow the same guidelines and guarantee the same quality standard.

 

We guarantee the utmost thoroughness and expertise in the work of scanning and handling of the originals and we provide scans up to 12,000 dpi of resolution, at 16-bit, in RGB, GRAYSCALE, LAB or CMYK color mode; unless otherwise indicated, files are saved with Adobe RGB 1998 or ProPhoto RGB color profile.

 

WWW.CASTORSCAN.COM

Developed using darktable 3.0.0

Developing !!

a day at a time.

+++ DISCLAIMER +++

Nothing you see here is real, even though the conversion or the presented background story might be based on historical facts. BEWARE!

  

Some background:

The Sd.Kfz. 141/4 Panzerkampfwagen III, commonly known as the Panzer III, was a medium tank developed in the 1930s by Germany and was used extensively in World War II. It was intended to fight other armored fighting vehicles and serve alongside and support the similar Panzer IV which was originally designed for infantry support. However, as the Germans faced the formidable T-34, more powerful anti-tank guns were needed, and since the Panzer IV had more development potential with a larger turret ring, the latter was redesigned to mount the long-barrelled 7.5 cm KwK 40 gun and the Panzer III effectively swapped roles with the Panzer IV. Later, the Panzer V “Panther” took over the role of the standard MBT. Production of the Panzer III as battle tank ceased in 1943. Nevertheless, the Panzer III's capable chassis was used for a range of specialized vehicles.

 

The Panzer III was by far the most widely used of all Axis chassis. Besides the StuG, or Sturmgeschütz III, family (9500 built), suspensions, tracks and engine were used in almost a dozen specially modified vehicles. These included the Tauchpanzer III, an improvised “submarine version” designed for “Operation Seelöwe”, the invasion of Great Britain in August 1940, the Sturm-Infanteriegeschütz 33B (or sIG-33B), a 1941-42 conversion of regular Panzer IIIs into a self-propelled chassis for the massive 150 mm (5.9 in) field gun, or the Sturmhaubitze 42 (StuH 42), of which 1024 were built. Other conversions included the Flammpanzer III Ausf.M(Fl), an Ausf.M-based flamethrower version, the Panzerbefehlswagen III command tanks and the Artillerie-Panzerbeobachtungswagen III, which was an advanced artillery observation model of which 262 were produced, appearing on the Russian front in 1943. The Bergepanzer III recovery tank was a late (1944) version affected to the Eastern Front, mostly to Tiger units.

 

Another late Panzer III development was the SdKfz. 141/4, officially called Panzerspähwagen III but better known as Spähpanzer III. It was, like the Panzerbefehlswagen III, not a newly produced vehicle but rather converted from recovered late Panzer III chassis. It was developed and introduced as an alternative to the SdKfz. 234 8x8 heavy scout cars, primarily for areas where better armor and off-road capabilities were called for, and where range was not a vital asset. In fact, the Panzerspähwagen III was more or less a direct alternative to the stillborn VK 1602 ‘Leopard’ light tank, very similar to it in many aspects.

 

As a dedicated scout vehicle, the Panzerspähwagen III was not designed to fight tanks. Its primary mission was rather to guide heavier battle tanks to potential targets in both offensive and defensive situations, and it would also act as an artillery scout. The crew was expected to race in front of the main Panzer Division or lie in wait ahead of defensive strongholds and search out the enemy. Once they had found them, they were to use speed to get out of range or a powerful radio set to report what they had seen, so that the main attack could be prepared.

Tailored to this task, the Spähpanzer III was simplified and lightened. It had a reduced crew of only four, with only the commander and a loader in a new turret - basically the same horseshoe-shaped turret that had originally been developed for the unrealized VK 1602, and which had also found its way on the highly successful SdKfz. 234/2, too. However, in order to provide the commander with a better all-round field of view under closed hatch conditions, a standard cupola was added. Another new piece of equipment was a stereoscopic rangefinder, useful for both reconnaissance and gun aiming. A stowage box was frequently mounted to the turret’s rear, too.

While the hull armor of up to 50 mm was retained, the turret’s armor was relatively light: the front was protected by 30 mm (1.2 in) armor at an angle of 20° from the vertical, the sides and rear had 10 mm armor set at 25°, and the top plate was 10 mm (0.39 in) armor, too. The gun mantlet was rounded and was effectively 40 to 100 mm (1.6 to 3.9 in) thick. Due to its small size and low weight, the turret only had a manual traverse (saving more weight and resources) and -10° to +20° depression/elevation.

 

The main gun was a 50 mm (1.97 in) KwK 39/1 L/60, which was sufficient to engage lightly armored enemies. It could, however, when firing armor piercing rounds from a favorable angle, penetrate at short range (100m) up to 130mm of armor at a 30° angle, enough to overcome a T-34’s armor – but this was not the vehicle’s task and rather a desperate measure. To support the vehicle’s escape, defensive smoke dischargers were often mounted, too. A 7.92 mm (0.31 in) Mauser MG 42 machine gun was fixed coaxially to the main gun, another machine gun of the same type was carried in a ball mount in a modified glacis plate. The latter was an attempt to improve the tank’s frontal protection through the clever use of angle instead of trying to add ever more armor and, consequently, weight. On the new glacis plate, the 50 mm armor was effectively extended to 115mm, and the shallow angle also deflected incoming rounds more easily. However, the rest of the armor remained almost vertical, so that this gain in protection was only marginal.

For even better ballistic protection both hull crew members (driver and radio operator) had only periscopes, similar to the late Panzer V “Panther” versions. Open vision ports at the front were deleted and therefore weak points in the front armor, even though the side ports were retained. Thanks to the smaller and lighter turret, both driver and radio operator in the hull also received individual hatches in the hull roof, which were greatly appreciated by the crews. They not only offered a better field of view when not under fire, they also provided them with a much improved escape route: former Panzer IIIs with turrets lacked these hatches and the only escape options from the hull were either via the turret or through small emergency hatches in the lower flanks, right through the running gear. The raised glacis plate furthermore offered more internal space in the tank’s front end, so that a new, semi-automatic gearbox could be installed, which made handling easier.

 

As a command vehicle, the Panzerspähwagen III carried two radio sets: a FuG 2 command channel set with a FuG 122 aerial, and a FuG 5 radio with an intercom system. This arrangement allowed tank commanders to listen on one frequency while transmitting and receiving on the FuG 5. This meant that the commander could listen to the regimental command net while talking to other tanks at the same time. This radio receiver could listen into a total of 125 channels, at 50 kHz channel steps in the 27.0 to 33.3 MHz range. The system had a usable range of around 4 km to 6 km, depending on the atmospheric conditions and the surrounding landscape.

 

Due to material shortages, esp. the lack of natural and synthetic rubber, most Panzerspähwagen III conversions received simplified, lightweight all-metal road wheels, which made the ride less comfortable but helped to reduce the vehicle’s overall weight. Protective side-skirts against hollow charges could be mounted, but these were normally left away since they added weight and got easily lost in action, so that their benefit was only marginal – and the Panzerspähwagen III was expected to avoid direct confrontations, anyway. Altogether, the Panzerspähwagen III weighed about 19 tons, five tons less than the final Panzer III battle tank versions with 75mm guns and uprated armor, and this markedly improved the vehicle’s performance and agility. The light turret, which markedly lowered the vehicle’s center of gravity, improved the handling, too.

 

A few Panzerspähwagen IIIs were ready to fight in Normandy in 1944, but their movements were constrained because of Allied air supremacy. However, a good use of the bocage proved that the Panzer III was still a match for most Allied tanks and that the Spähpanzer concept worked well. Only a limited number of this SdKfz. 141 type was produced, though, since resources were concentrated on the development and production of heavy battle tanks. Production numbers are uncertain, but less than 50 Panzerspähwagen IIIs seem to have been re-built until early 1945.

 

By the end of 1944 the regular Panzer IIIs were no longer the bulk of the German armored forces, and they were relegated to second line duties, e .g in composite small defensive units. And as the production had stopped earlier, their numbers decreased even more, and by fall of 1944, there were perhaps 80 still operational on the Eastern Front. By then, new generations of US, British and Soviet tanks had nailed their coffin. The type had reached its limits as a battle tank, its former advanced features were now commonly used, and no further up-gunning was possible.

 

The last Panzer IIIs fought in the Netherlands, Northern Italy (Gothic line), and in eastern Prussia. Perhaps a handful still operational were spread between desperately weakened companies in March-April 1945, like the Steiner Brigade.

  

Specifications:

Crew: Four (commander/gunner, loader, driver, radio-operator/hull machine gunner)

Weight: 19.2 tonnes

Length: 5.56 m (18 ft 3 in), hull only

6,04 m (19 ft 10 in) overall

Width: 2.90 m (9 ft 6 in)

Height: 2.41 m (7 ft 11 in) w/o antenna mast

Suspension: Torsion bar

Fuel capacity: 320 liter

 

Armor:

15 – 50 mm (0.6 – 1.97 in)

 

Performance:

Maximum road speed: 44 km/h (27 mph)

Off-road speed: 28 km/h (18 mph)

Operational range: 165 km (103 mi) with internal fuel

Power/weight: 15.63 PS (11.24 kW)/tonne

 

Engine:

Maybach HL120 TRM water-cooled 12-cylinder gasoline engine with 300 PS (296 hp, 220 kW),

combined with a Maybach OG 55 11 77 semi-automatic transmission

 

Armament:

1× 50 mm (1.97 in) KwK 39/1 L/60 with sixty rounds

2× 7.92 mm MG 42 machine guns (coaxial with main gun and in the front hull) with 2.400 rounds

  

The kit and its assembly:

This converted Panzer III was spawned by the idea that, by 1944, this 1936 design could have been re-built for a different use than a battle tank – a task for which this medium tank had become much too light, with an utter lack of development potential. A dedicated recce variant appeared plausible. This idea was further promoted by the fact that I had a surplus VK 1602 turret in the donor bank, left over from a Hasegawa SdKfz. 234/2 “Puma”.

 

The chassis was taken from a Revell “Panzer III Ostwind” kit and modified in two ways. Firstly, I changed the glacis plate, replacing the old-school vertical front with a sloped alternative, crafted from styrene sheet pieces. A new ball mount for the hull machine gun was added, as well as periscopes for the crew on new hatches, which became possible through the smaller turret.

The turret opening in the hull had not to be adapted to the smaller Puma turret – the latter was only a little bit smaller than the opening, so that some spacers were enough to make it fit snuggly, and a thin “distance ring” between hull and turret was added, too, so that it would not directly sit on the body. Fairings for a stereoscopic rangefinder were added to the turret flanks, scratched from styrene profile material, and I also added a typical Panzer III stowage box to the turret’s rear. It had to be customized to the smaller “Puma” turret, but I think that this visual enlargement of the turret is a good balance to the rest of the hull, and the box changes the vehicle’s silhouette, too. The commando cupola from the Revell kit (which comes, beyond the open “Ostwind” AA turret, with a full, early standard Panzer III turret) was left open, using the hatch from the VK 1602 turret, and I put a figure into the opening – this German commanding officer is actually 1:76, but that’s not obvious. The figure comes IIRC from a Matchbox “Wespe” SPG that I built more than 30 years ago. Since the figure had somehow lost a leg in the meantime, the Panzerspähwagen III became a suitable new workplace for the handicapped, after having been stripped off of an old enamel paint layer and outfitted with a multi-colored new uniform. Other small changes include the scratched antenna mast for the vehicle’s uprated radio equipment (from heated sprue material) and some re-arranged external equipment.

 

As another, subtle gimmick, I replaced the original main wheels, for a different and somewhat confusing look. A simplified running gear, without rubber on the main wheels, appeared quite plausible for 1944 onwards. The new road wheels came from a Zvezda IS-2 tank. I had a dozen of these left over from another conversion project, just in the right number and their diameter is virtually identical to the Panzer III’s original wheels! Just the spare wheels had to be taken over from the Revell kit. The fiddly OOB segmented plastic tracks were replaced with soft vinyl tracks from a Panzer III/IV CMK aftermarket set. Personally, I find them easier to handle and to paint – due to their anthracite black color and the material’s smoothness. Nice stuff!

  

Painting and markings:

As a late WWII vehicle I decided to apply a non-standard/fictional paint scheme, something different from the popular “Hinterhalt” scheme, and I settled upon a pattern similar to an E-100 tank I had built a while ago. The scheme consists of an overall coat of grey-green (RLM02, a universal and omnipresent tone) with disrupting, large spots of dark grey (RAL 7021, Schwarzgrau), which were strategically placed over corners and edges of the hull, so that the outlines break up. I adapted the concept onto my modified Panzer III, but somehow this looked goofy – probably due to the much smaller size and classic tank silhouette of the vehicle: the whole affair was way too reminiscent of the Allied late-war “Mickey Mouse” scheme in olive drab and black!

 

In order to provide a more outstanding look and lighten everything up a little, I added small grey-green mottles to the dark grey areas. After that, however, the still uniform grey-green areas stood out, so that I eventually applied mottles in RAL 7028 (Dunkelgelb) to these areas, too. The contrast is rather low, but I think that the overall look is in the end more balanced with them, and the mottles overall help to break up the outlines even further – and the paint scheme looks more “different” now. The wheels and the running gear sections of the hull were – as a standard order of the time – left without the mottles, because the swirling patterns would be rather obvious when the vehicle was moving.

 

The basic tones are Revell 45, Humbrol 67 and ModelMaster 1584, later treated with a dark, red-brown overall washing with acrylic paint, dry-painting with a greyish beige all over (Revell 89, nice weathering tone for fresh, clayish mud) and some watercolor in ochre and umbra for dust and mud residues. Tactical markings are minimal and come from the Revell Ostwind kit and a Hasegawa Panther. Finally, the kit was sealed with matt acrylic varnish and some mineral pigments were dusted onto the model’s lower areas.

  

An interesting result, and the fictional Panzerkampfwagen III looks IMHO disturbingly plausible, as it combines well-known elements and comes with subtle updates/modifications. And somehow the vehicle (unintentionally) reminds me a lot of the comparable M24 Chaffee. And isn’t there a certain look of a mini KV-1, due to the turret’s shape and proportions?

Developed using darktable 3.4.0

developed with Compard Digibase C-41 Kit, DLRS Scan

Camarillo, California

I developed the lumen photograms in dilute developer, or fixed direc, or first bleached before processing, then developing in dilute paper developer and then fixing. They now should be real to light. When first bleaching it goes more to gray black, when first developing it keeps the brown color from the exposure.

 

After exposure, first bleached in C41 bleach then redeveloped in dilute paper developer in light by inspection pulled washed and fixed. This gives a more grey final image.

Deb shows some of the botanical illustration skills she learned at the Denver Botanic Gardens a few years ago.

 

When she took ink drawing, one time the instructor asked to see her preliminary pencil sketch. She asked "My what?" She had been doing ink direct to paper with no preliminary pencil drawing, as she still mostly does. The watercolor follows after the ink is totally dry.

Fuji Klasse, Expired Lucky SHD ISO 100

Self Developed, D76 1:1, 14 Minutes

Canoscan 9000f, 4800dpi

Collection:

Images from the History of Medicine (IHM)

 

Publication:

Produced: 1918

 

Language(s):

English

 

Format:

Still image

 

Subject(s):

Hospitals, Military,

Military Personnel,

Nurses, Canada,

Leek Island Military Hospital.

 

Genre(s):

Photograph

 

Abstract:

Black and white photograph of a uniformed soldier lying in a chair outside, with a blanket over him, developing film. Standing around him are 2 uniformed soldiers, 2 nurses, and 2 orderlies.

 

Related Title(s):

Is part of: Leek Island Military Hospital.; See related catalog record: 101744383

 

Extent:

1 photograph : 11 x 7 cm

 

Technique:

silver gelatin DOP, black and white

 

NLM Unique ID:

101766712

 

Permanent Link:

resource.nlm.nih.gov/101766712

Developed using darktable 3.0.0

Finally developed a roll of 120 b/w from one of my Holgas...

Kathakali (Malayalam: കഥകളി, kathakaḷi; Sanskrit: कथाकळिः, kathākaḷiḥ) is a stylized classical Indian dance-drama noted for the attractive make-up of characters, elaborate costumes, detailed gestures and well-defined body movements presented in tune with the anchor playback music and complementary percussion. It originated in the country's present day state of Kerala during the 17th century and has developed over the years with improved looks, refined gestures and added themes besides more ornate singing and precise drumming.

 

HISTORY

Popular belief is that kathakali is emerged from "Krishnanattam", the dance drama on the life and activities of Lord Krishna created by Sri Manavedan Raja, the Zamorin of Calicut (1585-1658 AD). Once Kottarakkara Thampuran, the Raja of Kottarakkara who was attracted by Krishnanattam requested the Zamorin for the loan of a troupe of performers. Due to the political rivalry between the two, Zamorin did not allow this. So Kottarakkara Thampuran created another art form called Ramanattam which was later transformed into Aattakatha. Krishnanaattam was written in Sanskrit, and Ramanattam was in Malayalam. By the end of 17th century, Attakatha was presented to the world with the title 'Kathakali'.

 

Kathakali also shares a lot of similarities with Krishnanattam, Koodiyattam (a classical Sanskrit drama existing in Kerala) and Ashtapadiyattam (an adaptation of 12th-century musical called Gitagovindam). It also incorporates several other elements from traditional and ritualistic art forms like Mudiyettu, Thiyyattu, Theyyam and Padayani besides a minor share of folk arts like Porattunatakam. All along, the martial art of Kalarippayattu has influenced the body language of Kathakali. The use of Malayalam, the local language (albeit as a mix of Sanskrit and Malayalam, called 'Manipravaalam'), has also helped the literature of Kathakali sound more transparent for the average audience.

 

As a part of modernising, propagating, promoting and popularizing Kathakali, the International Centre for Kathakali at New Delhi has taken up a continuing project since 1980 of producing new plays based on not only traditional and mythological stories, but also historical stories, European classics and Shakespeare's plays. Recently they produced Kathakali plays based on Shakespeare's Othello and Greek-Roman mythology of Psyche and Cupid.

 

Even though the lyrics/literature would qualify as another independent element called Sahithyam, it is considered as a component of Geetha or music, as it plays only a supplementary role to Nritham, Nrithyam and Natyam.

 

KATHAKALI PLAYS

Traditionally there are 101 classical Kathakali stories, though the commonly staged among them these days total less than one-third that number. Almost all of them were initially composed to last a whole night. Nowadays, there is increasing popularity for concise, or oftener select, versions of stories so as the performance lasts not more than three to four hours from evening. Thus, many stories find stage presentation in parts rather than totality. And the selection is based on criteria like choreographical beauty, thematic relevance/popularity or their melodramatic elements. Kathakali is a classical art form, but it can be appreciated also by novices—all contributed by the elegant looks of its character, their abstract movement and its synchronisation with the musical notes and rhythmic beats. And, in any case, the folk elements too continue to exist. For better appreciation, perhaps, it is still good to have an idea of the story being enacted.

 

The most popular stories enacted are Nalacharitham (a story from the Mahabharata), Duryodhana Vadham (focusing on the Mahabharata war after profiling the build-up to it), Kalyanasougandhikam, (the story of Bhima going to get flowers for his wife Panchali), Keechakavadham (another story of Bhima and Panchali, but this time during their stint in disguise), Kiratham (Arjuna and Lord Shiva's fight, from the Mahabharata), Karnashapatham (another story from the Mahabharata), Nizhalkuthu and Bhadrakalivijayam authored by Pannisseri Nanu Pillai. Also staged frequently include stories like Kuchelavrittam, Santanagopalam, Balivijayam, Dakshayagam, Rugminiswayamvaram, Kalakeyavadham, Kirmeeravadham, Bakavadham, Poothanamoksham, Subhadraharanam, Balivadham, Rugmangadacharitam, Ravanolbhavam, Narakasuravadham, Uttaraswayamvaram, Harishchandracharitam, Kacha-Devayani and Kamsavadham.

 

Recently, as part of attempts to further popularise the art, stories from other cultures and mythologies, such as those of Mary Magdalene from the Bible, Homer's Iliad, and William Shakespeare's King Lear and Julius Caesar besides Goethe's Faust too have been adapted into Kathakali scripts and on to its stage. Synopsis of 37 kathakali stories are available in kathakalinews.com.

 

MUSIC

The language of the songs used for Kathakali is Manipravalam. Though most of the songs are set in ragas based on the microtone-heavy Carnatic music, there is a distinct style of plain-note rendition, which is known as the Sopanam style. This typically Kerala style of rendition takes its roots from the temple songs which used to be sung (continues even now at several temples) at the time when Kathakali was born.

 

As with the acting style, Kathakali music also has singers from the northern and southern schools. The northern style has largely been groomed by Kerala Kalamandalam in the 20th century. Kalamandalam Neelakantan Nambisan, an overarching Kathakali musician of those times, was a product of the institute. His prominent disciples include Kalamandalam Unnikrishna Kurup, Kalamandalam Gangadharan, Kalamandalam P.G. Radhakrishnan, Rama Varrier, Madambi Subramanian Namboodiri, Tirur Nambissan, Kalamandalam Sankaran Embranthiri, Kalamandalam Hyderali, Kalamandalam Haridas, Subramanian, Kalanilayam Unnikrishnan and Kalamandalam Bhavadasan. The other prominent musicians of the north feature Kottakkal Vasu Nedungadi, Kottakkal Parameswaran Namboodiri, Kottakkal P.D. Narayanan Namboodiri, Kottakkal Narayanan, Kalamandalam Anantha NarayananKalamandalam Sreekumar Palanad Divakaran, Kalanilayam Rajendran, Kolathappilli Narayanan Namboodiri, Kalamandalam Narayanan Embranthiri, Kottakkal Madhu, Kalamandalam Babu Namboodiri, Kalamandalam Harish and Kalamandalam Vinod. In the south, some of whom are equally popular in the north these days, include Pathiyur Sankarankutty. Southerner musicians of the older generation include Cherthala Thankappa Panikker, Thakazhi Kuttan Pillai, Cherthala Kuttappa Kurup, Thanneermukkam Viswambharan and Mudakkal Gopinathan.

 

PERFORMANCE

Traditionally, a Kathakali performance is usually conducted at night and ends in early morning. Nowadays it isn't difficult to see performances as short as three hours or fewer. Kathakali is usually performed in front of the huge Kalivilakku (kali meaning dance; vilakku meaning lamp) with its thick wick sunk till the neck in coconut oil. Traditionally, this lamp used to provide sole light when the plays used to be performed inside temples, palaces or abodes houses of nobles and aristocrats. Enactment of a play by actors takes place to the accompaniment of music (geetha) and instruments (vadya). The percussion instruments used are chenda, maddalam (both of which underwent revolutionary changes in their aesthetics with the contributions of Kalamandalam Krishnankutty Poduval and Kalamandalam Appukutty Poduval) and, at times, edakka. In addition, the singers (the lead singer is called “ponnani” and his follower is called “singidi”) use chengila (gong made of bell metal, which can be struck with a wooden stick) and ilathalam (a pair of cymbals). The lead singer in some sense uses the Chengala to conduct the Vadyam and Geetha components, just as a conductor uses his wand in western classical music. A distinguishing characteristic of this art form is that the actors never speak but use hand gestures, expressions and rhythmic dancing instead of dialogue (but for a couple of rare characters).

 

ACTING

A Kathakali actor uses immense concentration, skill and physical stamina, gained from regimented training based on Kalaripayattu, the ancient martial art of Kerala, to prepare for his demanding role. The training can often last for 8–10 years, and is intensive. In Kathakali, the story is enacted purely by the movements of the hands (called mudras or hand gestures) and by facial expressions (rasas) and bodily movements. The expressions are derived from Natyashastra (the tome that deals with the science of expressions) and are classified into nine as in most Indian classical art forms. Dancers also undergo special practice sessions to learn control of their eye movements.

 

There are 24 basic mudras—the permutation and combination of which would add up a chunk of the hand gestures in vogue today. Each can again can be classified into 'Samaana-mudras'(one mudra symbolising two entities) or misra-mudras (both the hands are used to show these mudras). The mudras are a form of sign language used to tell the story.

 

The main facial expressions of a Kathakali artist are the 'navarasams' (Navarasas in anglicised form) (literal translation: Nine Tastes, but more loosely translated as nine feelings or expressions) which are Sringaram (amour), Hasyam (ridicule, humour), Bhayanakam (fear), Karunam (pathos), Roudram (anger, wrath), Veeram (valour), Beebhatsam (disgust), Adbhutam (wonder, amazement), Shantam (tranquility, peace). The link at the end of the page gives more details on Navarasas.

 

One of the most interesting aspects of Kathakali is its elaborate make-up code. Most often, the make-up can be classified into five basic sets namely Pachcha, Kathi, Kari, Thaadi, and Minukku. The differences between these sets lie in the predominant colours that are applied on the face. Pachcha (meaning green) has green as the dominant colour and is used to portray noble male characters who are said to have a mixture of "Satvik" (pious) and "Rajasik" (dark; Rajas = darkness) nature. Rajasik characters having an evil streak ("tamasic"= evil) -- all the same they are anti-heroes in the play (such as the demon king Ravana) -- and portrayed with streaks of red in a green-painted face. Excessively evil characters such as demons (totally tamasic) have a predominantly red make-up and a red beard. They are called Red Beard (Red Beard). Tamasic characters such as uncivilised hunters and woodsmen are represented with a predominantly black make-up base and a black beard and are called black beard (meaning black beard). Women and ascetics have lustrous, yellowish faces and this semi-realistic category forms the fifth class. In addition, there are modifications of the five basic sets described above such as Vella Thadi (white beard) used to depict Hanuman (the Monkey-God) and Pazhuppu, which is majorly used for Lord Shiva and Balabhadra.

 

NOTABLE TRAINING CENTRES & MASTERS

Kathakali artistes need assiduous grooming for almost a decade's time, and most masters are products of accomplished institutions that give a minimum training course of half-a-dozen years. The leading Kathakali schools (some of them started during the pre-Independent era India) are Kerala Kalamandalam (located in Cheruthuruthy near Shoranur), PSV Natya Sangham (located in Kottakal near Kozhikode), Sadanam Kathakali and Classical Arts Academy (or Gandhi Seva Sadan located in Perur near Ottappalam in Palakkad), Unnayi Varier Smaraka Kalanilayam (located in Irinjalakuda south of Thrissur), Margi in Thiruvananthapuram, Muthappan Kaliyogam at Parassinikkadavu in Kannur district and RLV School at Tripunithura off Kochi and Kalabharathi at Pakalkkuri near Kottarakkara in Kollam district, Sandarshan Kathakali Kendram in Ambalapuzha and Vellinazhi Nanu Nair Smaraka Kalakendra in Kuruvattor. Outside Kerala, Kathakali is being taught at the International Centre for Kathakali in New Delhi, Santiniketan at Visva-Bharati University in West Bengal, Kalakshetra in Chennai and Darpana Academy in Ahmedabad among others. PadmaSree Guru Chengannur Raman Pillai mostly known as 'Guru Chengannur'was running a traditional Gurukula Style approach to propagate Kathakali.

 

‘Guru Chengannur” is ever renowned as the Sovereign Guru of Kathakali. His precision in using symbols, gestures and steps were highest in the field of Kathakali. Guru Chegannur's kaththi vesham, especially the portrayal of Duryodhana enthralled the audience every time he performed. A master of the art, he found immense happiness and satisfaction in the success and recognition of his disciples.

 

Senior Kathakali exponents of today include Padma Bhushan Kalamandalam Ramankutty Nair, Padma Shri Kalamandalam Gopi, Madavoor Vasudevan Nair, Chemancheri Kunhiraman Nair, Kottakkal Krishnankutty Nair, Mankompu Sivasankara Pillai, Sadanam Krishnankutty, Nelliyode Vasudevan Namboodiri, Kalamandalam Vasu Pisharody, FACT Padmanabhan, Kottakkal Chandrasekharan, Margi Vijayakumar, Kottakkal Nandakumaran Nair, Vazhenkada Vijayan, Inchakkattu Ramachandran Pillai, Kalamandalam Kuttan, Mayyanad Kesavan Namboodiri, Mathur Govindan Kutty, Narippatta Narayanan Namboodiri, Chavara Parukutty, Thonnakkal Peethambaran, Sadanam Balakrishnan, Kalanilayam Gopalakrishnan, Chirakkara Madhavankutty, Sadanam K. Harikumaran, Thalavadi Aravindan, Kalanilayam Balakrishnan, Pariyanampatta Divakaran, Kottakkal Kesavan, Kalanilayam Gopi and Kudamaloor Muralikrishnan. The late titan actor-dancers of Kathakali's modern age (say, since the 1930s) include Pattikkamthodi Ravunni Menon, Chenganoor Raman Pillai, Chandu Panicker, Thakazhi Guru Kunchu Kurup, Padma Shri Kalamandalam Krishnan Nair, Padma Shri Vazhenkada Kunchu Nair, Kavalappara Narayanan Nair, Kurichi Kunhan Panikkar, Thekkinkattil Ramunni Nair, Padma Shri Keezhpadam Kumaran Nair, Kalamandalam Padmanabhan Nair, Mankulam Vishnu Namboodiri, Oyur Kochu Govinda Pillai, Vellinezhi Nanu Nair, Padma Shri Kavungal Chathunni Panikkar, Kudamaloor Karunakaran Nair, Kottakkal Sivaraman, Kannan Pattali, Pallippuram Gopalan Nair, Haripad Ramakrishna Pillai, Champakkulam Pachu Pillai, Chennithala Chellappan Pillai, Guru Mampuzha Madhava Panicker, and Vaikkom Karunakaran.

 

Kathakali is still hugely a male domain but, since the 1970s, females too have made entry into the art form on a recognisable scale. The central Kerala temple town of Tripunithura has, in fact, a ladies troupe (with members belonging to several part of the state) that performs Kathakali, by and large in Travancore.

 

KATHAKALI STYLES

Known as Sampradäyaṃ(Malayalam: സമ്പ്രദായം); these are leading Kathakali styles that differ from each other in subtleties like choreographic profile, position of hand gestures and stress on dance than drama and vice versa. Some of the major original kathakali styles included:

 

Vettathu Sampradayam

Kalladikkodan Sampradyam

Kaplingadu Sampradayam

 

Of late, these have narrowed down to the northern (Kalluvazhi) and southern (Thekkan) styles. It was largely developed by the legendary Pattikkamthodi Ravunni Menon (1881-1949) that is implemented in Kerala Kalamandalam (though it has also a department that teaches the southern style), Sadanam, RLV and Kottakkal. Margi has its training largely based on the Thekkan style, known for its stress on drama and part-realistic techniques. Kalanilayam, effectively, churns out students with a mix of both styles.

 

OTHER FORMS OD DANCE & OFFSHOOTS

Kerala Natanam is a kind of dance form, partly based on Kathakali techniques and aesthetics, developed and stylised by the late dancer Guru Gopinath in the mid-20th century. Kathakali also finds portrayal in Malayalam feature films like Vanaprastham, Parinayam, Marattam, and Rangam. Besides documentary films have also been shot on Kathakali artistes like Chenganoor Raman Pillai, Kalamandalam Krishnan Nair, Keezhpadam Kumaran Nair, Kalamandalam Ramankutty Nair, Kalamandalam Gopi and Kottakkal Sivaraman.

 

As for fictional literature, Kathakali finds mention in several Malayalam short stories like Karmen (by N.S. Madhavan) and novels like Keshabharam (by P.V. Sreevalsan). Even the Indo-Anglian work like Arundhati Roy's Booker prize-winning The God of Small Things has a chapter on Kathakali, while, of late, Anita Nair's novel, Mistress, is entirely wrapped in the ethos of Kathakali.

 

Similar musical theater is popular in Kasaragod and the coastal and Malenadu regions of Karnataka, viz. Yakshagana. Though Yakshagana resembles Kathakali in terms of its costume and makeup to an extent, Yakshagana is markedly different from Kathakali as it involves dialogues and method acting also the narration is in Kannada, wherein philosophical debates are also possible within framework of the character. As per records the art form of Yakshagana was already rooted and well established at the time of Sri Manavedan Raja. There is possibilities of its significant influence in formation of Kathakkali as the troupe of performers of "Krishnanattam" designed the basic costume of the art form already established in other parts of south India including Males playing the female roles (until more recently).

 

Kottayam thamburan's way of presenting kathakali was later known as Kalladikkoden sambradayam. Chathu Paniker,the introducer of Kallikkoden Sambrathayam, stayed in Kottayam for five years with Kottayam Thamburan's residence and practiced Kalladikkoden Sambrathayam. Then he returned to his home place. After a short period Chathu Paniker reached Pulapatta as instructed by Kuthiravattath nair. That was around the year ME 865. Many deciples from Kadathanadu, Kurumbra nadu, Vettathu nadu, Palakkadu and Perumpadappu studied kathakali(Kalladikkoden Sambrathayam ) By that time Chathu Paniker was an old man. Some years later he died from Pulapatta.

 

NOTED KATHAKALI VILLAGES & BELTS

There are certain pockets in Kerala that have given birth to many Kathakali artistes over the years. If they can be called Kathakali villages (or some of them, these days, towns), here are some of them: Vellinezhi, Kuruvattoor, Karalmanna, Cherpulassery, Kothachira, peringode, sreekrishnapuram Kongad and Ottapalam in Palakkad district, Vazhenkada in Malappuram district, Thichur or Tichoor, Guruvayur, Thiruvilwamala and Irinjalakuda in Thrissur district, Tripunithura, Edappally, Thekkan Chittoor in Ernakulam district and Kuttanad, Harippad belt in Alappuzha district besides places in and around Thiruvanathapuram in south Travancore and Payyannur in north Malabar.

 

AWARDS FOR KATHAKALI ARTISTS

Sangeet Natak Akademi Awardees - Kathakali (1956–2005)

Nambeesan Smaraka Awards—For artistic performances related kathakali{1992-2008}

 

KATHAKALI ATTAMS (ELAKI ATTAMS)

Attams or more specifically "elaki attams" are sequences of acting within a story acted out with the help of mudras without support from vocal music. The actor has the freedom to change the script to suit his own individual preferences. The actor will be supported ably by Chenda, Maddalam, and Elathalam (compulsory), Chengila (not very compulsory).

 

The following are only some examples. 'Kailasa Udharanam' and 'Tapas Attam' are very important attams and these are described at the end. Two of the many references are Kathakali Prakaram, pages 95 to 142 by Pannisheri Nanu Pillai and Kathakaliyile Manodharmangal by Chavara Appukuttan Pillai.

 

VANA VARNANA: BHIMA IN KALYANA SAUGANDHIKA

Modern man looks at the forest, indeed the birthplace of primates, with a certain wonder and a certain respect. Kathakali characters are no exception.

 

When Pandavas were living in the forest, one day, a flower, not seen before, wafted by the wind, comes and falls at the feet of Panchali. Exhilarated by its beauty and smell, Panchali asks Bhima to bring her more such flowers. To her pleasure Bhima is ready to go at once. But Panchali asks him what he shall do for food and drink on the way. Bhima thinks and says "Food and Drink! Oh, this side glance (look) of yours. This look of longing. This look of anticipation. The very thought fills me up. I don't need any food and drink at all. Let me go." He takes his mace and off he goes. Ulsaham (enthusiasm) is his Sdhayi Bhavam (permanent feature).

 

"Let me go at once in search of this flower," says Bhima. "The scented wind is blowing from the southern side. Let me go that way." After walking some distance he sees a huge mountain called Gandhamadana and three ways. He decides to take the middle one which goes over the mountain. After going further "The forest is getting thicker. Big trees, big branches in all directions. The forest looks like a huge dark vessel into which even light can not penetrate. This is my (Bhima's) way. Nothing can hinder me." So saying he pulls down many trees. Sometimes he shatters the trees with his mace. Suddenly he sees an elephant. "Oh! Elephant." He describes it. Its trunk. Sharp ears.

 

The itching sensation in the body. It takes some mud and throws on the body. Oh good. Then it sucks water and throws on the body. Somewhat better. Slowly it starts dosing even though alert at times. A very huge python is approaching steadily. Suddenly it catches hold of the elephant's hind leg. The elephant wakes up and tries to disengage the python. The python pulls to one side. The elephant kicks and drags to the other side. This goes on for some time. Bhima looks to the other side where a hungry lion is looking for food. It comes running and strikes the elephants head and eats part of the brain and goes off. The python completes the rest. "Oh my god, how ruthless!" says Bhima and proceeds on his way.

 

UDYANA VARNANA: NALA IN NALACHARITHAM SECOND DAY

Descriptions of gardens are found in most dance forms of India and abroad. These are also common in Kathakali.

 

Newly married Nala and Damayanthi are walking in the garden. When Nala was lovingly looking at Damayanthi a flower falls on her. Nala is overjoyed and thinks that this is a kindness nature has shown on his wife. Nala says "On seeing the arrival of their queen, the trees and climbers are showing happiness by dropping flowers on you." He tells her, "See that tree. When I used to be alone the tree used to hug the climber and seemingly laugh at my condition." Then he looks at the tree and says, "Dear Tree, look at me now. See how fortunate I am with my beautiful wife."

 

Both wander about. A bumblebee flies towards Damayanthi. Immediately Nala protects her face with a kerchief. He looks at the bee and then at Damayanthi. He says, "On seeing your face the bee thought it was a flower and came to drink the nectar." Nala and Damayanthi listen to the sounds coming out of the garden. Damayanti says, "It appears that the whole garden is thrilled. The flowers are blooming and smiling. Cuckoos are singing and the bees are dancing. Gentle winds are blowing and rubbing against our bodies. How beautiful the whole garden looks." Then Nala says that the sun is going down and it is time for them to go back and takes her away.

 

SHABDA VARNANA: HANUMAN IN KALYANA SAUGANDHIKAM

While Bhima goes in search of the flower, here Hanuman is sitting doing Tapas with mind concentrated on Sri Rama.

 

When he hears the terrible noises made by Bhima in the forest he feels disturbed in doing his Tapas. He thinks "What is the reason for this?" Then the sounds become bigger. "What is this?" He thinks, "The sounds are getting bigger. Such a terrible noise. Is the sea coming up thinking that the time is ripe for the great deluge (Pralaya). Birds are flying helter-skelter. Trees look shocked. Even Kali Yuga is not here. Then what is it? Are mountains quarreling with each other? No, That can't be it. Indra had cut off the wings of mountains so that they don't quarrel. Is the sea changing its position? No it can't be. The sea has promised it will not change its position again. It can't break the promise." Hanuman starts looking for clues. "I see elephants and lions running in fear of somebody. Oh a huge man is coming this way. Oh, a hero is coming. He is pulling out trees and throwing it here and there. Okay. Let him come near, We will see."

 

THANDEDATTAM: RAVANA IN BALI VADHAM

After his theranottam Ravana is seen sitting on a stool. He says to himself "I am enjoying a lot of happiness. What is the reason for this?" Thinks. "Yes I know it. I did Tapas to Brahma and received all necessary boons. Afterwards I won all ten directions. I also defeated my elder brother Vaishravana. Then I lifted Kailas mountain when Siva and Parvathi were having a misunderstanding. Parvathi got frightened and embraced Siva in fear. Siva was so happy he gave a divine sword called Chandrahasa. Now the whole world is afraid of me. That is why I am enjoying so much happiness." He goes and sits on the stool. He looks far away. "Who is coming from a distance. he is coming fast. Oh, it is Akamba. Okay. Let me find out what news he has for me."

 

ASHRAMA VARNANA: ARJUNA IN KIRATHAM

Arjuna wants to do Tapas to Lord Siva and he is looking a suitable place in the Himalayan slopes. He comes to place where there is an ashram. Arjuna looks closely at the place. "Oh. What a beautiful place this is. A small river in which a very pure water is flowing. Some hermits are taking baths in the river. Some hermits are standing in the water and doing Tapsas. Some are facing the Sun. Some are standing in between five fires." Arjuna salutes the hermits from far. He says to himself "Look at this young one of a deer. It is looking for its mother. It seems to be hungry and thirsty. Nearby a female tiger is feeding its young ones. The little deer goes towards the tigress and pushes the young tiger cubs aside and starts drinking milk from the tigress. The tigress looks lovingly at the young deer and even licks its body as if it were its own child. How beautiful. How fulfilling."

 

Again he looks "Here on this side a mongoose and a serpent forgetting their enmity are hugging each other. This place is really strange and made divine by saints and hermits. Let me start my Tapas somewhere nearby."

 

A sloka called "Shikhini Shalabha" can be selected instead of the above if time permits.

 

AN ATTAM BASED ON A SLOKA

Sansrit slokas are sometimes shown in mudras and it has a pleasing and exhilarating effect. Different actors use slokas as per his own taste and liking. However, the slokas are taught to students during their training period. An example is given below.

 

Kusumo Kusumolpatti Shrooyathena Chathushyathe

Bale thava Mukhambuje Pashya Neelolpaladwayam

 

Meaning a flower blooming inside another flower is not known to history. But, my dear, in your lotus like face are seen two blue Neelolpala flowers (eyes).

 

A CONVERSATION BASED ON A SLOKA

Sanskrit slokas can also be used to express an intent. One such example is a sloka used by Arjuna addressed to Mathali the charioteer in Kalakeya Vadham. Sloka:

Pitha: Kushalee Mama hritha Bhujaam

Naatha Sachee Vallabha:

Maatha: kim nu Pralomacha Kushalinee

Soonurjayanthasthayo

Preethim va Kushchate Thadikshnavidhow

Cheta Samutkanuthe

Sutha: tvam Radhamashu Chodaya vayam

Dharmadivam Mathala

 

Meaning: The husband of Indrani and the lord of gods my father - Is he in good health? His son Jayantha - Is he strictly following the commands of his father? Oh, I am impatient to see all of them.

 

SWARGA VARNANA: ARJUNA IN KELAKEYA VADHAM

Arjuna goes to heaven on the invitation of his father, Indra. After taking permission from Indrani he goes out to see all the places in Swarga. First he sees a building, his father's palace. It is so huge with four entrances. It is made of materials superior to gold and jewels of the world. Then he goes ahead and sees Iravatha. Here he describes it as a huge elephant with four horns. He is afraid to touch it. Then he thinks that animals in Swarga can't be cruel like in the world and so thinking he goes and touches and salutes Iravatha. He describes the churning of the white sea by gods and demons with many details and how Iravatha also came out of the white sea due to this churning.

 

He walks on and sees his father's (Indra's) horse. It is described as being white and its mane is sizzling like the waves of the white sea from which it came. He touches and salutes the horse also. Then he goes to see the river of the sky (or milky way). He sees many birds by this river and how the birds fly and play is shown.

 

Then he sees the heavenly ladies. Some are collecting flowers, and one of them comes late and asks for some flowers for making garland. The others refuse. She goes to the Kalpa Vriksha and says "please give me some flowers." Immediately a shower of flowers occurs which she collects in her clothes and goes to make garlands chiding the others. "See... I also got flowers." After this he sees the music and dance of the heavenly ladies. First it starts with the adjustments of instruments Thamburu, Mridangam, Veena. Then the actual music starts along with the striking of cymbals. Then two or three types of dances are shown. Then comes juggling of balls. It is described by a sloka thus:

 

Ekopi Thraya Iva Bhathi Kandukoyam

 

Kanthayaa: Karathala Raktharaktha:

Abhrastho Nayanamareechi Neelaneelo

Popular belief is that kathakali is emerged from "Krishnanattam", the dance drama on the life and activities of Lord Krishna created by Sri Manavedan Raja, the Zamorin of Calicut (1585-1658 AD). Once Kottarakkara Thampuran, the Raja of Kottarakkara who was attracted by Krishnanattam requested the Zamorin for the loan of a troupe of performers. Due to the political rivalry between the two, Zamorin did not allow this. So Kottarakkara Thampuran created another art form called Ramanattam which was later transformed into Aattakatha. Krishnanaattam was written in Sanskrit, and Ramanattam was in Malayalam. By the end of 17th century, Attakatha was presented to the world with the title 'Kathakali'. Kathakali also shares a lot of similarities with Krishnanattam, Koodiyattam (a classical Sanskrit drama existing in Kerala) and Ashtapadiyattam (an adaptation of 12th-century musical called Gitagovindam). It also incorporates several other elements from traditional and ritualistic art forms like Mudiyettu, Thiyyattu, Theyyam and Padayani besides a minor share of folk arts like Porattunatakam. All along, the martial art of Kalarippayattu has influenced the body language of Kathakali. The use of Malayalam, the local language (albeit as a mix of Sanskrit and Malayalam, called ), has also helped the literature of Kathakali sound more transparent for the average audience. As a part of modernising, propagating, promoting and popularizing Kathakali, the International Centre for Kathakali at New Delhi has taken up a continuing project since 1980 of producing new plays based on not only traditional and mythological stories, but also historical stories, European classics and Shakespeare's plays. Recently they produced Kathakali plays based on Shakespeare's Othello and Greek-Roman mythology of Psyche and Cupid.

 

Even though the lyrics/literature would qualify as another independent element called Sahithyam, it is considered as a component of Geetha or music, as it plays only a supplementary role to

Bhumau Talcharana Naghamshu Gaurgaura:

 

Meaning One ball looks like three balls. When it is in the hands of the juggler, it takes the redness of the hands, when it goes up it takes the blueness of the eyes, when it strikes the ground it becomes white from the whiteness of the leg nails. Once a juggled ball falls down. Then she, the juggler, somehow manages to proceed and remarks "See.. how I can do it".

 

At one time a garment slips from a lady's body and she adjusts the cloth showing shameful shyness (Lajja). Then the ladies go in for a Kummi dance. As Arjuna was enjoying this dance, suddenly somebody calls him. Arjuna feels scared. "Oh God, where am I?" he says and beats a hasty retreat.

 

TAPAS ATTAM: RAVANA IN RAVANA ULBHAVAM

[Background: Mali, Sumali and Malyavan were three brothers ruling Sri Lanka. During a war between them and Indra, Indra requested help from Lord Vishnu and as a consequence Lord Vishnu killed Mali. Sumali and Malyavan escaped to Patala. Kaikasi was the daughter of Sumali. She wandered in the forest. She belong three boys through a great sage called Vishravassu. (Vishravassu had an earlier son called Vaishravana who became the richest among all people.) The eldest boy of Kaikasi was Ravana followed by Kumbhakarna and Vibhishana.]

 

SCENE 1

When Ravana was a young boy (Kutti Ravana vesham), one day he was sleeping on his mothers lap in a place called madhuvanam. At that time Kaikasi sees Vaishravana flying overhead in his vimana (mythical aeroplane). She thinks “Oh, that is Vaishravana, technically a brother of my son who is sleeping on my lap. He is rich and strong. My son is so poor and weak. While thinking thus a drop of tear from her eyes drops on Ravana’s face. Ravana suddenly wakes up and sees his mother crying. When he knew the reason he could not bear it. He says he is going to do tapas to Brahma to get boons so that he will be strong and rich.

 

SCENE 2

(The tapas itself is shown as a part of autobiographical narration of adult ravana)

 

Ravana (adult Ravana, not kutti Ravana) is sitting on a stool. He thinks “Why am I so happy? How did I become so rich and strong? Oh yes. It is because of the tapas I did. What made me do the tapas? When I was a young boy, one day I was sleeping on my mother’s lap in a place called Madhuvanam. A drop of tear from her eyes falls on my face. I asked her why she was crying. She said she saw Vaishravana flying overhead in his vimana (plane). She told me Vaishravan was a brother of mine now flying in a plane. He is rich and strong. I am so poor and weak. When I heard this comparison between me and my brother, I could not bear it. I am going to do tapas to Brahma to get boons so that I will be strong and rich.

 

I made five different types of fires (while doing tapas gods are approached through Agni the god of fire). Then I started my tapas. I asked my brothers to stand guard and also keep the fires burning. Then I fully concentrated on tapas. Time passed but Brahma did not appear. I looked. Why is Brahma not appearing? I doubled my concentration. Time passed. Brahma is not appearing. Still not appearing? I cut one of my heads and put it in the fire. Waited, Brahma did not come. One more head rolls. Still no Brahma comes. Heads roll and roll. No Brahma. Only one head is left. First I thought of stopping my tapas. But no! Never! That will be an insult to me and my family. It is better to die than stop. Also when I die Brahma will be judged as being partial. With great determination I swung the sword at my last neck, when, lo and behold, suddenly Brahma appeared and caught my hand. I looked at him with still un-subsided, but gradually subsiding anger. Brahma asked me what boons I wanted. I asked for a boon that I should win all the worlds and have all the wealth and fame and that I should not be killed except by man. I also asked him to give boons for my brothers.

 

In the next scene Ravana asks Kumbhakarna and Vibhishana what boons they got. Unfortunately Kumbhakarna’s tongue got twisted while asking for boon and he got ‘sleep’ instead of becoming the ‘king of gods’. Ravana laughed it off. As for Vibhishana, he being a bhaktha of Vishnu, asked for Vishnu’s blessings and got it. Ravana laughs it off and also decides to conquer all the worlds and starts preparing his grand army for the big conquest of the worlds.

 

[This method of presentation with a peculiar sequence has a tremendous dramatic affect. The main actor redoes a small part of what happened to kutti Ravana vesham, and this gives a view of the high contrast between the boy and the man Ravana. Similarly the presence of Kumbhakarna and Vibhishana in the subsequent scene offers a good smile on the face of the viewer at the end of the play.]

 

KAILASA UDDHARANAM: RAVANA IN BALI VIJAYAM

[Background and Previous scene: After receiving the boons, and widening his kingdom in all directions, Ravana lives in Sri Lanka with great pomp and splendor. One day he sees Saint Narada approaching his palace singing songs in praise of him ‘Jaya jaya Ravana, Lanka Pathe’. Happily he receives Narada and seats him next to him. After telling Narada about the victory of his son Indrajith on Indra, Ravana tells Narada “Now there is nobody on earth or other worlds who can fight with me”. To this Narada replies “ Very true indeed, but there is one huge monkey called Bali who says he can defeat you. He even said that you are just like a blade of grass to him. Well let him say what he wants. You are unbeatable.” Then Narada says ‘let us go there and see him’. Both decide to go. But Ravana takes his famous sword called “Chandrahasam”. Then Narada asks the history of this sword. Ravana’s Attam Starts.]

 

Ravana says “I received this sword from Lord Siva. It happened thus. Once when I was conquering new places and expanding my empire I happened to be going across the Kailasa mountain. The plane got stuck on the mountain unable to move forward. I got down from the plane and looked at the mountain. (Looks from one end to the other first horizontally and then vertically.) So huge it was. Then I decided to lift it with my bare hand and keep it aside and move forward. I started sticking my hands under it one by one. Then I tried to lift it. It doesn’t move. I put more force and more force. It moved just a bit. I pushed harder and harder, slowly it started moving then again and again and it moved easily. Then I lifted it up with my hands and started juggling it (exaggeration evident).

 

“At that particular time Lord Siva was quarreling with his wife Parvathi. Why did they fight? The story is as follows. Parvathi had gone for enjoying swimming and bathing in some beautiful pond. At that time Siva opened his jata (disheveled long hair) and called Ganga for some entertainment after asking Ganapathi and Subramania to go for some errands. Somehow becoming suspicious, right at that time, Parvathi came back in a hurry with wet clothes and saw Siva with Ganga. Siva was wondering what to do and it was at that time that Ravana started lifting the Kailasa. When Kailasa started shaking Parvathi got scared and ran to Siva and hugged him. So the quarrel ended and Siva was happy. “As a reward Siva called me and gave me this famous Chandrahasa sword.”

 

Then Narada and Ravana leave to meet Bali. Ravana wanted to take the sword along with him, but Narada suggested that the sword is not required for teaching a lesson to Bali who is after all an unarmed monkey.

 

WIKIPEDIA

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HOYSALA ARCHITECTURE

Hoysala architecture is the building style developed under the rule of the Hoysala Empire between the 11th and 14th centuries, in the region known today as Karnataka, a state of India. Hoysala influence was at its peak in the 13th century, when it dominated the Southern Deccan Plateau region. Large and small temples built during this era remain as examples of the Hoysala architectural style, including the Chennakesava Temple at Belur, the Hoysaleswara Temple at Halebidu, and the Kesava Temple at Somanathapura. Other examples of Hoysala craftsmanship are the temples at Belavadi, Amruthapura, Hosaholalu, Mosale, Arasikere, Basaralu, Kikkeri and Nuggehalli. Study of the Hoysala architectural style has revealed a negligible Indo-Aryan influence while the impact of Southern Indian style is more distinct.

 

Temples built prior to Hoysala independence in the mid-12th century reflect significant Western Chalukya influences, while later temples retain some features salient to Chalukyan art but have additional inventive decoration and ornamentation, features unique to Hoysala artisans. Some three hundred temples are known to survive in present-day Karnataka state and many more are mentioned in inscriptions, though only about seventy have been documented. The greatest concentration of these are in the Malnad (hill) districts, the native home of the Hoysala kings.

 

The Karnata Dravida tradition which covers a period of about seven centuries began in the 7th century under the patronage of the Chalukya dynasty of Badami, developed further under the Rashtrakutas of Manyakheta during the 9th and 10th centuries and the Western Chalukyas (or Later Chalukyas) of Basavakalyan in the 11th and 12th centuries. Its final development stage and transformation into an independent style was during the rule of the Hoysalas in the 12th and 13th centuries. Medieval inscriptions displayed prominently at temple locations give information about donations made toward the maintenance of the temple, details of consecration and on occasion, even architectural details.

 

TEMPLE DEITIES

Hinduism is a combination of secular and sacred beliefs, rituals, daily practices and traditions that has evolved over the course of over two thousand years and embodies complex symbolism combining the natural world with philosophy. Hindu temples began as simple shrines housing a deity and by the time of the Hoysalas had evolved into well articulated edifices in which worshippers sought transcendence of the daily world. Hoysala temples were not limited to any specific organised tradition of Hinduism and encouraged pilgrims of different Hindu devotional movements. The Hoysalas usually dedicated their temples to Shiva or to Vishnu (two of the popular Hindu gods), but they occasionally built some temples dedicated to the Jain faith as well. Worshippers of Shiva are called Shaivas and worshippers of Vishnu are called Vaishnavas. While King Vishnuvardhana and his descendants were Vaishnava by faith, records show that the Hoysalas maintained religious harmony by building as many temples dedicated to Shiva as they did to Vishnu. Most of these temples have secular features with broad themes depicted in their sculptures. This can be seen in the famous Chennakesava Temple at Belur dedicated to Vishnu and in the Hoysaleswara temple at Halebidu dedicated to Shiva. The Kesava temple at Somanathapura is different in that its ornamentation is strictly Vaishnavan. Generally Vaishnava temples are dedicated to Keshava (or to Chennakeshava, meaning "Beautiful Vishnu") while a small number are dedicated to Lakshminarayana and Lakshminarasimha (Narayana and Narasimha both being Avatars, or physical manifestations, of Vishnu) with Lakshmi, consort of Vishnu, seated at his feet. Temples dedicated to Vishnu are always named after the deity. The Shaiva temples have a Shiva linga, symbol of fertility and the universal symbol of Shiva, in the shrine. The names of Shiva temples can end with the suffix eshwara meaning "Lord of". The name "Hoysaleswara", for instance, means "Lord of Hoysala". The temple can also be named after the devotee who commissioned the construction of the temple, an example being the Bucesvara temple at Koravangala, named after the devotee Buci. The most striking sculptural decorations are the horizontal rows of moldings with detailed relief, and intricately carved images of gods, goddesses and their attendants on the outer temple wall panels.

 

The Doddagaddavalli Lakshmi Devi ("Goddess of Wealth") Temple is an exception as it is dedicated to neither Vishnu nor Shiva. The defeat of the Jain Western Ganga Dynasty (of present-day south Karnataka) by the Cholas in the early 11th century and the rising numbers of followers of Vaishnava Hinduism and Virashaivism in the 12th century was mirrored by a decreased interest in Jainism. However, two notable locations of Jain worship in the Hoysala territory were Shravanabelagola and Kambadahalli. The Hoysalas built Jain temples to satisfy the needs of its Jain population, a few of which have survived in Halebidu containing icons of Jain tirthankaras. They constructed stepped wells called Pushkarni or Kalyani, the ornate tank at Hulikere being an example. The tank has twelve minor shrines containing Hindu deities.

 

The two main deities found in Hoysala temple sculpture are Shiva and Vishnu in their various forms and avatars (incarnations). Shiva is usually shown with four arms holding a trident and a small drum among other emblems that symbolize objects worshiped independently of the divine image with which they are associated. Any male icon portrayed in this way is Shiva although a female icon may sometimes be portrayed with these attributes as Shiva's consort, Parvati. Various depictions of Lord Shiva exist: showing him naked (fully or partially), in action such as slaying a demon (Andhaka) or dancing on the head of a slain elephant (Gajasura) and holding its skin up behind his back. He is often accompanied by his consort Parvati or shown with Nandi the bull. He may be represented as Bhairava, another of Shiva's many manifestations.

 

A male figure depicted holding certain objects such as a conch (symbol of eternal, heavenly space) and a wheel (eternal time and destructive power) is Vishnu. If a female figure is depicted holding these objects, she is seen as his consort, Lakshmi. In all the depictions Vishnu is holding four objects: a conch, a wheel, a lotus and a mace. These can be held in any of the icon's hands, making possible twenty-four different forms of Vishnu, each with a unique name. Apart from these, Vishnu is depicted in any of his ten avataras, which include Vishnu sitting on Anantha (the celestial snake and keeper of life energy also known as Shesha), Vishnu with Lakshmi seated on his lap (Lakshminarayana), with the head of a lion disemboweling a demon on his lap (Lakshminarasimha), with head of a boar walking over a demon (Varaha), in the Krishna avatar (as Venugopala or the cow herder playing the Venu (flute), dancing on the head of the snake Kaliya, lifting a hill such as Govardhana), with his feet over head of a small figure (Vamana), along with Indra riding an elephant, with Lakshmi seated on Garuda, and the eagle (stealing the parijata tree).

 

TEMPLE COMPLEX

The focus of a temple is the centre or sanctum sanctorum (garbhagriha) where the image of the deity resides, so temple architecture is designed to move the devotee from outside to the garbhagriha through ambulatory passageways for circumambulation and halls or chambers (mantapas) that become increasingly sacred as the deity is approached. Hoysala temples have distinct parts that are merged to form a unified organic whole, in contrast to the temples of Tamil country where different parts of a temple stand independently. Although superficially unique, Hoysala temples resemble each other structurally. They are characterised by a complex profusion of sculpture decorating all the temple parts chiseled of soft soapstone (chloritic schist), a good material for intricate carving, executed mostly by local craftsmen, and exhibit architectural features that distinguish them from other temple architectures of South India.

 

Most Hoysala temples have a plain covered entrance porch supported by lathe turned (circular or bell-shaped) pillars which were sometimes further carved with deep fluting and moulded with decorative motifs. The temples may be built upon a platform raised by about a metre called a "jagati". The jagati, apart from giving a raised look to the temple, serves as a pradakshinapatha or "circumambulation path" for circumambulation around the temple, as the garbagriha (inner sanctum) provides no such feature. Such temples will have an additional set of steps leading to an open mantapa (open hall) with parapet walls. A good example of this style is the Kesava Temple at Somanathapura. The jagati which is in unity with the rest of the temple follows a star-shaped design and the walls of the temple follow a zig-zag pattern, a Hoysala innovation.

 

Devotees can first complete a ritual circumambulation on the jagati starting from the main entrance by walking in a clockwise direction (towards the left) before entering the mantapa, following the sculptural clockwise-sequenced reliefs on the outer temple walls depicting a sequence of epic scenes from the Hindu epics. Temples that are not built on a jagati can have steps flanked by elephant balustrades (parapets) that lead to the mantapa from ground level. An example of a temple that does not exhibit the raised platform is the Bucesvara temple in Korvangla, Hassan District. In temples with two shrines (dvikuta), the vimanas (the shrines or cellae) may be placed either next to each other or on opposite sides. The Lakshmidevi temple at Doddagaddavalli is unique to Hoysala architecture as it has four shrines around a common center and a fifth shrine within the same complex for the deity Bhairava (a form of Shiva). In addition, four minor shrines exist at each corner of the courtyard (prakaram).

 

ARCHITECTURAL ELEMENTS

MANTAPA

The mantapa is the hall where groups of people gather during prayers. The entrance to the mantapa normally has a highly ornate overhead lintel called a makaratorana (makara is an imaginary beast and torana is an overhead decoration). The open mantapa which serves the purpose of an outer hall (outer mantapa) is a regular feature in larger Hoysala temples leading to an inner small closed mantapa and the shrine(s). The open mantapas which are often spacious have seating areas (asana) made of stone with the mantapa's parapet wall acting as a back rest. The seats may follow the same staggered square shape of the parapet wall. The ceiling here is supported by numerous pillars that create many bays. The shape of the open mantapa is best described as staggered-square and is the style used in most Hoysala temples. Even the smallest open mantapa has 13 bays. The walls have parapets that have half pillars supporting the outer ends of the roof which allow plenty of light making all the sculptural details visible. The mantapa ceiling is generally ornate with sculptures, both mythological and floral. The ceiling consists of deep and domical surfaces and contains sculptural depictions of banana bud motifs and other such decorations.

 

If the temple is small it will consist of only a closed mantapa (enclosed with walls extending all the way to the ceiling) and the shrine. The closed mantapa, well decorated inside and out, is larger than the vestibule connecting the shrine and the mantapa and has four lathe-turned pillars to support the ceiling, which may be deeply domed. The four pillars divide the hall into nine bays. The nine bays result in nine decorated ceilings. Pierced stone screens (Jali or Latticework) that serve as windows in the navaranga (hall) and Sabhamantapa (congregation hall) is a characteristic Hoysala stylistic element.

 

A porch adorns the entrance to a closed mantapa, consisting of an awning supported by two half-pillars (engaged columns) and two parapets, all richly decorated. The closed mantapa is connected to the shrine(s) by a vestibule, a square area that also connects the shrines. Its outer walls are decorated, but as the size the vestibule is not large, this may not be a conspicuous part of the temple. The vestibule also has a short tower called the sukanasi or "nose" upon which is mounted the Hoysala emblem. In Belur and Halebidu, these sculptures are quite large and are placed at all doorways.

 

The outer and inner mantapa (open and closed) have circular lathe-turned pillars[36] having four brackets at the top. Over each bracket stands sculptured figure(s) called salabhanjika or madanika. The pillars may also exhibit ornamental carvings on the surface and no two pillars are alike. This is how Hoysala art differs from the work of their early overlords, the Western Chalukyas, who added sculptural details to the circular pillar base and left the top plain. The lathe-turned pillars are 16, 32, or 64-pointed; some are bell-shaped and have properties that reflect light. The Parsvanatha Basadi at Halebidu is a good example. According to Brown, the pillars with four monolithic brackets above them carry images of salabhanjikas and madanikas (sculpture of a woman, displaying stylized feminine features). This is a common feature of Chalukya-Hoysala temples. According to Sastri, the shape of the pillar and its capital, the base of which is square and whose shaft is a monolith that is lathe turned to render different shapes, is a "remarkable feature" of Hoysala art.

 

VIMANA

The vimana, also called the cella, contains the most sacred shrine wherein resides the image of the presiding deity. The vimana is often topped by a tower which is quite different on the outside than on the inside. Inside, the vimana is plain and square, whereas outside it is profusely decorated and can be either stellate ("star-shaped") or shaped as a staggered square, or feature a combination of these designs, giving it many projections and recesses that seem to multiply as the light falls on it. Each projection and recess has a complete decorative articulation that is rhythmic and repetitive and composed of blocks and mouldings, obscuring the tower profile. Depending on the number of shrines (and hence on the number of towers), the temples are classified as ekakuta (one), dvikuta (two), trikuta (three), chatushkuta (four) and panchakuta (five). Most Hoysala temples are ekakuta, dvikuta or trikuta, the Vaishnava ones mostly being trikuta. There are cases where a temple is trikuta but has only one tower over the main shrine (in the middle). So the terminology trikuta may not be literally accurate. In temples with multiple disconnected shrines, such as the twin temples at Mosale, all essential parts are duplicated for symmetry and balance.

 

The highest point of the temple (kalasa) has the shape of a water pot and stands on top of the tower. This portion of the vimana is often lost due to age and has been replaced with a metallic pinnacle. Below the kalasa is a large, highly- sculptured structure resembling a dome which is made from large stones and looks like a helmet. It may be 2 m by 2 m in size and follows the shape of the shrine. Below this structure are domed roofs in a square plan, all of them much smaller and crowned with small kalasas. They are mixed with other small roofs of different shapes and are ornately decorated. The tower of the shrine usually has three or four tiers of rows of decorative roofs while the tower on top of the sukanasi has one less tier, making the tower look like an extension of the main tower (Foekema calls it the "nose"). One decorated roof tier runs on top of the wall of a closed mantapa above the heavy eaves of an open mantapa and above the porches.

 

Below the superstructure of the vimana are temple "eaves" projecting half a meter from the wall. Below the eaves two different decorative schemes may be found, depending on whether a temple was built in the early or the later period of the empire. In the early temples built prior to the 13th century, there is one eave and below this are decorative miniature towers. A panel of Hindu deities and their attendants are below these towers, followed by a set of five different mouldings forming the base of the wall. In the later temples there is a second eave running about a metre below the upper eaves with decorative miniature towers placed between them. The wall images of gods are below the lower eaves, followed by six different mouldings of equal size. This is broadly termed "horizontal treatment". The six mouldings at the base are divided in two sections. Going from the very base of the wall, the first horizontal layer contains a procession of elephants, above which are horsemen and then a band of foliage. The second horizontal section has depictions of the Hindu epics and Puranic scenes executed with detail. Above this are two friezes of yallis or makaras (imaginary beasts) and hamsas (swans). The vimana (tower) is divided into three horizontal sections and is even more ornate than the walls.

 

SCULPTURE

In Hoysala art Hardy identifies two conspicuous departures from the more austere Western (Later) Chalukya art:ornamental elaboration and a profusion of iconography with figure sculptures, both of which are found in abundance even on the superstructure over the shrine. Their medium, the soft chlorite schist (Soapstone) enabled a virtuoso carving style. Hoysala artists are noted for their attention to sculptural detail be it in the depiction of themes from the Hindu epics and deities or in their use of motifs such as yalli, kirtimukha (gargoyles), aedicula (miniature decorative towers) on pilaster, makara (aquatic monster), birds (hamsa), spiral foliage, animals such as lions, elephants and horses, and even general aspects of daily life such as hair styles in vogue.

 

Salabhanjika, a common form of Hoysala sculpture, is an old Indian tradition going back to Buddhist sculpture. Sala is the sala tree and bhanjika is the chaste maiden. In the Hoysala idiom, madanika figures are decorative objects put at an angle on the outer walls of the temple near the roof so that worshipers circumambulating the temple can view them.

 

The sthamba buttalikas are pillar images that show traces of Chola art in the Chalukyan touches. Some of the artists working for the Hoysalas may have been from Chola country, a result of the expansion of the empire into Tamil-speaking regions of Southern India. The image of mohini on one of the pillars in the mantapa (closed hall) of the Chennakeshava temple is an example of Chola art.

 

General life themes are portrayed on wall panels such as the way horses were reined, the type of stirrup used, the depiction of dancers, musicians, instrumentalists, and rows of animals such as lions and elephants (where no two animals are identical). Perhaps no other temple in the country depicts the Ramayana and Mahabharata epics more effectively than the Hoysaleshwara temple at Halebidu.

 

Erotica was a subject the Hoysala artist handled with discretion. There is no exhibitionism in this, and erotic themes were carved into recesses and niches, generally miniature in form, making them inconspicuous. These erotic representations are associated with the Shakta practice.

 

Apart from these sculptures, entire sequences from the Hindu epics (commonly the Ramayana and the Mahabharata) have been sculpted in a clockwise direction starting at the main entrance. The right to left sequence is the same direction taken by the devotees in their ritual circumambulation as they wind inward toward the inner sanctum. Depictions from mythology such as the epic hero Arjuna shooting fish, the elephant-headed god Ganesha, the Sun god Surya, the weather and war god Indra, and Brahma with Sarasvati are common. Also frequently seen in these temples is Durga, with several arms holding weapons given to her by other gods, in the act of killing a buffalo (a demon in a buffalo's form) and Harihara (a fusion of Shiva and Vishnu) holding a conch, wheel and trident. Many of these friezes were signed by the artisans, the first known instance of signed artwork in India.

 

RESEARCH

According to Settar, surveys in modern times have indicated that 1000–1500 structures were built by the Hoysalas, of which about a hundred temples have survived to date. The Hoysala style is an offshoot of the Western Chalukya style, which was popular in the 10th and 11th centuries. It is distinctively Dravidian, and according to Brown, owing to its features, Hoysala architecture qualifies as an independent style. While the Hoysalas introduced innovative features into their architecture, they also borrowed features from earlier builders of Karnata like the Kadambas, Western Chalukyas. These features included the use of chloritic schist or soapstone as a basic building material. Other features were the stepped style of vimana tower called the Kadamba shikhara, which was inherited from the Kadambas. Hoysala sculptors made use of the effect of light and shade on carved walls, which poses a challenge for photography of the temples. The artistry of the Hoysalas in stone has been compared to the finesse of an ivory worker or a goldsmith. The abundance of jewellery worn by the sculpted figures and the variety of hairstyles and headdresses depicted give a fair idea of the lifestyles of the Hoysala times.

 

NOTABLE CRAFTSMEN

While medieval Indian artisans preferred to remain anonymous, Hoysala artisans signed their works, which has given researchers details about their lives, families, guilds, etc. Apart from the architects and sculptors, people of other guilds such as goldsmiths, ivory carvers, carpenters, and silversmiths also contributed to the completion of temples. The artisans were from diverse geographical backgrounds and included famous locals. Prolific architects included Amarashilpi Jakanachari, a native of Kaidala in Tumkur district, who also built temples for the Western Chalukyas. Ruvari Malithamma built the Kesava Temple at Somanathapura and worked on forty other monuments, including the Amruteshwara temple at Amruthapura. Malithamma specialised in ornamentation, and his works span six decades. His sculptures were typically signed in shorthand as Malli or simply Ma. Dasoja and his son Chavana from Balligavi were the architects of Chennakesava Temple at Belur; Kedaroja was the chief architect of the Hoysaleswara Temple at Halebidu. Their influence is seen in other temples built by the Hoysalas as well. Names of other locals found in inscriptions are Maridamma, Baicoja, Caudaya, Nanjaya and Bama, Malloja, Nadoja, Siddoja, Masanithamma, Chameya and Rameya. Artists from Tamil country included Pallavachari and Cholavachari.

 

WIKIPEDIA

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Quay Brothers Return to Philly for First North American Exhibition, Film Festival Award

 

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Norristown-Native Animators, University of the Arts Grads Have Developed Global Cult Following

 

PHILADELPHIA (December 8, 2008) – Quirky, dark and moody has worked well for identical twins and Norristown natives Stephen and Timothy Quay. Their global cult following knows them better as the award-winning, London-based Brothers Quay, stop-action animators and graduates of The University of the Arts.

 

For the first time in North America, original sets (décors) from their films will be on display in the exhibition "DORMITORIUM: Film ‘Décors’ by the Quay Bros.” at their alma mater’s Rosenwald-Wolf Gallery, February 27 – April 9. Part of the University’s 50th anniversary celebration of its College of Art and Design, the festivities will include a reception with the brothers, and a presentation of the Vision Award for extraordinary achievement in filmmaking in conjunction with Philadelphia CineFest on April 3.

 

The décors in the exhibition range from the brothers’ critically acclaimed “Street of Crocodiles” (1986) to “The Piano Tuner of Earthquakes” (2006). The exhibition also includes décors from “The Unameable Little Broom” (1985); “Stille Nacht I (Dramolet)” (1988); “The Comb (From the Museums of Sleep)” (1990); “Rehearsals for Extinct Anatomies” (1988); “The Cabinet of Jan Svanmajer” (1984); “Rehearsals For Extinct Anatomies” (1988); and “The Calligrapher” (1991). After its run at the University’s Rosenwald-Wolf Gallery, the show travels to Parsons The New School for Design in New York City in the fall and Old Dominion University, Norfolk, Va., in the fall.

 

“Street of Crocodiles,” based on the short novel of the same name by the Polish author and artist Bruno Schulz, was selected by director and animator Terry Gilliam as one of the 10 best animated films of all time, and critic Jonathan Romney included it on his list of the 10 best films in any medium. “The Piano Tuner of Earthquakes” – a dark fairy tale about a demonic doctor who abducts a beautiful opera singer, with designs on transforming her into a mechanical nightingale – is the brothers’ second full-length feature film.

 

The Quays also directed an animated sequence in the 2002 Oscar-winning film “Frida,” starring Salma Hayek and Alfred Molina. Their first feature film, “Institute Benjamenta, or This Dream People Call Human Life” was released in 1995. Their third feature, based on Schulz’s “Sanatorium Under the Sign of the Hourglass,” is in pre-production.

 

They have built a cult following making dark and moody films, mostly on or influenced by Eastern European film, literature and music. Many feature partially disassembled dolls and generally have no meaningful spoken dialogue. Their work has been impacted by an array of disparate influences – from Polish animators Walerian Borowczyk and Jan Lenica to writers Franz Kafka and Robert Walser; from puppeteers Wladyslaw Starewicz and Richard Teschner to composers Leo Janácek, Zdenek Lika and Leszek Jankowski.

 

Born and raised in Norristown, Pa., the brothers graduated from the Philadelphia College of Art (now The University of the Arts) in 1969 (Stephen with a degree in film; Timothy with a degree in illustration) and promptly moved to England to study at the Royal College of Art, where they made their first film. During the ’70s, they spent time in the Netherlands and returned to England to team up with fellow Royal College alumnus Keith Griffiths, who has produced all of their films, to form Koninck Studios in 1980.

 

The University of the Arts is the nation’s first and only university dedicated to the visual, performing and communication arts. Its 2,300 students are enrolled in undergraduate and graduate programs on its campus in the heart of Philadelphia’s Avenue of the Arts. The institution’s roots as a leader in educating creative individuals date back to 1868.

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Ski road trip in March 2013 to Fernie, British Columbia, Canada, film run time 5:00 minutes

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Bali is an island and province of Indonesia. The province includes the island of Bali and a few smaller neighbouring islands, notably Nusa Penida, Nusa Lembongan, and Nusa Ceningan. It is located at the westernmost end of the Lesser Sunda Islands, between Java to the west and Lombok to the east. Its capital of Denpasar is located at the southern part of the island.

 

With a population of 3,890,757 in the 2010 census, and 4,225,000 as of January 2014, the island is home to most of Indonesia's Hindu minority. According to the 2010 Census, 83.5% of Bali's population adhered to Balinese Hinduism, followed by 13.4% Muslim, Christianity at 2.5%, and Buddhism 0.5%.

 

Bali is a popular tourist destination, which has seen a significant rise in numbers since the 1980s. It is renowned for its highly developed arts, including traditional and modern dance, sculpture, painting, leather, metalworking, and music. The Indonesian International Film Festival is held every year in Bali.

 

Bali is part of the Coral Triangle, the area with the highest biodiversity of marine species. In this area alone over 500 reef building coral species can be found. For comparison, this is about 7 times as many as in the entire Caribbean. There is a wide range of dive sites with high quality reefs, all with their own specific attractions. Many sites can have strong currents and swell, so diving without a knowledgeable guide is inadvisable. Most recently, Bali was the host of the 2011 ASEAN Summit, 2013 APEC and Miss World 2013.

 

HISTORY

ANCIENT

Bali was inhabited around 2000 BC by Austronesian people who migrated originally from Southeast Asia and Oceania through Maritime Southeast Asia. Culturally and linguistically, the Balinese are closely related to the people of the Indonesian archipelago, Malaysia, the Philippines, and Oceania. Stone tools dating from this time have been found near the village of Cekik in the island's west.

 

In ancient Bali, nine Hindu sects existed, namely Pasupata, Bhairawa, Siwa Shidanta, Waisnawa, Bodha, Brahma, Resi, Sora and Ganapatya. Each sect revered a specific deity as its personal Godhead.

 

Inscriptions from 896 and 911 don't mention a king, until 914, when Sri Kesarivarma is mentioned. They also reveal an independent Bali, with a distinct dialect, where Buddhism and Sivaism were practiced simultaneously. Mpu Sindok's great granddaughter, Mahendradatta (Gunapriyadharmapatni), married the Bali king Udayana Warmadewa (Dharmodayanavarmadeva) around 989, giving birth to Airlangga around 1001. This marriage also brought more Hinduism and Javanese culture to Bali. Princess Sakalendukirana appeared in 1098. Suradhipa reigned from 1115 to 1119, and Jayasakti from 1146 until 1150. Jayapangus appears on inscriptions between 1178 and 1181, while Adikuntiketana and his son Paramesvara in 1204.

 

Balinese culture was strongly influenced by Indian, Chinese, and particularly Hindu culture, beginning around the 1st century AD. The name Bali dwipa ("Bali island") has been discovered from various inscriptions, including the Blanjong pillar inscription written by Sri Kesari Warmadewa in 914 AD and mentioning "Walidwipa". It was during this time that the people developed their complex irrigation system subak to grow rice in wet-field cultivation. Some religious and cultural traditions still practised today can be traced to this period.

 

The Hindu Majapahit Empire (1293–1520 AD) on eastern Java founded a Balinese colony in 1343. The uncle of Hayam Wuruk is mentioned in the charters of 1384-86. A mass Javanese emigration occurred in the next century.

 

PORTUGUESE CONTACTS

The first known European contact with Bali is thought to have been made in 1512, when a Portuguese expedition led by Antonio Abreu and Francisco Serrão sighted its northern shores. It was the first expedition of a series of bi-annual fleets to the Moluccas, that throughout the 16th century usually traveled along the coasts of the Sunda Islands. Bali was also mapped in 1512, in the chart of Francisco Rodrigues, aboard the expedition. In 1585, a ship foundered off the Bukit Peninsula and left a few Portuguese in the service of Dewa Agung.

 

DUTCH EAST INDIA

In 1597 the Dutch explorer Cornelis de Houtman arrived at Bali, and the Dutch East India Company was established in 1602. The Dutch government expanded its control across the Indonesian archipelago during the second half of the 19th century (see Dutch East Indies). Dutch political and economic control over Bali began in the 1840s on the island's north coast, when the Dutch pitted various competing Balinese realms against each other. In the late 1890s, struggles between Balinese kingdoms in the island's south were exploited by the Dutch to increase their control.

 

In June 1860 the famous Welsh naturalist, Alfred Russel Wallace, travelled to Bali from Singapore, landing at Buleleng on the northcoast of the island. Wallace's trip to Bali was instrumental in helping him devise his Wallace Line theory. The Wallace Line is a faunal boundary that runs through the strait between Bali and Lombok. It has been found to be a boundary between species of Asiatic origin in the east and a mixture of Australian and Asian species to the west. In his travel memoir The Malay Archipelago, Wallace wrote of his experience in Bali:

 

I was both astonished and delighted; for as my visit to Java was some years later, I had never beheld so beautiful and well-cultivated a district out of Europe. A slightly undulating plain extends from the seacoast about ten or twelve miles inland, where it is bounded by a fine range of wooded and cultivated hills. Houses and villages, marked out by dense clumps of coconut palms, tamarind and other fruit trees, are dotted about in every direction; while between them extend luxurious rice-grounds, watered by an elaborate system of irrigation that would be the pride of the best cultivated parts of Europe.

 

The Dutch mounted large naval and ground assaults at the Sanur region in 1906 and were met by the thousands of members of the royal family and their followers who fought against the superior Dutch force in a suicidal puputan defensive assault rather than face the humiliation of surrender. Despite Dutch demands for surrender, an estimated 200 Balinese marched to their death against the invaders. In the Dutch intervention in Bali, a similar massacre occurred in the face of a Dutch assault in Klungkung.

 

AFTERWARD THE DUTCH GOVERNORS

exercised administrative control over the island, but local control over religion and culture generally remained intact. Dutch rule over Bali came later and was never as well established as in other parts of Indonesia such as Java and Maluku.

 

n the 1930s, anthropologists Margaret Mead and Gregory Bateson, artists Miguel Covarrubias and Walter Spies, and musicologist Colin McPhee all spent time here. Their accounts of the island and its peoples created a western image of Bali as "an enchanted land of aesthetes at peace with themselves and nature." Western tourists began to visit the island.

 

Imperial Japan occupied Bali during World War II. It was not originally a target in their Netherlands East Indies Campaign, but as the airfields on Borneo were inoperative due to heavy rains, the Imperial Japanese Army decided to occupy Bali, which did not suffer from comparable weather. The island had no regular Royal Netherlands East Indies Army (KNIL) troops. There was only a Native Auxiliary Corps Prajoda (Korps Prajoda) consisting of about 600 native soldiers and several Dutch KNIL officers under command of KNIL Lieutenant Colonel W.P. Roodenburg. On 19 February 1942 the Japanese forces landed near the town of Senoer [Senur]. The island was quickly captured.

 

During the Japanese occupation, a Balinese military officer, Gusti Ngurah Rai, formed a Balinese 'freedom army'. The harshness of war requisitions made Japanese rule more resented than Dutch rule. Following Japan's Pacific surrender in August 1945, the Dutch returned to Indonesia, including Bali, to reinstate their pre-war colonial administration. This was resisted by the Balinese rebels, who now used recovered Japanese weapons. On 20 November 1946, the Battle of Marga was fought in Tabanan in central Bali. Colonel I Gusti Ngurah Rai, by then 29 years old, finally rallied his forces in east Bali at Marga Rana, where they made a suicide attack on the heavily armed Dutch. The Balinese battalion was entirely wiped out, breaking the last thread of Balinese military resistance.

 

INDIPENDENCE FROM THE DUTCH

In 1946, the Dutch constituted Bali as one of the 13 administrative districts of the newly proclaimed State of East Indonesia, a rival state to the Republic of Indonesia, which was proclaimed and headed by Sukarno and Hatta. Bali was included in the "Republic of the United States of Indonesia" when the Netherlands recognised Indonesian independence on 29 December 1949.

 

CONTEMPORARY

The 1963 eruption of Mount Agung killed thousands, created economic havoc and forced many displaced Balinese to be transmigrated to other parts of Indonesia. Mirroring the widening of social divisions across Indonesia in the 1950s and early 1960s, Bali saw conflict between supporters of the traditional caste system, and those rejecting this system. Politically, the opposition was represented by supporters of the Indonesian Communist Party (PKI) and the Indonesian Nationalist Party (PNI), with tensions and ill-feeling further increased by the PKI's land reform programs. An attempted coup in Jakarta was put down by forces led by General Suharto.

 

The army became the dominant power as it instigated a violent anti-communist purge, in which the army blamed the PKI for the coup. Most estimates suggest that at least 500,000 people were killed across Indonesia, with an estimated 80,000 killed in Bali, equivalent to 5% of the island's population. With no Islamic forces involved as in Java and Sumatra, upper-caste PNI landlords led the extermination of PKI members.

 

As a result of the 1965/66 upheavals, Suharto was able to manoeuvre Sukarno out of the presidency. His "New Order" government reestablished relations with western countries. The pre-War Bali as "paradise" was revived in a modern form. The resulting large growth in tourism has led to a dramatic increase in Balinese standards of living and significant foreign exchange earned for the country. A bombing in 2002 by militant Islamists in the tourist area of Kuta killed 202 people, mostly foreigners. This attack, and another in 2005, severely reduced tourism, producing much economic hardship to the island.

 

GEOGRAPHY

The island of Bali lies 3.2 km east of Java, and is approximately 8 degrees south of the equator. Bali and Java are separated by the Bali Strait. East to west, the island is approximately 153 km wide and spans approximately 112 km north to south; administratively it covers 5,780 km2, or 5,577 km2 without Nusa Penida District, its population density is roughly 750 people/km2.

 

Bali's central mountains include several peaks over 3,000 metres in elevation. The highest is Mount Agung (3,031 m), known as the "mother mountain" which is an active volcano rated as one of the world's most likely sites for a massive eruption within the next 100 years. Mountains range from centre to the eastern side, with Mount Agung the easternmost peak. Bali's volcanic nature has contributed to its exceptional fertility and its tall mountain ranges provide the high rainfall that supports the highly productive agriculture sector. South of the mountains is a broad, steadily descending area where most of Bali's large rice crop is grown. The northern side of the mountains slopes more steeply to the sea and is the main coffee producing area of the island, along with rice, vegetables and cattle. The longest river, Ayung River, flows approximately 75 km.

 

The island is surrounded by coral reefs. Beaches in the south tend to have white sand while those in the north and west have black sand. Bali has no major waterways, although the Ho River is navigable by small sampan boats. Black sand beaches between Pasut and Klatingdukuh are being developed for tourism, but apart from the seaside temple of Tanah Lot, they are not yet used for significant tourism.

 

The largest city is the provincial capital, Denpasar, near the southern coast. Its population is around 491,500 (2002). Bali's second-largest city is the old colonial capital, Singaraja, which is located on the north coast and is home to around 100,000 people. Other important cities include the beach resort, Kuta, which is practically part of Denpasar's urban area, and Ubud, situated at the north of Denpasar, is the island's cultural centre.

 

Three small islands lie to the immediate south east and all are administratively part of the Klungkung regency of Bali: Nusa Penida, Nusa Lembongan and Nusa Ceningan. These islands are separated from Bali by the Badung Strait.

 

To the east, the Lombok Strait separates Bali from Lombok and marks the biogeographical division between the fauna of the Indomalayan ecozone and the distinctly different fauna of Australasia. The transition is known as the Wallace Line, named after Alfred Russel Wallace, who first proposed a transition zone between these two major biomes. When sea levels dropped during the Pleistocene ice age, Bali was connected to Java and Sumatra and to the mainland of Asia and shared the Asian fauna, but the deep water of the Lombok Strait continued to keep Lombok Island and the Lesser Sunda archipelago isolated.

 

CLIMATE

Being just 8 degrees south of the equator, Bali has a fairly even climate year round.

 

Day time temperatures at low elevations vary between 20-33⁰ C although it can be much cooler than that in the mountains. The west monsoon is in place from approximately October to April and this can bring significant rain, particularly from December to March. Outside of the monsoon period, humidity is relatively low and any rain unlikely in lowland areas.

 

ECOLOGY

Bali lies just to the west of the Wallace Line, and thus has a fauna that is Asian in character, with very little Australasian influence, and has more in common with Java than with Lombok. An exception is the yellow-crested cockatoo, a member of a primarily Australasian family. There are around 280 species of birds, including the critically endangered Bali myna, which is endemic. Others Include barn swallow, black-naped oriole, black racket-tailed treepie, crested serpent-eagle, crested treeswift, dollarbird, Java sparrow, lesser adjutant, long-tailed shrike, milky stork, Pacific swallow, red-rumped swallow, sacred kingfisher, sea eagle, woodswallow, savanna nightjar, stork-billed kingfisher, yellow-vented bulbul and great egret.

 

Until the early 20th century, Bali was home to several large mammals: the wild banteng, leopard and the endemic Bali tiger. The banteng still occurs in its domestic form, whereas leopards are found only in neighbouring Java, and the Bali tiger is extinct. The last definite record of a tiger on Bali dates from 1937, when one was shot, though the subspecies may have survived until the 1940s or 1950s. The relatively small size of the island, conflict with humans, poaching and habitat reduction drove the Bali tiger to extinction. This was the smallest and rarest of all tiger subspecies and was never caught on film or displayed in zoos, whereas few skins or bones remain in museums around the world. Today, the largest mammals are the Javan rusa deer and the wild boar. A second, smaller species of deer, the Indian muntjac, also occurs. Saltwater crocodiles were once present on the island, but became locally extinct sometime during the last century.

 

Squirrels are quite commonly encountered, less often is the Asian palm civet, which is also kept in coffee farms to produce Kopi Luwak. Bats are well represented, perhaps the most famous place to encounter them remaining the Goa Lawah (Temple of the Bats) where they are worshipped by the locals and also constitute a tourist attraction. They also occur in other cave temples, for instance at Gangga Beach. Two species of monkey occur. The crab-eating macaque, known locally as "kera", is quite common around human settlements and temples, where it becomes accustomed to being fed by humans, particularly in any of the three "monkey forest" temples, such as the popular one in the Ubud area. They are also quite often kept as pets by locals. The second monkey, endemic to Java and some surrounding islands such as Bali, is far rarer and more elusive is the Javan langur, locally known as "lutung". They occur in few places apart from the Bali Barat National Park. They are born an orange colour, though by their first year they would have already changed to a more blackish colouration. In Java however, there is more of a tendency for this species to retain its juvenile orange colour into adulthood, and so you can see a mixture of black and orange monkeys together as a family. Other rarer mammals include the leopard cat, Sunda pangolin and black giant squirrel.

 

Snakes include the king cobra and reticulated python. The water monitor can grow to at least 1.5 m in length and 50 kg and can move quickly.

 

The rich coral reefs around the coast, particularly around popular diving spots such as Tulamben, Amed, Menjangan or neighbouring Nusa Penida, host a wide range of marine life, for instance hawksbill turtle, giant sunfish, giant manta ray, giant moray eel, bumphead parrotfish, hammerhead shark, reef shark, barracuda, and sea snakes. Dolphins are commonly encountered on the north coast near Singaraja and Lovina.

 

A team of scientists conducted a survey from 29 April 2011 to 11 May 2011 at 33 sea sites around Bali. They discovered 952 species of reef fish of which 8 were new discoveries at Pemuteran, Gilimanuk, Nusa Dua, Tulamben and Candidasa, and 393 coral species, including two new ones at Padangbai and between Padangbai and Amed. The average coverage level of healthy coral was 36% (better than in Raja Ampat and Halmahera by 29% or in Fakfak and Kaimana by 25%) with the highest coverage found in Gili Selang and Gili Mimpang in Candidasa, Karangasem regency.

 

Many plants have been introduced by humans within the last centuries, particularly since the 20th century, making it sometimes hard to distinguish what plants are really native.[citation needed] Among the larger trees the most common are: banyan trees, jackfruit, coconuts, bamboo species, acacia trees and also endless rows of coconuts and banana species. Numerous flowers can be seen: hibiscus, frangipani, bougainvillea, poinsettia, oleander, jasmine, water lily, lotus, roses, begonias, orchids and hydrangeas exist. On higher grounds that receive more moisture, for instance around Kintamani, certain species of fern trees, mushrooms and even pine trees thrive well. Rice comes in many varieties. Other plants with agricultural value include: salak, mangosteen, corn, kintamani orange, coffee and water spinach.

 

ENVIRONMENT

Some of the worst erosion has occurred in Lebih Beach, where up to 7 metres of land is lost every year. Decades ago, this beach was used for holy pilgrimages with more than 10,000 people, but they have now moved to Masceti Beach.

 

From ranked third in previous review, in 2010 Bali got score 99.65 of Indonesia's environmental quality index and the highest of all the 33 provinces. The score measured 3 water quality parameters: the level of total suspended solids (TSS), dissolved oxygen (DO) and chemical oxygen demand (COD).

 

Because of over-exploitation by the tourist industry which covers a massive land area, 200 out of 400 rivers on the island have dried up and based on research, the southern part of Bali would face a water shortage up to 2,500 litres of clean water per second by 2015. To ease the shortage, the central government plans to build a water catchment and processing facility at Petanu River in Gianyar. The 300 litres capacity of water per second will be channelled to Denpasar, Badung and Gianyar in 2013.

 

ECONOMY

Three decades ago, the Balinese economy was largely agriculture-based in terms of both output and employment. Tourism is now the largest single industry in terms of income, and as a result, Bali is one of Indonesia's wealthiest regions. In 2003, around 80% of Bali's economy was tourism related. By end of June 2011, non-performing loan of all banks in Bali were 2.23%, lower than the average of Indonesian banking industry non-performing loan (about 5%). The economy, however, suffered significantly as a result of the terrorist bombings 2002 and 2005. The tourism industry has since recovered from these events.

 

AGRICULTURE

Although tourism produces the GDP's largest output, agriculture is still the island's biggest employer; most notably rice cultivation. Crops grown in smaller amounts include fruit, vegetables, Coffea arabica and other cash and subsistence crops. Fishing also provides a significant number of jobs. Bali is also famous for its artisans who produce a vast array of handicrafts, including batik and ikat cloth and clothing, wooden carvings, stone carvings, painted art and silverware. Notably, individual villages typically adopt a single product, such as wind chimes or wooden furniture.

 

The Arabica coffee production region is the highland region of Kintamani near Mount Batur. Generally, Balinese coffee is processed using the wet method. This results in a sweet, soft coffee with good consistency. Typical flavours include lemon and other citrus notes. Many coffee farmers in Kintamani are members of a traditional farming system called Subak Abian, which is based on the Hindu philosophy of "Tri Hita Karana". According to this philosophy, the three causes of happiness are good relations with God, other people and the environment. The Subak Abian system is ideally suited to the production of fair trade and organic coffee production. Arabica coffee from Kintamani is the first product in Indonesia to request a Geographical Indication.

 

TOURISM

The tourism industry is primarily focused in the south, while significant in the other parts of the island as well. The main tourist locations are the town of Kuta (with its beach), and its outer suburbs of Legian and Seminyak (which were once independent townships), the east coast town of Sanur (once the only tourist hub), in the center of the island Ubud, to the south of the Ngurah Rai International Airport, Jimbaran, and the newer development of Nusa Dua and Pecatu.

 

The American government lifted its travel warnings in 2008. The Australian government issued an advice on Friday, 4 May 2012. The overall level of the advice was lowered to 'Exercise a high degree of caution'. The Swedish government issued a new warning on Sunday, 10 June 2012 because of one more tourist who was killed by methanol poisoning. Australia last issued an advice on Monday, 5 January 2015 due to new terrorist threats.

 

An offshoot of tourism is the growing real estate industry. Bali real estate has been rapidly developing in the main tourist areas of Kuta, Legian, Seminyak and Oberoi. Most recently, high-end 5 star projects are under development on the Bukit peninsula, on the south side of the island. Million dollar villas are being developed along the cliff sides of south Bali, commanding panoramic ocean views. Foreign and domestic (many Jakarta individuals and companies are fairly active) investment into other areas of the island also continues to grow. Land prices, despite the worldwide economic crisis, have remained stable.

 

In the last half of 2008, Indonesia's currency had dropped approximately 30% against the US dollar, providing many overseas visitors value for their currencies. Visitor arrivals for 2009 were forecast to drop 8% (which would be higher than 2007 levels), due to the worldwide economic crisis which has also affected the global tourist industry, but not due to any travel warnings.

 

Bali's tourism economy survived the terrorist bombings of 2002 and 2005, and the tourism industry has in fact slowly recovered and surpassed its pre-terrorist bombing levels; the longterm trend has been a steady increase of visitor arrivals. In 2010, Bali received 2.57 million foreign tourists, which surpassed the target of 2.0–2.3 million tourists. The average occupancy of starred hotels achieved 65%, so the island is still able to accommodate tourists for some years without any addition of new rooms/hotels, although at the peak season some of them are fully booked.

 

Bali received the Best Island award from Travel and Leisure in 2010. The island of Bali won because of its attractive surroundings (both mountain and coastal areas), diverse tourist attractions, excellent international and local restaurants, and the friendliness of the local people. According to BBC Travel released in 2011, Bali is one of the World's Best Islands, ranking second after Santorini, Greece.

 

In August 2010, the film Eat Pray Love was released in theatres. The movie was based on Elizabeth Gilbert's best-selling memoir Eat, Pray, Love. It took place at Ubud and Padang-Padang Beach at Bali. The 2006 book, which spent 57 weeks at the No. 1 spot on the New York Times paperback nonfiction best-seller list, had already fuelled a boom in Eat, Pray, Love-related tourism in Ubud, the hill town and cultural and tourist center that was the focus of Gilbert's quest for balance through traditional spirituality and healing that leads to love.

 

In January 2016, after music icon David Bowie died, it was revealed that in his will, Bowie asked for his ashes to be scattered in Bali, conforming to Buddhist rituals. He had visited and performed in a number of Southest Asian cities early in his career, including Bangkok and Singapore.

 

Since 2011, China has displaced Japan as the second-largest supplier of tourists to Bali, while Australia still tops the list. Chinese tourists increased by 17% from last year due to the impact of ACFTA and new direct flights to Bali. In January 2012, Chinese tourists year on year (yoy) increased by 222.18% compared to January 2011, while Japanese tourists declined by 23.54% yoy.

 

Bali reported that it has 2.88 million foreign tourists and 5 million domestic tourists in 2012, marginally surpassing the expectations of 2.8 million foreign tourists. Forecasts for 2013 are at 3.1 million.

 

Based on Bank Indonesia survey in May 2013, 34.39 percent of tourists are upper-middle class with spending between $1,286 to $5,592 and dominated by Australia, France, China, Germany and the US with some China tourists move from low spending before to higher spending currently. While 30.26 percent are middle class with spending between $662 to $1,285.

 

SEX TOURISM

In the twentieth century the incidence of tourism specifically for sex was regularly observed in the era of mass tourism in Indonesia In Bali, prostitution is conducted by both men and women. Bali in particular is notorious for its 'Kuta Cowboys', local gigolos targeting foreign female tourists.

 

Tens of thousands of single women throng the beaches of Bali in Indonesia every year. For decades, young Balinese men have taken advantage of the louche and laid-back atmosphere to find love and lucre from female tourists—Japanese, European and Australian for the most part—who by all accounts seem perfectly happy with the arrangement.

 

By 2013, Indonesia was reportedly the number one destination for Australian child sex tourists, mostly starting in Bali but also travelling to other parts of the country. The problem in Bali was highlighted by Luh Ketut Suryani, head of Psychiatry at Udayana University, as early as 2003. Surayani warned that a low level of awareness of paedophilia in Bali had made it the target of international paedophile organisations. On 19 February 2013, government officials announced measures to combat paedophilia in Bali.

 

TRANSPORTATION

The Ngurah Rai International Airport is located near Jimbaran, on the isthmus at the southernmost part of the island. Lt.Col. Wisnu Airfield is found in north-west Bali.

 

A coastal road circles the island, and three major two-lane arteries cross the central mountains at passes reaching to 1,750m in height (at Penelokan). The Ngurah Rai Bypass is a four-lane expressway that partly encircles Denpasar. Bali has no railway lines.

 

In December 2010 the Government of Indonesia invited investors to build a new Tanah Ampo Cruise Terminal at Karangasem, Bali with a projected worth of $30 million. On 17 July 2011 the first cruise ship (Sun Princess) anchored about 400 meters away from the wharf of Tanah Ampo harbour. The current pier is only 154 meters but will eventually be extended to 300–350 meters to accommodate international cruise ships. The harbour here is safer than the existing facility at Benoa and has a scenic backdrop of east Bali mountains and green rice fields. The tender for improvement was subject to delays, and as of July 2013 the situation remained unclear with cruise line operators complaining and even refusing to use the existing facility at Tanah Ampo.

 

A Memorandum of Understanding has been signed by two ministers, Bali's Governor and Indonesian Train Company to build 565 kilometres of railway along the coast around the island. As of July 2015, no details of this proposed railways have been released.

 

On 16 March 2011 (Tanjung) Benoa port received the "Best Port Welcome 2010" award from London's "Dream World Cruise Destination" magazine. Government plans to expand the role of Benoa port as export-import port to boost Bali's trade and industry sector. The Tourism and Creative Economy Ministry has confirmed that 306 cruise liners are heading for Indonesia in 2013 – an increase of 43 percent compared to the previous year.

 

In May 2011, an integrated Areal Traffic Control System (ATCS) was implemented to reduce traffic jams at four crossing points: Ngurah Rai statue, Dewa Ruci Kuta crossing, Jimbaran crossing and Sanur crossing. ATCS is an integrated system connecting all traffic lights, CCTVs and other traffic signals with a monitoring office at the police headquarters. It has successfully been implemented in other ASEAN countries and will be implemented at other crossings in Bali.

 

On 21 December 2011 construction started on the Nusa Dua-Benoa-Ngurah Rai International Airport toll road which will also provide a special lane for motorcycles. This has been done by seven state-owned enterprises led by PT Jasa Marga with 60% of shares. PT Jasa Marga Bali Tol will construct the 9.91 kilometres toll road (totally 12.7 kilometres with access road). The construction is estimated to cost Rp.2.49 trillion ($273.9 million). The project goes through 2 kilometres of mangrove forest and through 2.3 kilometres of beach, both within 5.4 hectares area. The elevated toll road is built over the mangrove forest on 18,000 concrete pillars which occupied 2 hectares of mangroves forest. It compensated by new planting of 300,000 mangrove trees along the road. On 21 December 2011 the Dewa Ruci 450 meters underpass has also started on the busy Dewa Ruci junction near Bali Kuta Galeria with an estimated cost of Rp136 billion ($14.9 million) from the state budget. On 23 September 2013, the Bali Mandara Toll Road is opened and the Dewa Ruci Junction (Simpang Siur) underpass is opened before. Both are ease the heavy traffic congestion.

 

To solve chronic traffic problems, the province will also build a toll road connecting Serangan with Tohpati, a toll road connecting Kuta, Denpasar and Tohpati and a flyover connecting Kuta and Ngurah Rai Airport.

 

DEMOGRAPHICS

The population of Bali was 3,890,757 as of the 2010 Census; the latest estimate (for January 2014) is 4,225,384. There are an estimated 30,000 expatriates living in Bali.

 

ETHNIC ORIGINS

A DNA study in 2005 by Karafet et al. found that 12% of Balinese Y-chromosomes are of likely Indian origin, while 84% are of likely Austronesian origin, and 2% of likely Melanesian origin. The study does not correlate the DNA samples to the Balinese caste system.

 

CASTE SYSTEM

Bali has a caste system based on the Indian Hindu model, with four castes:

 

- Sudra (Shudra) – peasants constituting close to 93% of Bali's population.

- Wesia (Vaishyas) – the caste of merchants and administrative officials

- Ksatrias (Kshatriyas) – the kingly and warrior caste

- Brahmana (Bramhin) – holy men and priests

 

RELIGION

Unlike most of Muslim-majority Indonesia, about 83.5% of Bali's population adheres to Balinese Hinduism, formed as a combination of existing local beliefs and Hindu influences from mainland Southeast Asia and South Asia. Minority religions include Islam (13.3%), Christianity (1.7%), and Buddhism (0.5%). These figures do not include immigrants from other parts of Indonesia.

 

Balinese Hinduism is an amalgam in which gods and demigods are worshipped together with Buddhist heroes, the spirits of ancestors, indigenous agricultural deities and sacred places. Religion as it is practised in Bali is a composite belief system that embraces not only theology, philosophy, and mythology, but ancestor worship, animism and magic. It pervades nearly every aspect of traditional life. Caste is observed, though less strictly than in India. With an estimated 20,000 puras (temples) and shrines, Bali is known as the "Island of a Thousand Puras", or "Island of the Gods". This is refer to Mahabarata story that behind Bali became island of god or "pulau dewata" in Indonesian language.

 

Balinese Hinduism has roots in Indian Hinduism and Buddhism, and adopted the animistic traditions of the indigenous people. This influence strengthened the belief that the gods and goddesses are present in all things. Every element of nature, therefore, possesses its own power, which reflects the power of the gods. A rock, tree, dagger, or woven cloth is a potential home for spirits whose energy can be directed for good or evil. Balinese Hinduism is deeply interwoven with art and ritual. Ritualizing states of self-control are a notable feature of religious expression among the people, who for this reason have become famous for their graceful and decorous behaviour.

 

Apart from the majority of Balinese Hindus, there also exist Chinese immigrants whose traditions have melded with that of the locals. As a result, these Sino-Balinese not only embrace their original religion, which is a mixture of Buddhism, Christianity, Taoism and Confucianism, but also find a way to harmonise it with the local traditions. Hence, it is not uncommon to find local Sino-Balinese during the local temple's odalan. Moreover, Balinese Hindu priests are invited to perform rites alongside a Chinese priest in the event of the death of a Sino-Balinese. Nevertheless, the Sino-Balinese claim to embrace Buddhism for administrative purposes, such as their Identity Cards.

 

LANGUAGE

Balinese and Indonesian are the most widely spoken languages in Bali, and the vast majority of Balinese people are bilingual or trilingual. The most common spoken language around the tourist areas is Indonesian, as many people in the tourist sector are not solely Balinese, but migrants from Java, Lombok, Sumatra, and other parts of Indonesia. There are several indigenous Balinese languages, but most Balinese can also use the most widely spoken option: modern common Balinese. The usage of different Balinese languages was traditionally determined by the Balinese caste system and by clan membership, but this tradition is diminishing. Kawi and Sanskrit are also commonly used by some Hindu priests in Bali, for Hinduism literature was mostly written in Sanskrit.

 

English and Chinese are the next most common languages (and the primary foreign languages) of many Balinese, owing to the requirements of the tourism industry, as well as the English-speaking community and huge Chinese-Indonesian population. Other foreign languages, such as Japanese, Korean, French, Russian or German are often used in multilingual signs for foreign tourists.

 

CULTURE

Bali is renowned for its diverse and sophisticated art forms, such as painting, sculpture, woodcarving, handcrafts, and performing arts. Balinese cuisine is also distinctive. Balinese percussion orchestra music, known as gamelan, is highly developed and varied. Balinese performing arts often portray stories from Hindu epics such as the Ramayana but with heavy Balinese influence. Famous Balinese dances include pendet, legong, baris, topeng, barong, gong keybar, and kecak (the monkey dance). Bali boasts one of the most diverse and innovative performing arts cultures in the world, with paid performances at thousands of temple festivals, private ceremonies, or public shows.

 

The Hindu New Year, Nyepi, is celebrated in the spring by a day of silence. On this day everyone stays at home and tourists are encouraged to remain in their hotels. On the day before New Year, large and colourful sculptures of ogoh-ogoh monsters are paraded and finally burned in the evening to drive away evil spirits. Other festivals throughout the year are specified by the Balinese pawukon calendrical system.

 

Celebrations are held for many occasions such as a tooth-filing (coming-of-age ritual), cremation or odalan (temple festival). One of the most important concepts that Balinese ceremonies have in common is that of désa kala patra, which refers to how ritual performances must be appropriate in both the specific and general social context. Many of the ceremonial art forms such as wayang kulit and topeng are highly improvisatory, providing flexibility for the performer to adapt the performance to the current situation. Many celebrations call for a loud, boisterous atmosphere with lots of activity and the resulting aesthetic, ramé, is distinctively Balinese. Often two or more gamelan ensembles will be performing well within earshot, and sometimes compete with each other to be heard. Likewise, the audience members talk amongst themselves, get up and walk around, or even cheer on the performance, which adds to the many layers of activity and the liveliness typical of ramé.

 

Kaja and kelod are the Balinese equivalents of North and South, which refer to ones orientation between the island's largest mountain Gunung Agung (kaja), and the sea (kelod). In addition to spatial orientation, kaja and kelod have the connotation of good and evil; gods and ancestors are believed to live on the mountain whereas demons live in the sea. Buildings such as temples and residential homes are spatially oriented by having the most sacred spaces closest to the mountain and the unclean places nearest to the sea.

 

Most temples have an inner courtyard and an outer courtyard which are arranged with the inner courtyard furthest kaja. These spaces serve as performance venues since most Balinese rituals are accompanied by any combination of music, dance and drama. The performances that take place in the inner courtyard are classified as wali, the most sacred rituals which are offerings exclusively for the gods, while the outer courtyard is where bebali ceremonies are held, which are intended for gods and people. Lastly, performances meant solely for the entertainment of humans take place outside the walls of the temple and are called bali-balihan. This three-tiered system of classification was standardised in 1971 by a committee of Balinese officials and artists to better protect the sanctity of the oldest and most sacred Balinese rituals from being performed for a paying audience.

 

Tourism, Bali's chief industry, has provided the island with a foreign audience that is eager to pay for entertainment, thus creating new performance opportunities and more demand for performers. The impact of tourism is controversial since before it became integrated into the economy, the Balinese performing arts did not exist as a capitalist venture, and were not performed for entertainment outside of their respective ritual context. Since the 1930s sacred rituals such as the barong dance have been performed both in their original contexts, as well as exclusively for paying tourists. This has led to new versions of many of these performances which have developed according to the preferences of foreign audiences; some villages have a barong mask specifically for non-ritual performances as well as an older mask which is only used for sacred performances.

 

Balinese society continues to revolve around each family's ancestral village, to which the cycle of life and religion is closely tied. Coercive aspects of traditional society, such as customary law sanctions imposed by traditional authorities such as village councils (including "kasepekang", or shunning) have risen in importance as a consequence of the democratisation and decentralisation of Indonesia since 1998.

 

WIKIPEDIA

Develop your senses- especially learn how to see. Realize that everything connects to everything else.

05/05/2023. London, United Kingdom. Sophie, Duchess of Edinburgh, Prince Edward, Duke of Edinburgh and The Foreign Secretary James Cleverly at the Small Island Developing States Coronation Event. Treasury. Picture by Kirsty O'Connor/Treasury

Pyrocumulus over a fire on the left. It thundered and rained an hour after as expected.

TsMV (All-Metal) bogie - ubnbalanced all-metal bogie without horn guides was developed for all-metal railcars mainly passenger and produced from 1950 onwards.

 

This TSMV-type bogie was made in 1959 by the H.CECIELSKY POZNAN - steel products manufaturer of Socilaist Poland

 

Exposition of the Russian Railways Museum in St. Petersburg, Russia

The Lockheed P-38 Lightning was a World War II American fighter aircraft built by Lockheed. Developed to a United States Army Air Corps requirement, the P-38 had distinctive twin booms and a single, central nacelle containing the cockpit and armament. Named "fork-tailed devil" (der Gabelschwanz-Teufel) by the Luftwaffe and "two planes, one pilot" (2飛行機、1パイロット Ni hikōki, ippairotto?) by the Japanese, the P-38 was used in a number of roles, including dive bombing, level bombing, ground-attack, night fighting, photoreconnaissance missions, and extensively as a long-range escort fighter when equipped with drop tanks under its wings.

 

The P-38 was used most successfully in the Pacific Theater of Operations and the China-Burma-India Theater of Operations as the mount of America's top aces, Richard Bong (40 victories) and Thomas McGuire (38 victories). In the South West Pacific theater, the P-38 was the primary long-range fighter of United States Army Air Forces until the appearance of large numbers of P-51D Mustangs toward the end of the war.

 

The P-38 was unusually quiet for a fighter, the exhaust muffled by the turbo-superchargers. It was extremely forgiving, and could be mishandled in many ways, but the rate of roll in the early versions was too slow for it to excel as a dogfighter. The P-38 was the only American fighter aircraft in production throughout American involvement in the war, from Pearl Harbor to Victory over Japan Day.

 

Design and development[edit]

Lockheed designed the P-38 in response to a February 1937 specification from the United States Army Air Corps. Circular Proposal X-608 was a set of aircraft performance goals authored by First Lieutenant Benjamin S. Kelsey (later Brigadier General) and First Lieutenant Gordon P. Saville (later General) for a twin-engine, high-altitude "interceptor" having "the tactical mission of interception and attack of hostile aircraft at high altitude." Kelsey recalled in 1977 that he and Saville drew up the specification using the word interceptor as a way to bypass the inflexible Army Air Corps requirement for pursuit aircraft to carry no more than 500 lb (227 kg) of armament including ammunition, as well as the restriction of single-seat aircraft to one engine. Kelsey was looking for a minimum of 1,000 lb (454 kg) of armament. Kelsey and Saville aimed to get a more capable fighter, better at dog-fighting and at high-altitude combat. Specifications called for a maximum airspeed of at least 360 mph (580 km/h) at altitude, and a climb to 20,000 ft (6,100 m) within six minutes, the toughest set of specifications USAAC had ever presented. The unbuilt Vultee XP1015 was designed to the same requirement, but was not advanced enough to merit further investigation. A similar single-engine proposal was issued at the same time, Circular Proposal X-609, in response to which the Bell P-39 Airacobra was designed. Both proposals required liquid-cooled Allison V-1710 engines with turbo-superchargers and gave extra points for tricycle landing gear.

 

The Lockheed design team, under the direction of Hall Hibbard and Clarence "Kelly" Johnson, considered a range of twin-engine configurations, including both engines in a central fuselage with push-pull propellers.

 

The eventual configuration was rare in terms of contemporary fighter aircraft design, with only the preceding Fokker G.1, the contemporary Focke-Wulf Fw 189 Luftwaffe reconnaissance aircraft, and the later Northrop P-61 Black Widow night fighter having a similar planform. The Lockheed team chose twin booms to accommodate the tail assembly, engines, and turbo-superchargers, with a central nacelle for the pilot and armament. The XP-38 gondola mockup was designed to mount two .50-caliber (12.7 mm) M2 Browning machine guns, with 200 rpg, two .30-caliber (7.62 mm) Brownings, with 500 rpg, and a T1 Army Ordnance 23-mm (.90 in) autocannon with a rotary magazine as a substitute for the non-existent 25-mm Hotchkiss aircraft autocannon specified by Kelsey and Saville. In the YP-38s, a larger John Browning-designed, Colt-made M9 37-mm (1.46 in) autocannon with 15 rounds replaced the T1. The 15 rounds were in three 5-round clips, an unsatisfactory arrangement according to Kelsey, and the M9 did not perform reliably in flight. Further armament experiments from March to June 1941 resulted in the P-38E combat configuration of four M2 Browning machine guns, and one Hispano 20-mm (.79 in) autocannon with 150 rounds.

 

P-38 armament, concentrated in the nose of the aircraft

Clustering all the armament in the nose was unlike most other U.S. aircraft, which used wing-mounted guns with trajectories set up to crisscross at one or more points in a convergence zone. Nose-mounted guns did not suffer from having their useful ranges limited by pattern convergence, meaning that good pilots could shoot much farther. A Lightning could reliably hit targets at any range up to 1,000 yd (910 m), whereas other fighters had to pick a single convergence range between 100 and 250 yd (230 m). The clustered weapons had a "buzz saw" effect on any target at the receiving end, making the aircraft effective for strafing as well. The rate of fire was about 650 rounds per minute for the 20×110-mm cannon round (130-gram shell) at a muzzle velocity of about 2,887 ft/s (880 m/s), and for the .50-caliber machine guns (43–48-gram rounds), about 850 rpm at 2,756 ft/s (840 m/s) velocity. Combined rate of fire was over 4,000 rpm with roughly every sixth projectile a 20-mm shell. The duration of sustained firing for the 20-mm cannon and .50-caliber machine guns was approximately 14 seconds and 35 seconds, respectively.

 

The Lockheed design incorporated tricycle undercarriage and a bubble canopy, and featured two 1,000-hp (746 kW) turbo-supercharged 12-cylinder Allison V-1710 engines fitted with counter-rotating propellers to eliminate the effect of engine torque, with the superchargers positioned behind the engines, with the exhaust side of the units exposed along the dorsal surfaces of the booms. Counter-rotation was achieved by the use of "handed" engines, which meant that the crankshaft of each engine turned in the opposite direction of its counterpart. The V-12 engines required changing only the spark plug firing order in order for the direction of the crankshaft to be reversed, according to the General Motors Allison V-1710 Service School Handbook.

 

It was the first American fighter to make extensive use of stainless steel and smooth, flush-riveted butt-jointed aluminum skin panels. It was also the first fighter to fly faster than 400 mph (640 km/h).

 

Pacific theater

 

Wartime poster encouraging greater production of P-38s

The P-38 was used most extensively and successfully in the Pacific theater, where it proved ideally suited, combining excellent performance with very long range, and had the added reliability of two engines for long missions over water. The P-38 was used in a variety of roles, especially escorting bombers at altitudes between 18–25,000 ft (5,500-7,600 m). The P-38 was credited with destroying more Japanese aircraft than any other USAAF fighter. Freezing cockpits were not a problem at low altitude in the tropics. In fact, since there was no way to open a window while in flight as it caused buffeting by setting up turbulence through the tailplane, it was often too hot; pilots taking low altitude assignments would often fly stripped down to shorts, tennis shoes, and parachute. While the P-38 could not out-turn the A6M Zero and most other Japanese fighters when flying below 200 mph (320 km/h), its superior speed coupled with a good rate of climb meant that it could utilize energy tactics, making multiple high-speed passes at its target. Also, its focused firepower was even more deadly to lightly armored Japanese warplanes than to the Germans'. The concentrated, parallel stream of bullets allowed aerial victory at much longer distances than fighters carrying wing guns. It is therefore ironic that Dick Bong, the United States' highest-scoring World War II air ace (40 victories solely in P-38s), would fly directly at his targets to make sure he hit them (as he himself acknowledged his poor shooting ability), in some cases flying through the debris of his target (and on one occasion colliding with an enemy aircraft which was claimed as a "probable" victory). The twin Allison engines performed admirably in the Pacific.

 

Postwar operations[edit]

The end of the war left the USAAF with thousands of P-38s rendered obsolete by the jet age. The last P-38s in service with the United States Air Force were retired in 1949.[82] A total of 100 late-model P-38L and F-5 Lightnings were acquired by Italy through an agreement dated April 1946. Delivered, after refurbishing, at the rate of one per month, they finally were all sent to the AMI by 1952. The Lightnings served in 4 Stormo and other units including 3 Stormo, flying reconnaissance over the Balkans, ground attack, naval cooperation and air superiority missions. Due to unfamiliarity in operating heavy fighters, old engines, and pilot errors, a large number of P-38s were lost in at least 30 accidents, many of them fatal. Despite this, many Italian pilots liked the P-38 because of its excellent visibility on the ground and stability on takeoff. The Italian P-38s were phased out in 1956; none survived the inevitable scrapyard.

 

Surplus P-38s were also used by other foreign air forces with 12 sold to Honduras and 15 retained by China. Six F-5s and two unarmed black two-seater P-38s were operated by the Dominican Air Force based in San Isidro Airbase, Dominican Republic in 1947. The majority of wartime Lightnings present in the continental U.S. at the end of the war were put up for sale for US$1,200 apiece; the rest were scrapped. P-38s in distant theaters of war were bulldozed into piles and abandoned or scrapped; very few avoided that fate.

 

Variants:

 

Over 10,000 Lightnings were manufactured in all, becoming the only U.S. combat aircraft that remained in continuous production throughout the duration of American participation in World War II. The Lightning had a major effect on other aircraft; its wing, in a scaled-up form, was used on the L-049 Constellation.

 

Popular culture

 

1950 Studebaker Champion

Harley Earl arranged for several of his designers to view a YP-38 prototype shortly before World War II, and its design directly inspired the tail fins of the 1948–1949 Cadillac

 

The P-38 was also the inspiration for Raymond Loewy and his design team at Studebaker for the 1950 and 1951 model-year Studebakers.

 

The whine of the speeder bike engines in Return of the Jedi was partly achieved by recording the engine noise of a P-38, combined with that of a North American P-51 Mustang.

 

Cadillac 1948 Series 62 Fastback.

 

Cadillac had been one of the leading builders of luxury cars in the US between the wars. As part of the greater General Motors Corporation, Cadillac was well placed to resume car production after the end of WW II. Not only to resume production, but to fund the development of all new models, incorporating an all-new engine (for 1949), and advanced styling influenced by developments in aviation during the war.

 

This new styling and bodies were first seen in 1948.

 

For 1948, the Series 62 was moved to the same 126 in (3,200 mm) chassis as the Series 61, making the vehicles virtually identical. The main difference, apart from extra chrome, was the availability of a convertible model. Distinguishing features included grooved bright metal front fender gravel guards, rocker panel brightwork, chevron style chrome slashes below taillights and slightly richer interior trim. Also in 1948 the first tail fins were added. Sales fell to 34,213, nevertheless accounting for a record 68% of all Cadillacs sold.

 

A combination of factors allowed Cadillac to firmly place itself at the forefront of the luxury market, and stay there for the next 40 years.

 

This Lockheed P-38 Lightning from 1941, and 1948 Cadillac Series 62 Fastback Coupe has been created in Lego miniland-scale for Flickr LUGNuts 79th Build Challenge, - "LUGNuts goes Wingnuts", - featuring automotive vehicles named after, inspired by, or related to aircraft.

Regina, Saskatchewan, Canada

Toyo View 45F Large Format 4"x5" monorail view camera

Upgrades: bag bellows, Yankee fresnel ground glass

snow dunes shot with Nikkor SW 75mm f4.5 lens in Copal #0 shutter (~20mm effective vs 35mm film)

house and pines shot with Nikkor W 150mm f5.6 lens in Copal #1 shutter (~45mm effective vs 35mm film)

Ilford FP4+ 125 ISO B&W sheet film multiple exposure

stand developed at 20 C for 1 hour with no agitation in "PQ-MAX" Development details on FilmDev:

10ml Ilford PQ Universal, 1L water

Epson Perfection V500 at 6400 dpi 48 bit

Scanned in two halves and stitched with MS Image Composition Editor

Some background:

The VF-1 was developed by Stonewell/Bellcom/Shinnakasu for the U.N. Spacy by using alien Overtechnology obtained from the SDF-1 Macross alien spaceship. Its production was preceded by an aerodynamic proving version of its airframe, the VF-X. Unlike all later VF vehicles, the VF-X was strictly a jet aircraft, built to demonstrate that a jet fighter with the features necessary to convert to Battroid mode was aerodynamically feasible. After the VF-X's testing was finished, an advanced concept atmospheric-only prototype, the VF-0 Phoenix, was flight-tested from 2005 to 2007 and briefly served as an active-duty fighter from 2007 to the VF-1's rollout in late 2008, while the bugs were being worked out of the fully functional VF-1 prototype (the VF-X-1).

 

Introduced in 2008, the VF-1 would be produced en masse within a short period of time, a total of 5,459 airframes were delivered until 2013. The space-capable VF-1's combat debut was on February 7, 2009, during the Battle of South Ataria Island - the first battle of Space War I - and remained the mainstay fighter of the U.N. Spacy for the entire conflict. From the start the VF-1 proved to be an extremely capable and versatile craft, successfully combating a variety of Zentraedi mecha even in most sorties which saw UN Spacy forces significantly outnumbered. The versatility of the Valkyrie design enabled the variable fighter to act as both large-scale infantry and as air/space superiority fighter. The signature skills of U.N. Spacy ace pilot Maximilian Jenius exemplified the effectiveness of the variable systems as he near-constantly transformed the Valkyrie in battle to seize advantages of each mode as combat conditions changed from moment to moment.

 

The basic VF-1 was deployed in four sub-variants (designated A, D, J, and S) and its success was increased by continued development of various enhancements and upgrades, including the GBP-1S "Armored" Valkyrie, FAST Pack "Super" Valkyrie and the additional RÖ-X2 heavy cannon pack weapon system for the VF-1S with additional firepower. The FAST Pack system was designed to enhance the VF-1 Valkyrie variable fighter, and the initial V1.0 came in the form of conformal pallets that could be attached to the fighter’s leg flanks for additional fuel – primarily for Long Range Interdiction tasks in atmospheric environment. Later FAST Packs were designed for space operations.

 

After the end of Space War I, production on Earth was stopped but the VF-1 continued to be manufactured both in the Sol system and throughout the UNG space colonies. Although the VF-1 would be replaced in 2020 as the primary Variable Fighter of the U.N. Spacy by the more capable, but also much bigger, VF-4 Lightning III, a long service record and its persistent production after the war in many space sectors proved the lasting worth of the design.

The versatile aircraft underwent constant upgrade programs. For instance, about a third of all VF-1 Valkyries were upgraded with Infrared Search and Track (IRST) systems, placed in a small, streamlined fairing in front of the cockpit. This system allowed passive long-range search and track modes, freeing the pilot from the need to give away his/her position through active radar emissions. The sensor could also be used for target illumination and precision weapons guidance.

Many Valkyries also received improved radar warning systems, with sensor arrays mounted on the wingtips, the fins and/or on the LERXs. Improved ECR measures and other defensive measure like flare/chaff dispensers were also added to some machines, typically in conformal fairings on the flanks of the legs/engine pods.

 

In early 2011, VF-1 production on Earth had already reached the 2.500th aircraft, a VF-1J which received a striking white-and-blue commemorative paint scheme upon roll-out, decorated with the logos of all major manufacturers and system suppliers. After a brief PR tour the machine (Bu. No. 2110406/1) was handed over to SVF-1, the famous Skull Squadron, as an attrition replacement for Major Yingluck 'Joker' Maneethapo's aircraft, leader of the unit’s 5th Flight and a Thai pilot ace from the first stages of the Zentraedi attacks in 2009.

With the opportunity to add more personal style to his new mount, Maneethapo's chose the non-standard modex ML 555 for his fighter - a play of words, because the five is pronounced 'ha' in Thai language and '555' a frequent abbreviation for 'laughing'. Bu. No. 2110406/1 retained its bright PR livery, because its primary colors matched well with SVF-1 ‘Lazulite’ flight’s ID color. The aircraft just lost the sponsor logos and instead received full military markings and tactical codes, including the unit’s renowned skull icon and the characteristic “ML” letter code on the foldable fins. The nose art for the 2.500th production VF-1 jubilee was retained, though.

In SVF-1 service, Bu. No. 2110406/1 was soon upgraded with an IRST and retrofitted with FAST Packs and avionics for various zero-G weapons for operations in space, since the unit was supposed to become based on SDF-1 and go into space with the large carrier ship. However, only SVF-1's Flight #1, 2 and 3 were taken on board of the SDF-1 when the ship left Earth, the remaining unit parts remained at the home base on Ataria Island, tasked with homeland defense duties.

 

In 2012, at the end of the war, SVF-1’s Lazulite’ flight was re-located on board of ARMD-02 (Armaments Rigged-up Moving Deck Space Carrier vessel), which was and rebuilt and attached to the refitted SDF-1 Macross as originally intended. There, Bu. No. 2110406/1 served into the first year of the New Era 0001 in 2013, when it was replaced as a Flight Leader’s mount by a VF-4 and handed over to SVF-42 back on Earth, where it was repainted in standard U.N. Spacy fighter colors (even though it still retained its commemorative nose art) and served until 2017. Bu. No. 2110406/1 was then retired and unceremoniously scrapped, having already exceeded its expected service life.

 

The VF-1 was without doubt the most recognizable variable fighter of Space War I and was seen as a vibrant symbol of the U.N. Spacy. At the end of 2015 the final rollout of the VF-1 was celebrated at a special ceremony, commemorating this most famous of variable fighters. The VF-1 Valkryie was built from 2006 to 2013 with several major variants (VF-1A = 5,093, VF-1D = 85, VF-1J = 49, VF-1S = 30), sub-variants (VF-1G = 12, VE-1 = 122, VT-1 = 68) and upgrades of existing airframes (like the VF-1P).

Despite its relatively short and intense production run the fighter remained active in many second line units and continued to show its worthiness even years later, e. g. through Milia Jenius who would use her old VF-1 fighter in defense of the colonization fleet - 35 years after the type's service introduction!

 

General characteristics:

All-environment variable fighter and tactical combat Battroid,

used by U.N. Spacy, U.N. Navy, U.N. Space Air Force and U.N.S. Marine Corps

 

Accommodation:

Pilot only in Marty & Beck Mk-7 zero/zero ejection seat

 

Dimensions:

Fighter Mode:

Length 14.23 meters

Wingspan 14.78 meters (at 20° minimum sweep)

Height 3.84 meters

Battroid Mode:

Height 12.68 meters

Width 7.3 meters

Length 4.0 meters

Empty weight: 13.25 metric tons

Standard T-O mass: 18.5 metric tons

MTOW: 37.0 metric tons

 

Power Plant:

2x Shinnakasu Heavy Industry/P&W/Roice FF-2001 thermonuclear reaction turbine engines, output 650 MW each, rated at 11,500 kg in standard or 225.63 kN in overboost

4x Shinnakasu Heavy Industry NBS-1 high-thrust vernier thrusters (1 x counter reverse vernier thruster nozzle mounted on the side of each leg nacelle/air intake, 1 x wing thruster roll control system on each wingtip)

18x P&W LHP04 low-thrust vernier thrusters beneath multipurpose hook/handles

 

Performance:

Battroid Mode: maximum walking speed 160 km/h

Fighter Mode: at 10,000 m Mach 2.71; at 30,000+ m Mach 3.87

g limit: in space +7

Thrust-to-weight ratio: empty 3.47; standard T-O 2.49; maximum T-O 1.24

 

Design Features:

3-mode variable transformation; variable geometry wing; vertical take-off and landing; control-configurable vehicle; single-axis thrust vectoring; three "magic hand" manipulators for maintenance use; retractable canopy shield for Battroid mode and atmospheric reentry; option of GBP-1S system, atmospheric-escape booster, or FAST Pack system

 

Transformation:

Standard time from Fighter to Battroid (automated): under 5 sec.

Min. time from Fighter to Battroid (manual): 0.9 sec.

 

Armament:

2x Mauler RÖV-20 anti-aircraft laser cannon, firing 6,000 ppm

1x Howard GU-11 55 mm three-barrel Gatling gun pod with 200 RPG, fired at 1,200 rpm

4x underwing hard points for a wide variety of ordnance, including…

12x AMM-1 hybrid guided multipurpose missiles (3/point), or

12x MK-82 LDGB conventional bombs (3/point), or

6x RMS-1 large anti-ship reaction missiles (2/outboard point, 1/inboard point), or

4x UUM-7 micro-missile pods (1/point) each carrying 15 x Bifors HMM-01 micro-missiles,

or a combination of above load-outs

  

The kit and its assembly:

Another small and vintage 1:100 VF-1 Fighter. This time it’s a non-canonical aircraft, based on a limited edition decal sheet that was published with the Japanese Model Graphix magazine in April 2001 (check this here for reference: www.starshipmodeler.com/mecha/jl_clrvalk.htm) with Hasegawa’s first release of their 1:72 Valkyrie Fighter kit. The give-away sheet featured several VF-1s, including an anniversary paint scheme for the 2.500th production Valkyrie. This is AFAIK neither ‘official’ nor canonical – but the pretty blue-and-white livery caught my attention, and I had for a long time the plan to re-create this livery on one of my favored 1:100 models. This would not work 100%, though, so I had to improvise – see below.

 

The kit was built OOB, with the landing gear down and (after taking the flight scenic pictures) with an open canopy, mounted on a small lift arm. Some typical small blade antennae the 1:100 simple kit lacks were added around the hull as a standard measure to improve the look. In the cockpit I added side consoles and a pilot figure for the in-flight shots.

The only non-standard additions are the IRST sensor fairing in front of the cockpit – the model of the anniversary VF-1 in the Model Graphix magazine carries this canonical upgrade, too, it was created from clear sprue material. Another tiny addition were the RHAWS antenna fairings at the top of the fins, scratched from small styrene profile bits.

 

The Valkyrie’s ordnance is standard and was taken OOB, featuring twelve AMM-1 missiles under the wings plus the standard GU-11 gatling gun pod; the latter was modified to hold a scratched wire display for in-flight pictures at its rear end. The Model Graphix VF-1 is insofar confusing as it seems to carry something that looks like a white ACMI pod on a non-standard pylon, rather attached to the legs than to the wings? That's odd and I could not make up a useful function, so I rejected this detail. The magazine Valkyrie's belly drop tank was - even though canonical, AFAIK - also not taken over to my later in-service status.

  

Painting and markings:

The more challenging part of the build, in two ways. First, re-creating the original commemorative livery would have called for home-made decals printed in opaque white for the manufacturers’ logos, something I was not able to do at home. So, I had to interpret the livery in a different way and decided to spin the aircraft’s story further: what would become of this VF-1 after its roll-out and PR event? In a war situation it would certainly be delivered quickly to a frontline unit, and since I had some proper markings left over, I decided to attach this colorful bird to the famous Skull Squadron, SVF-1, yet to a less glorious Flight. Since flight leaders and aces in the Macross universe would frequently fly VF-1s in individual non-standard liveries, sometimes even very bright ones, the 2,500th VF-1 could have well retained its catchy paint scheme.

 

The second part of the challenge: the actual paint job. Again, no suitable decals were at hand, so I had to re-create everything from scratch. The VF-1J kit I used thankfully came molded in white styrene, so that the front half of the aircraft could be easily painted in white, with no darker/colored plastic shining through. I painted the white (Revell 301, a very pure white) with a brush first. For the blue rear half, I settled upon an intense and deep cobalt blue tone (ModelMaster 2012). For the zigzag border between the colors, I used Tamiya masking tape, trimmed with a tailor’s zigzag scissors and applied in a slightly overlapping pattern for an irregular edge.

The landing gear became standard all-white (Revell 301, too), with bright red edges (Humbrol 174) on the covers. Antenna fairings were painted with radome tan (Humbrol 7) as small color highlights.

 

The cockpit interior became standard medium grey (Revell 47) with a black ejection seat with brown cushions (Humbrol 119 and Revell 84), and brown “black boxes” behind the headrest. The air intakes as well as the interior of the VG wings were painted dark grey (Revell 77). The jet nozzles/feet were internally painted with Humbrol 27003 (Steel Metallizer) and with Revell 91 on the outside, and they were later thoroughly treated with graphite to give them a burnt/worn look.

The GU-11 pod became standard bare metal (Revell 91, Iron metallic), the AMM-1s were painted in light grey (Humbrol 127) with many additional painted details in five additional colors, quite a tedious task when repeated twelve times...

 

After basic painting was one the model received a careful overall washing with black ink to emphasize the engraved panel lines, and light post-shading was done to the blue areas to emphasize single panels.

The full-color ’kite’ roundels came from an 1:100 VF-1A sheet, the skull emblems were left over from my Kotobukiya 1:72 VF-4 build some years ago, which OOB carries SVF-1 markings, too. The 2.500th aircraft nose art decoration was printed on clear decal film with an ink jet printer at home, even though it’s so small that no details can be discerned on the model. SVF-1’s “ML” tail code was created with single white decal letters (RAF WWII font), the red “555” modex came from an PrintScale A-26 Invader sheet, it's part of a USAF serial number from an all-black Korean War era aircraft.

 

The wings' leading edges were finished in medium grey, done with decal sheet material. The Model Graphix Valkyrie does not sport this detail, but I think that the VF-1 looks better with them and more realistic. Red warning stripes around the legs - also not seen on the model in the magazine - were made from similar material.

 

The confetti along the jagged edge between the white and the blue areas was created with decal material, too – every bit was cut out and put into place one for one… To match the cobalt blue tone, the respective enamel paint was applied on clear decal sheet material and cut into small bits. For the white and red confetti, generic decal sheet material was used. All in all, this was another tedious process, but, at the small 1:100 scale, masks or tape would have been much more complex and less successful with the brushes I use for painting. For this home-made approach the result looks quite good!

 

Finally, after some typical details and position lights had been added with clear paints over a silver base, the small VF-1 was sealed with a coat of semi-matt acrylic varnish, giving it a slightly shiny finish.

  

A pretty VF-1 – even though I’d call it purely fictional, despite being based on material that was published in a Japanese magazine more than 20 years ago. The simple yet striking livery was a bit tricky to create, but the result, with the additional SVF-1 unit markings, looks good and makes me wonder how this machine would look with FAST pack elements for use in space or as a transformed Battroid?

5½ inch 80# cardstock circles, a good, stiff medium for this model.

 

Perfect model for CraftROBOing or die-stamping.

 

Crease pattern (postscript)

The Landschaftspark Duisburg-Nord is a public park in the German city of Duisburg. The centrepiece of the park is the ruins of a blast furnace complex that was shut down in 1985.

 

The blast furnace complex was built in 1902 by the "Rheinische Stahlwerke zu Meiderich bei Ruhrort" and was later taken over by the Thyssen Group. It was badly damaged during the Second World War, but was rebuilt in the 1950s. In 1985, the blast furnaces of the complex had become too small to be profitable and the complex was closed. Between 1991 and 2002, the site was developed as a public park.

Onshore breeze developing

Some background:

]The VF-4 Lightning III began development in 2005 under the initial designation of the VF-X-4. Developed as a successor craft to the VF-1 Valkyrie, the VF-4 Lightning III was designed as a variable fighter that emphasized mobility in outer space.

 

The VF-4's development began with the prototype VF-X-4 and the VF-X-3. However, when Earth was devastated in Space War I the loss of military facilities also resulted in loss of the VF-X-3. Amongst the airframes under development exist prototype No. 1 craft, VF-X-4V1 and the trial manufactured VF-4A-0 and thus the surviving VF-X-4 was developed and completed as the VF-4 Lightning III. A trial-produced variable fighter, designated the VF-4A-0, was also built using 25% VF-1 Valkyrie parts.

 

VF-X-4 underwent flight tests, including being test piloted by Space War I veteran Hikaru Ichijo. Once successful operational models were ready, the VF-4 began mass production on February 2012. Initial deployment began on the SDF-2 Megaroad-01 in VF-1 Skull and SVF-184 Iron Chiefs Squadrons on September 2012. When the SDF-2 Megaroad launched in the same month, Hikaru Ichijō flew a VF-4 alongside the new colonization vessel as the ship lifted from Earth and began exploration outside of the Sol system.

 

As a result of integrating existing Overtechnology and Zentradi-series technology, the VF-4 had a characteristic three-hulled-type airframe structure remarkably different from the conservative VF-1 Valkyrie design. The three-hulled style of the VF-4 increased fuselage volume, propellant capacity and armament load capability that all resulted in a 40% improved combat ability over the VF-1. Fully transformable, the VF-4 could shift into Battroid and Gerwalk modes like previous variable fighters.

 

However, the VF-4 did suffer minor mobility problems within an atmosphere and the new type was primarily deployed to the Space Air Corps of emigrant fleets to serve as the main fighter craft of the UN Forces in the 2020s. It was because flight performance within the atmosphere was not as good as the VF-1 that the VF-5000 Star Mirage became the main combat craft within atmosphere, while the VF-4 operated mainly in outer space.

 

Built as a space fighter, the VF-4 primary weapons became two large beam cannons, though the craft was capable of carrying a GU-11 gun pod in Gerwalk and Battroid modes. In addition to the powerful primary beam guns, the Lightning III also featured twelve semi-recessed long-range missiles, as well as underwing pylons for additional missiles and other stores.

The VF-4 was only slightly heavier than the VF-1, but featured considerably more powerful engines, making the craft ideal for operations deeper out in space. The Lightning III was also much faster in the atmosphere than the older VF-1, although the VF-4’s flight mobility performance was not as great.

 

The VF-4 was also notable as the first production variable fighter to utilize a HOTAS system (Hands On Throttle And Stick) for the cockpit HMI (Human-Machine Interface). Furthermore, the VF-4's cockpit was laid out as a single hexagonal MFD (Multi-Function Display) that proved so successful that it was retrofitted into "Block 6" VF-1 fighters, as well as providing the template for all future variable fighter cockpits.

 

By the end of 2015, mass production of the VF-1 series at last had come to an end. From 2020 onward, the VF-4 Lightning III officially replaced the VF-1 to become the main variable fighter of U.N. Forces. Production of the VF-4 continued for a decade and ceased in 2022, with a total of 8,245 Lightning III variable fighters produced.

The VF-4 variable fighter remained in active service into the late 2040's but was complemented or substituted in many branches of the UN Forces by the cheaper and more atmospherically maneuverable VF-5000 Star Mirage. The VF-4 Lightning III was eventually replaced as the main variable fighter of U.N. Spacy in the later half of the 2030s by the VF-11 Thunderbolt.

  

General characteristics:

Manufacturer: Stonewell/Bellcom

Equipment Type: Variable fighter

Government: U.N. Spacy, U.N. Space Marines

Introduction: 2012

Operational Deployment: September 2012

 

Dimensions:

Accommodation: pilot only

Fighter Mode: wingspan 12.65 meters; height 5.31 meters; length 16.8 meters

Mass: empty 13.95 metric tons

Structure: space metal frame, SWAG energy conversion armor

 

Powerplant:

2x Shinnakasu/P&W/Roice FF-2011 thermonuclear turbine engines,

rated at 14,000 kg (137.34 kN) each

2x dorsal rocket engines (mounted on top of the main thermonuclear turbine engines)

2x ramjet engines (embedded into the inner wing sections)

P&W HMM-1A high-maneuverability vernier thrusters

 

Performance:

Fighter Mode: Mach 3.02 at 10,000 m

Mach 5.15 at 30,000+ m

Thrust-to-weight ratio: (empty) 2.01 (rating for turbine engine thrust ONLY)

g limit: unknown

 

[Armament:

2 x large beam cannons in forward engine nacelles

12x semi-recessed long range missiles (mounted on engine nacelles and ventral fuselage)

8x underwing pylons for missiles, gun pods an/or drop tanks

  

The kit and its assembly:

Well, this build has been lingering for almost 25 years in the back of my mind. It just took so long that a suitable IP kit (with a reasonable price tag) would materialize!

The original inspiration struck me with a VF-4 profile in the source book "This is animation special: Macross PLUS" from 1994, which accidently fell into my hands in a local Japanese book store. Among others, a side and top view profile of an aggressor VF-4 in an all-brown, Soviet-style paint scheme was featured. At that time I found the idea and the scheme pretty cool, so much that I even built a modified 1:100 VF-1 as a ground attack aircraft in this paint scheme.

 

However, the original VF-4 profile from the source book had always been present, but for years there had been no affordable kit. There have been garage/resin kits, but prices would start at EUR 250,-, and these things were and are extraordinarily rare.

Things changed for the better when WAVE announced an 1:72 VF-4 kit in late 2016, and it eventually materialized in late 2017. I immediately pre-ordered one from Japan (in a smart move, this even saved money) and it eventually turned up here in Germany in early 2018. Patience pays out, it seems...

I had preferred a 1:100 kit, though, due to space issues and since almost any other Macross variable fighter model in my collection is in this small scale, but I am happy that a decent VF-4 kit at all appeared after so many years!

 

Concerning the WAVE kit, there’s light and shadow. First of all, you have to know that you get a VF-4A. This is mentioned nowhere on the box, but might be a vital information for hardcore modelers. The early VF-4A is a rather different aircraft than the later VF-4G, with so fundamental differences that it would warrant a completely new kit! On the other side, with a look at the kit’s parts, I could imagine that a VF-4B two-seater could be easily realized in the future, too.

 

The kit is a solid construction, a snap-fit kit molded in different colors so that it can be built without painting. This sounds toy-like, but - like many small scale Bandai Valkyrie kits - anything you ask for is actually there. When you use glue and put some effort into the kit and some donor parts, you can make a very good model from it.

 

The kit's box is pretty oversized, though (any sprue is shrink-wrapped, horrendous garbage pile and wasted space!), and the kit offers just a single decal (water-slide decals, not stickers) option for a Skull Squadron VF-4A – AFAIK it’s Hikaru Ichijoe’s machine that appears in one of the Macross Flash Back 2012 music videos, as it escorts the SDF-02 “Megaroad” colonial ship after launch from Earth towards the center of our Galaxy.

 

The parts are crisply molded, and I actually like the fact that the kit is not as uber-engineered as the Hasegawa Valkyries. You can actually call the WAVE kit simple - but in a positive sense, because the parts number is reduced to a minimum, material strength is solid and the kit's construction is straightforward. Fit is excellent – I just used some putty along the engine gondolas due to their complex shape, but almost anything else would either fit almost perfectly or just call for some sanding. Impressive!

 

Surface details etc. are rather basic, but very crisp and emphasized enough that anything remains visible after adding some paint. However, after all, this aircraft is just a fictional animation mecha, and from this perspective the kit is really O.K..

 

After building the kit I most say that it's nothing that leaves you in awe, and for a retail price of currently roundabout EUR 50-70,- (I was lucky to get it for an early bird deal at EUR 40,-, but still pricey for what I got) the kit is pretty expensive and has some weaknesses:

 

The model comes with a decent (= simple) cockpit and a very nice and large pilot figure, but with no ordnance except for the semi-recessed long-range missiles (see below). The cockpit lacks any side consoles, floor or side wall details. If you put the pilot into the cockpit as intended, this is not a big issue, since the figure blocks any sight into the cockpit’s lower regions. However, the side sticks are molded into the pilot’s hands, so that you have to scratch a lot if you want to present the cockpit open and with an empty seat.

 

The landing gear is simple, too, and the wells are very shallow (even though they feature interior details). As a special feature, you can switch with some extra parts between an extended or retracted landing gear, and there are extra parts that allow the air intakes and some vectoring nozzles to be closed/extended for orbital operations. However, detail fetishists might replace the OOB parts with the landing gear from an 1:72 F-18 for an overall better look.

 

Provisions for underwing hardpoints are actually molded into the lower fuselage part (and could be punched/drilled open - another indication that more VF-4 boxings with extra sprues might follow?), but the kit does not come with any pylons or other ordnance than the dozen fuselage-mounted AAMs. Furthermore, the semi-recessed missiles are just that: you only get the visible halves of the only provided ordnance, which are simply stuck into slits on the model’s surface. As a consequence, you have to mount them at any rate – building a VF-4 for a diorama in which the missiles are about to be loaded would require massive scratch-building efforts and modifications.

 

Another problem indirectly arises when you put some effort into the kit and want to clean and pre-paint the missiles before assembly: every missile is different and has its allocated place on the VF-4 hull. The missiles are numbered – but only on the sprue! Once you cut them out, you either have to keep them painstakingly in order, or you will spend a long evening figuring out where which missile belongs! This could be easily avoided if the part number would be engraved on the missiles’ back sides – and that’s what I actually did (with a water-proof pen, though) in order to avoid trouble.

 

The clear canopy is another issue. The two parts are crystal-clear, but, being a snap-fit kit, the canopy parts have to be clipped into the fuselage (rear part) and onto a separate canopy frame (front part). In order to fit, the clear parts have cramps molded into their bases – and due to the excellent transparency and a magnifier effect, you can see them easily from the outside – and on the inside, when you leave the cockpit open. It’s not a pretty solution, despite the perfect fit of the parts.

One option I can think of is to carefully sand the cramps and the attachment points away, but I deem this a hazardous stunt. I eventually hid the cramps behind a thin line of paint, which simulates a yellow-ish canopy seal. The extra windscreen framing is not accurate, but the simplest solution that hides this weak point.

 

The kit itself was built OOB, because it goes together so well. I also refrained from adding pylons and ordnance – even though you can easily hang anything from Hasegawa’s VF-1 weapon set under the VF-4’s wings and fuselage. A final, small addition was a scratched, ventral adapter for a 3.5 mm steel rod, as a display for the flight scene beauty pic.

  

Painting and markings:

As mentioned above, the livery is based on an official profile which I deem authentic and canonical. My aircraft depicts a different machine from VFT-127, though, since I could not (and did not really want to) 100% replicate the profile's machine from the Macross PLUS source book, "13 Red". Especially the squadron’s emblem on the fin would create massive problems.

 

For the two-tone wrap-around scheme I used Humbrol 72 (Khaki Drill) and 98 (Chocolate Brown), based on the printed colors in the source book where I found the scheme. The pattern is kept close to the benchmark profile, and, lacking an underside view, I just mirrored the upper scheme. The starboard side pattern was guesstimated.

As a second-line aggressor aircraft, I weathered the VF-4 with a black ink wash, some post-shading with various lighter tones (including Humbrol 160, 168, 170 and 187) and did some wet-sanding treatment for an uneven and worn look.

 

Interior surfaces were painted according to visual references from various sources: the landing gear and the air intakes became white, while the cockpit was painted in RAF Dark Sea Grey.

 

In order to add some color to the overall brown aircraft I decided to paint the missiles all around the hull in white with tan tips – in the profile, the appear to be integrated into the camouflage, what I found dubious.

 

Most stencils come from the OOB sheet, but I added some more from the scrap box. The grey "kite" roundels come from an 1:72 Hasegawa Macross F-14 Tomcat kit sheet, which I acquired separately for a reasonable price. Even though it took four weeks to be delivered from Asia, the investment was worthwhile, since the sheet also provided some useful low-viz stencils.

 

The VAT-127 “Zentraedi Busters” unique tail insignia was more complicated, because these had to be printed at home. As a side note, concerning the fin marking, I recently found a translation of the benchmark profile's text on mahq.net, which is interesting: "The Regult within the targeting reticle on the tail met with disapproval from micronized Zentraedi pilots, and so was only used for a short time." The comment also reveals that the original aircraft's modex is "713", not just "13" as depicted, so I tried to reflect these details on my build, too.

 

I eventually settled for a solution that was partly inspired by the kit’s OOB fin marking and the wish for more contrast for the motif: I scanned the original Regult pod illustration from the source book and printed it on white decal sheet. This was sealed with two layers of glossy acrylic varnish (applied with a rattle can) and then cut into a white field that fills the fixed part of the fin (using the WAVE kit’s OOB fin markings as reference). Once in place and dry, two black outlines were added separately (generic decal material) which help blend the decal and the surroundings. Finally, thin strips of silver decal sheet were used for the fins’ leading edges.

 

This design variation, compared with the original “13 Red” illustration, led to the idea of a flight leader’s machine with slightly more prominent markings. In order to take this concept further I also gave the aircraft a white stripe around the front fuselage, placed under the kite roundel and again with black outlines for a consistent look. It’s not much different from “13 Red”, but I think that it looks conclusive and, together with the white fin markings and the missiles, livens up the VF-4’s look.

 

The appropriate flight leader tactical code “01 Red” was puzzled together from single digits from a Begemot Su-27 sheet, the rest of the bort numbers were taken from the OOB sheet (which incidentally feature a “01” code, too).

 

Concerning the OOB decal sheet, there’s much light but also some deep shadow. While the register is excellent and the carrier film flexible enough to lay down smoothly, the instructions lack information where to place the zillion of stencils (“No step” and “Beware of Blast” stuff) are to be placed! You only get references for the major markings – the rest has either to be guessed, OR you are in possession of the VF-4 source book from Softbank Publishing which was (incidentally?) released in parallel with the WAVE kit. This mecha porn offers an overview of all(!) relevant stencils on the VF-4A’s hull, and ONLY with this information the exhaustive decal sheet makes some sense…

 

As final steps, the VF-4 received some dry-brushing with light grey around the leading edges, some chipped paint was simulated with dry-brushed aluminum and, finally, light soot stains around the vectoring nozzles all around the hull and the weapon bays were created with graphite. Then the kit was sealed with matt acrylic varnish (Italeri).

  

Well, in the end, it’s not a carbon copy of the inspiring illustration, but rather another machine from the same squadron, with more creative freedom. I stayed as true to the benchmark as possible, though, and I like the result. Finally, after almost 25 years, I can tick this project off of my long ideas and inspiration list.

 

Considering the kit itself, I am really torn. I am happy that there finally is a VF-4 IP kit at all after so many years, but to me it’s a contradictive offer. I am not certain about the target group, because for a toy-like snap-fit kit it’s too detailed and expensive, but for the serious modeler it has some major flaws.

The biggest issue is the kit’s horrendous price – even if it would be more detailed or contained some fine resin or PE parts (which I would not want, just a “good” plastic kit). Sure, you can put some effort into the kit and improve it, e .g. in the cockpit or with a donor landing gear, but weak points like the “flat” missiles and the lack of proper bays for them are IMHO poor. For the relatively huge price tag I’d hoped for a “better” OOB offer. However, the kit is easy to build and a good representation of the Lightning III, and I am curious if there are kit variants in WAVE’s pipeline?