h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

It was so good to see my yellow aeroplane rise in the air, just like any other, but so much better!

Thank you EVERYONE who helped put it all together, but especially Terry, Tom, Kate, Jeremy and Andy. And John for overseeing it.

Now lets get it flying EVERYWHERE

Richard

Well done Richard! I've seen the other little video clip you took with your camera (I still find it hard to believe that you can a shoot 15 second video clip with a bloody camera!) showing the plane's first flight and I'll put it up on site on Tuesday, on this page. I had a go yesterday but I haven't quite managed to complete the uploading process without Michael's help.

Have a great wknd!

Sam.

Thanks Sam

In my documentary days I became aware that 'nothing' really happened unless it was recorded. That makes seeing the pics of my yellow aeroplane up on the site even more special.

I see that a couple didn't enlarge beyond the medium size. Be good for me to work out how to fix that when I get it.

And for the next flight I'll see if I can do a real video sequence: Wide shots, medium shot, close shots etc on my tiny camera and then edit it all on my grand Mac laptop.

Then I just need to add sound ... !

Richard

It is good to learn that some thing sophisticated once again sounded and proved very succesful at the first trial if you know what I mean.But my wonder is,There had to be the motive in this isn,t it? What was the intention of coming up with such modifications?
Hope to hear more on this ,thankx,
Johnpaul.(JPJomeno)

Hello JPJ

Our excitement about the plane is mostly because it heralds something that began just as a dream and is now well on the way to becoming a reality. The passage in between has been long: learning to fly, choosing the plane, building it. The next step is to get it working as flying filming platfrom for 360 - and one day soon we hope to take it to Africa for that purpose. In the meantime we are enjoying crossing the hurdles that stand in the way of every dream that dares to become real.

Enlarged pics now up ...

Hi Richard,

Congratulations!!

Wonderful to see the flying banana finally take to the skies.

I look forward to sitting aft and filming our beautiful world from the heavens very soon.

Warmest regards,

Sacha

Thanks Sacha

I'll get that little matter of flight testing out of the way as soon as I can.

As I understand it there is 23 more hours to go, which I can do. However I've heard there might be another hour to be done by Tom, the test pilot, just to check all is well with the C of G (centre of gravity) as we are moving the battery back to the tail.

Hugely looking forward to flying with you soon.

Richard

Took my Aged Parent up to see the shed today (Saturday). Lured her up there by taking her to The Gardens of the Rose nearby too. She was impressed...but looked around at everyone fiddling with their microlights, sighed heavily and said that it was really no different from steam engine enthusiasts and that I'd gone full circle (my Dad was fanatical about steam).

We've worked out why the shed (sorry, hangar) looks a bit odd. It's exactly perpendicular to the ground. Unfortunately the ground isn't!

Pretty impressive with the roof on though. Looking forward to a barbie or two up there...