Development

When did you start developing for flight simulators and what got you interested in it?

When I first joined PAD in 1999, Barry Blaisdell was running it on his own, although in the four years previous to that, he had collaborated with several other developers. At the time Barry was receiving lots of requests for repaints of his existing models and he needed someone to work on the paintings, which would enable him to work on new aircraft designs. After a while I learned web design and took over the running and ownership of the PAD web site. I was also the chief flight tester and eventually did all the flight dynamics and design work.

Tell us about the nature of your designs and what you do?

As the lead designer, Barry would choose which aircraft we would all work on. The aircraft he tended to choose, were aircraft where he knew we could talk to somebody who had either worked on, or flown them. A lot of the information we received about the aircraft we built, came from either pilots or engineers, and helped tremendously with the authenticity of the aircraft we modelled.

In the early years we were fortunate to get lots of real world information about DeHavilland aircraft operating in Canada, and so we worked our way through the DHC-2 Beaver, DHC-3 Otter, DHC-5 Buffalo, DHC-6 Twin Otter and DHC-Dash-8 series. We produced many variations of each of these aircraft and it was a challenging, but always rewarding experience. When I first started with PAD, FS98 was the current version of MS Flight Simulator, but as each new incarnation of MSFS became available we had to re-design and update all of our models. In its sixteen years of production, PAD created over 60 original models.

What do you consider your best or most popular work?

The best ones were always our latest designs because we learned things as we went along. The Beechcraft 99 and the Fokker 100 are technically the best PAD models we created, but in terms of popularity measured by the number of downloads, the DHC-6 Twin Otter and the Bombardier Dash-8-Q400 remain the most popular.

What do you find to be the most challenging aspect of a project?

From my own personal point of view, the most challenging aspect of a project, is getting the model to fly right. Performance data of aircraft is widely available (especially because of the internet) but juggling the numbers in the air file and aircraft.cfg file to match the published figures is a long process of trial and error.

Getting the "feel" of the controls is also quite a challenge because how the controls feel depends to some extent on the how the user's stick or yoke is set up with his/her FS settings. Whenever possible we asked a real life pilot to try out the controls and suggest improvements. PAD created models with beginners and moderately advanced simmers in mind; people who fly for fun. We never set out to cater for the hardcore flight simmer who demands that every last detail is simulated, but even so we tried, and mostly succeeded, in producing models that flew as close to their real life counterparts as we could make them.

What have been your favorite projects?

I think the slightly quirky ones, such as the Republic Seabee, the Britten-Norman Trislander and the Dornier Seastar. They were all fun to make and to fly.

What software packages and tools do you use to develop?

Over the years the lead designers on each project had their own favorite design software. Udo Lemmob and Pavel Toman both favored Gmax and produced some great FS2002/FS2004 Twin Otters and Katanas for us. Jean-Pierre Brisard, who made most of our FS2004 and FSX models, favored FS Design Studio.

Who would you consider to be your mentors or inspiration in the development world if you have any?

I think Milton Shupe was probably my earliest inspiration. He started FS design at about the same time as I joined PAD, and the quality of his work and his dedication to freeware is just outstanding. Barry Blaisdell was also an inspiration, as he was always willing to help new designers and painters. My colleague Jean-Pierre also ranks as one of my FS heroes; he was just such a delight to work with and I still miss our daily interchange of emails in our own peculiar lingo of mixed up English and French. He and Barry were great losses to the FS community when they passed away.

Do you develop payware/freeware or both and why?

Because we never really got deep into gauge designing (we mostly used a lot of freeware gauges from other designers) nearly all our work had to be freeware for copyright reasons, but that was always perfectly acceptable, because right from the start, our work was always going to be a hobby for us, and we never regarded it as a source of income. We just had fun doing what we fancied, and when we fancied. We briefly dipped our toes into the payware market when we sold the copyright of a few models to a well known software publisher, but that was a short lived project that never really worked well.

What advice would you give to flight simmers thinking of building their first aircraft?

Be prepared for a long uphill struggle, but one in which you will learn a great many things about designing aircraft. 3D modelling can be a slow and frustrating occupation. Start simple and learn to use the basic tools of your design program, and then, and only then, join an online design forum. The members there will be happy to answer questions and help fill in all the gaps that the manuals usually leave out. Also, try and remember that an aircraft (especially the first one) can take up to and even over a year to complete to a satisfactory level, and that's if you do a little bit here and there every day. Scenery modelling on the other hand is slightly simpler.

The Team

How many people work with you or your team?

For most of the productive period of PAD, the core team consisted of three people; Barry, Jean-Pierre and myself, but over the sixteen years that we made our models, we collaborated with lots of talented designers, painters and individuals, with all sorts of specialist knowledge. These included aircraft owners and pilots, with some being airline pilots.

Real Life

Do you have any experience in real aviation?

I have some. As a boy I grew up next door to the airfield where the Spitfire was designed and flew and so I spent a lot of time with my face pressed against the fence watching these aircraft come and go. I joined the Air Cadets and got quite a bit of back seat flying and stick time in Chipmunks. I served in the RAF for four years as a photographer, having failed the medical for aircrew, and later was a member of a gliding club and took a flying course in a Cessna 150 but for financial reasons did not accrue enough hours to get a Private Pilot's Licence.

What are your plans for the future?

PAD's production line stopped in July 2011 when Jean-Pierre sadly died and although I've had tentative inquiries from a few fledgling designers, it seems unlikely that a new model with the PAD name will emerge in the foreseeable future. I am keeping the web site alive with repaints of our back catalogue and the help desk is still very active. The PAD web site still gets around 400-500 hits per day which is not bad for a little hobby site.

Bob, if you could fly on any aircraft and route, what would it be and why?

Funny you should mention that, because I have already flown on my most 'wished for' flight, and that was flying over the Grand Canyon in a Twin Otter, but I still hope one day to go on a whale watching flight in a DHC Beaver along the North West Pacific coast.

What can sites like FlightSim.Com do to support you and the hobby better?

Do more of what you have always done; provide a one stop shop for freeware downloads, payware downloads, and provide a place for forums, discussion, help topics and articles of general aviation interest.

How do you feel about the future of flight simulation in general?

As long as there are wannabe pilots like me out there, home computer flight simulators and add-ons will always find a ready market.

Many thanks.

Bob May
http://www.premaircraft.com