Avro Lancaster Flyovers - Four Merlins In Sync

Next to the symphony orchestra, mankind's most beautiful creation, to me, is the aeroplane. Music to my ears, in addition to a great flying machine: The Avro Lancaster bomber and its four Rolls-Royce Merlin engines in synchronization.

An Operational Record Book (Partial)

The postings on this blog with some of the biggest hit counts are those regarding RAF Bomber Command No. 626 Squadron, with which my father flew during the war.  I thought it time to add a little more information regarding his operational record.

Here is a partial list -- culled from material provided to me by Dave Stapleton of The 626 Squadron Research Project -- of "ops" flown by Flying Officer A.R. Screen and crew:

Date - Target - Notes

12 March 1945 - Dortmund

13 March 1945 - Herne - The target was a Benzol Plant

23 March 1945 - Bremen Bridge

14 April 1945 - Potsdam

22 April 1945 - Bremen - Mission abandoned on Master Bomber’s orders.

25 April 1945 - Berchtesgaden - Hitler’s Eagles Nest in Bavaria (specifically, the SS Barracks)

With the Allied forces now advancing well into Germany, Bomber Command now turned its attention to humanitarian sorties and 626 Squadron was similarly tasked. (The Squadron’s Lancasters were converted to carry sacks of food in the bomb bays. Each aircraft carried 284 sacks; these were dropped from 500ft.) The crew flew two of these sorties:

30 April 1945 - Rotterdam - Operation Manna

2 May 1945 - Rotterdam - Operation Manna

Special thanks to:

Dave Stapleton

The 626 Squadron Research Project

Copyright 2010 ©

Post script:

A few weeks ago I was telling a friend how young these guys were who flew in RAF Bomber Command. My dad was nineteen; his crewmates would have been that age or a year or two older. I joked with my buddy that if this particular aircrew was known for doing something special during the war, and a movie were made about their experiences, the guy in the role of my dad would probably be an actor in his late twenties or early thirties. And Flying Officer Screen would no doubt be played by someone like Johnny Depp.

Film producers, who aren't known for being a bright lot to begin with, often miss on details like the above.

RAF '626 Squadron' Lancasters Over Berchtesgaden - April 25, 1945

In previous postings I talked about my father's experiences during WW2 with RAF Bomber Command No 626 Squadron. Below is a photo I discovered on the Internet (Tom Bint's webpage, www.626-squadron.co.uk), taken during 626's final major operation of the war: The bombing of the SS Barracks in Berchtesgaden, on April 25th, 1945.

"Tights and Fights" Spaceship Set

The episode of a web-series that I designed and built a spaceship control set for back in March and April of this year has 'gone-to-air'.

Watch it here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oVV0wx9TsyE

Credit Is Past Due

Further to my post below (SET FOR WEB-SERIES) I have to give credit to the fine team who helped me realize the set -- including assisting me build the original structure, paint, and pop it together in the studio.

Jonathan Cresswell-Jones
Amanda Gougeon
Stephanie Avery
Karl Man
Scott Albert
Darren Pickering

Set For Web-Series

I recently completed designing and building a set for an episode of a web-series.

The gig was a lot of fun; the producers, real pros.

When the "air-date" approaches, I will post more info, including sketches from the design process.


(Photo at top: The Major mans his station. Photo above: Series art director Darren Pickering adjusts some set-dressing.)

Aircrew - RAF No. 626 Squadron Lancaster - 1945

Further to my posts below, here is some information provided to me courtesy of Dave Stapleton of "The 626 Squadron Research Project". Here is the roster of my dad's crew-mates on a 626 Squadron Lancaster bomber:

Pilot Officer A R Screen - RAF - Pilot
Flying Officer R J Lovell - RCAF - Navigator
Warrant Officer E A Ellum - RAF - Wireless Operator
Flying Officer D H Mitchell - RCAF - Bomb Aimer
Sergeant W R Bradley - RAF - Flight Engineer
Sergeant H W St. Laurent - RCAF - Mid-Upper Gunner
Sergeant C Rodger - RCAF - Rear Gunner


As indicated by the listing, RAF bomber aircrews were made up of men from different Commonwealth countries, not just from the U.K. Hence four Canadians. If memory serves, my father told me that Sergeant Rodger was from Toronto.

Those guys were a brave bunch. When I was in my late teens or early 20s, I would bellyache something like: "Ohh... where's the bus? My feet are cold." Okay, jerk, try the following: Cold or even frostbitten hands (if you were a gunner); flak exploding all around; getting 'coned' in searchlights over a city; coming under attack from a lurking night fighter, with your pilot sending your bomber into a violent corkscrew maneuver -- as the gunners open fire and fill the inside of the fuselage with fumes of cordite -- to increase your chances of seeing home that night; a bomb dropped by a friendly bomber above hitting your own aircraft, and right beside where you are sitting (that happened to my dad on a trip); wondering if you might end up bobbing about on the North Sea in the middle of the night, or having to bail out over enemy territory....

Those cold feet don't seem to be so bad, after all.

Spring Cleaning '10

This blog started on May 28th, 2008. After reviewing my past postings -- mainly the first bunch -- I decided to clean house. Too much early rubbish... to the bin.

A few of the early postings will be reinserted in the near future with some minor editing.

As I mentioned in the very first posting I have a regular website:
http://hyper-reality.tv/

Hopefully, things will pick up soon in the production end.

IMDB (Internet Movie Database) listing is here:
http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0820735/

Royal Air Force 626 Squadron - May 1945

Dave Stapleton of http://626squadron.org/ supplied me with the above picture to help identify my father. It was taken on May 30th, 1945, and shows RAF 626 Squadron airmen wearing their "Best Blues".

Just a few weeks before, my dad and his crew flew twice to Rotterdam as part of "Operation Manna", a series of sorties which involved air-dropping sacks of food for the starving Dutch population.

Those were different times.

Nothing's changed, eh? How we never learn.

626 Squadron - Royal Air Force

I’m just old enough to have had a father who served in World War II. I say this as when the subject comes up I am asked how I can be the offspring of a Second World War veteran – I’m 48, and I am one of the second batch as my late father had been married before.

In reference to that great opening speech in one of my favourite movies, Patton (1970), where George C. Scott as George S. Patton addresses an unseen crowd of soldiers, my father did not ‘shovel shit in Louisiana’. He served in RAF Bomber Command; specifically as an Air Gunner on Lancasters with number 626 Squadron. I say this, I suppose, partly in the hope to snag those former aircrew who might be surfing the Net after keying “626 Squadron” into their search engines. My dad’s “Skipper” was Pilot Officer A. R. Screen; referred to by his crew as “three engine Screen” as their Lanc often lost an engine on sorties.

As I discovered a few years ago after keying the said search I found out that there is a British gentleman, by the name of Dave Stapleton, who dedicates time to researching the very same squadron – he too has a connection to 626. Last week Dave sent me a nice panorama shot which had been taken of the squadron's crewmembers a couple of weeks after VE-Day. These large-format photographs were taken of the squadron previously during the war (as they were for other squadrons) but what is interesting about this one is that these guys survived the war. My dad is in there somewhere but, as the picture does not come with a “key”, I have to corroborate this one with the siblings.

Not to go on too much about the subject, Dave also supplied me with my dad’s Operational Record, but I will end with this: “This raid on Berchtesgaden was the last operational sortie flown by 626 Squadron, and the last major raid of the war in Europe. Two targets were identified for the raid, the Eagles Nest itself and the SS Barracks nearby. 626 Squadron’s target was the SS Barracks.”

Thanks again to Dave Stapleton for his fine research work: http://626squadron.org/


* The photo above is of the very Lancaster that my father flew in on the ‘Berchtesgaden’ operation; in addition to two earlier raids, including one on Bremen three days before. (The crew pictured here is not his crew.)

Sea Things

Like many artists I draw what Archie Bunker might call "normal tings": Humans, buildings, oxen pulling plows, and a house cat playing with a ball of yarn.

However, I remind myself that I am not afraid to conjure up strange things. Fastened above, from my archives, is a pencil sketch that I commissioned myself to render back in December of 1984. It is titled, simply enough, "Sea Thing (on the beach)". The original is approximately 8" by 8".

Looking at the drawing now, the workmanship is not particularly good, but it is an example of what I can pull out of my hat... well, the subject matter, not the actual subject. Cripes, if I were to pull that out of my hat...

My excuse is that when I was in my formative years I was living in West Germany. As anyone would tell you who was in that lovely country back in those days (1960s/1970s) there was a lot of kids, around my own age, who were physically deformed, some horribly. All thanks to a little drug called Thalidomide. Pretty upsetting stuff.

It was very common to see children with flippers for arms, or malformed legs.

I remember my family driving across the German countryside and my mother blurting out with some emotion, "oh, look at that little boy, he's horribly deformed". Due the speed that my dad was driving, I was not able to see anything -- probably a good thing. The description my mother gave me was more interesting than anything else. Kids are inquisitive.

And some of them go on to draw and paint. I've drawn more offbeat things than just this, but it is a sampling.

Next: "My Mind"

Graveyard Shift

Back in the summer of 1985 a received a call from a friend of mine, who also filled the role of 'film school' classmate, to tell me that there was an ad running in that week's issue of Now Magazine looking for crew members for an unnamed feature film.

I called the number provided in the classified and spoke to the production's line producer, a guy by the name of Peter Boboras. He asked me if I could do anything in particular, and I answered by saying that I had recently done two years of design school. After little time had passed Peter asked me to come down to the production office -- on Sullivan Street in Toronto -- and we would talk.

During the interview I showed a selection of sketches and designs in addition to photographs of various 'miniatures' I had done. Peter said that in the current draft of the script there was a need to build a miniature of tents in a desert. "I can do that." I was more or less hired on the spot. It should be noted that the story was not called Graveyard Shift at this point and it was not even a horror film, but rather an adventure. Just to convince the film company that I could work fast and require little in the way of funds to make miniature scenery, I spec built a futuristic structure table top model, complete with two landing pads... for whatever might want to land. Next I took deep-focus 35mm photographs of this concoction so I did not have to drag it into the office and to show how something, with the proper shooting, could belie its small size.

As the new school year approached (1985-1986) the project in question was still moving along. Peter told me one day that Graveyard Shift was the production's new name.

To make a long story short, my main responsibility was to design a graveyard set -- a film within a film, or rather, a music video within a feature film. I swung into action immediately by going down to the Toronto Reference Library, remember, this was years before the Internet, to look at clipping files of graveyards -- the real kind and those in the movies. Also, I journeyed to the Mount Pleasant Cemetery with sketchbook in hand. I took my camera too but decided that I would make myself draw the various mausoleums; this way, you are forced to study the shapes and contours of the buildings which helps you understand more what you are trying to reproduce in the film studio.

In addition to the studio set I would illustrate 'floating' flats for the picture's music video scenes.

The producers had rented me a small space in the old Massey-Ferguson factory complex just south of King Street. (It is no longer there as it was razed years ago.) I remember it being toasty warm with a nice set of loading doors; actually it was part of a loading dock, as were all the units around us. An interesting area, it was, with little side-streets -- more like back alleys. This was where I built my set, as a bunch of pre-fabs. In the actual film studio we would fasten the sections together to make a whole. My wonderful hard-working crew consisted of Mark Lang, Chris Leger, and Dave Fiaconi. (My brother Jon also helped out when he was not with the main crew. He functioned as a Production Assistant before the shoot started, often helping the art department, and was a grip when 'principle' got rolling.)

The film studio was on George Street, here in Toronto. It was a small studio fit for a low-low budget production, and for teaching a novice production designer that you must always visit the space before you drag your pencil across the drawing velum. I thought I was doing the right thing by asking someone what I thought were the right questions: "What is the fly?" On this query by me I was given a bad dimension from the other party. I seem to remember it being "sixteen feet". Perfect. Well, it was until I eventually went down to the studio to check 'er out myself. As soon as I saw it I could tell that the ceiling was no where near the spec given to me earlier. The studio manager told me it was just over twelve feet (to the beams). That's great, I thought. The mausoleum I designed is over twelve feet tall. Not to overly trust anyone at this late juncture, I popped out the tape measure and checked myself. Time to redesign.

I got home, went to my drafting table and scratched out the mausoleum's entablature. "That'll do it! That easy." Sure the building looked odd and unbalanced but that is what happens. (I elected not to scale it down as I knew it would look foolish and not unlike the Stonehenge bit from the movie Spinal Tap. The door would have to be shrunken down... fit for 'Cousin It' from the old TV show, The Addams Family. The audience would laugh.)

What helped make the job enjoyable, and I was having a good time, not to mention learning a lot, was that the film's director, Jerry Ciccoritti, was well versed in 'art things'. When I showed him my earliest sketches he could ask for things in certain terminology, making my job easier as there was no "this thingy here" talk to confuse me. Thinking back we did not have to get into full blown conversations -- they were always to the point.

Peter Boboras arranged to send David Rayfield, the film's art director, and who would be responsible for painting the set, and I to the Canadian Opera Company's fabrication shop for some informative lessons with their master painter. We were shown how to simulate marble and concrete with brushes and sponges. My god, did I learn a lot in September and October of 1985. Of course, the learning never stops.

By the way, the columns for my mausoleum would be rented from the CBC, so I designed the set to contain them. I made sure that the length given me was correct... as I did not need anymore surprises, needless to say. Such an error would be crippling, especially if the columns were longer than the dimension supplied to me. After all, I could not cut down rented pieces to fit my set. An assortment of tombstones/headstones was also rented from the CBC. Of course, my crew and I could easily make them, and we did make several, but since the Corp had replicas in the prop department, it made perfect sense to grab those, too.

To build up the 'ground' so as to not have a nice-looking mausoleum sitting on a flat studio floor, even a dressed one, we rented a bunch of 'risers' (and their 'tops') from CFTO studios. These would be erected on the George Street studio floor and my building would sit up on top of that, adding to the effect of uneven ground. I should mention that I used (reinforced) 3/4 inch plywood on the floor of the structure as I knew that the actors would be running and walking around on top -- we did not need feet punching through during a take and then yelling for all to hear, "where's St. Laurent?!"

Everything was more or less going according to plan. Everything was ready at my end of things; the main unit would be shooting in the studio later 'that week'. In the meantime, I would attempt to show up to some of my classes at school. Well, folks, you do not know the meaning of "a scene right out of a movie" until I explain what happened next: One day I got home from school, opened the door to my apartment and met a ringing telephone. I ran over and picked it up. It was Peter Boboras:

"Simon, you gotta round up your boys and put your set up tonight. The crew is in there tomorrow."

"What? I thought it was happening on Thursday."

"It was, but they moved it up to tomorrow."

Time to make a quick series of phone calls. It was 5 p.m. I had about 15 hours to make a show.

In late October of 1985, my wonderful crew in all their dedicated glory worked with me in the studio that night to make a graveyard. Sure, finances and time were very tight, but the results were rewarding for us all.


***

Photos above:

Top, top (b&w) -- At about 4 a.m. I stood in the north-east corner of the studio and took this picture as the set was starting to come together. Left to right: Michael Toke, Ellen Atkin, Rae Crombie (painting at door of mausoleum), and Chris Leger.

Bottom, top (colour) -- The completed set. I took this picture (along with many more) the morning after the crew had wrapped up shooting in the studio. Mere minutes after the still photography session, the demolition crew of two and I pulled out the crowbars and went to work.

A Hamlet - Dover - April 1990

While visiting England back in April of 1990, I made sure I revisited Dover Castle, a well known tourist attraction in those parts. I had been once before, as a wee-one back in 1967, so it was time, twenty three years later, to make the pilgrimage.

When I arrived at the main gate the security guard, a rather pleasant older chap, said to me with no hesitation, "you're in today for free, mate". Of course, I asked why... it could not have been the fact that I looked, walked, and quacked like a Canadian, especially since I had not even quacked at that point.

"Why?"

"Franco Zeffirelli's filming his new movie here."

"Neat."

One could not help but notice that a movie was being shot: There were a few facades placed in strategic locations, flags flapping from the turrets, and an artificial rocky addition to the castle's main entrance.

A few years later I showed some pictures I had taken to an aspiring art director friend of mine and her reaction was "I love this stuff... this is why I want to be an art director". (She is now one.)

The above caption could be "Film crew sets up a scene for Franco Zeffirelli's Hamlet".

When I unearth more pics I will put them up.

The Film Effects (Toronto) Gang

Back on June 10th I posted a personal tribute to Film Effects owner and 'optical effects' guru, the late George Furniotis. A few weeks later I uncovered a bunch of photographs I had taken back in November of 1993, one of which (above) captured most of the ol' gang, including George.

Left to right: Alan Peppiatt, Bob Yoshioka, Chris Ross, me (at bottom), and George Furniotis.