Old Crow

By Aircraft Photography, Anderson's Portrait Park, Light Painting, , , , , ,

Light Painting “Old Crow”

We’ve got another cool light painting project to share with you today, the world-famous P-51D Mustang, “Old Crow”!

Behind-the-scenes photo of the camera setup for the light painting of "Old Crow", a P-51-D Mustang.

Here’s the camera setup for “Old Crow’s” light painting project.

I’m back from EAA’s AirVenture for 2025, and what an amazing experience it was! Hundreds of people visited our Light Painting Photography Booth, and they all loved what they saw!

Light Painting by Michael Anderson Photography's booth at AirVenture 2025.

Here’s the center section of our Light Painting Photography booth at AirVenture this year.

This year, we featured several new artworks in our booth, including our newest addition, a stunning 60″ metal print of the Howard 500 N500LN!

Our completed light painting of the Howard 500 N500LN, along with Mother Nature's stunning sunset!

This beautiful light-painted photograph of the Howard 500 N500LN was just one of the show stoppers in our Light Painting Photography booth at AirVenture this year!

While there, we were commissioned for some amazing light painting projects that we’ll be sharing once they’re scheduled and completed. And, I created three cool light paintings during the show, too! Old Crow was the first! It was created during the Wednesday aerial fireworks spectacular!

A big shout-out to our long-time friend Wayne Nolden, who lives not too far from Oshkosh, for assisting me that night! Unfortunately, Joannie hurt her knee before the show and could not attend this year. Wayne filled in for her admirably. Thank you, Wayne!

The Rest of the Story

Every year that we’ve attended AirVenture, Wayne spends at least one day with us, usually one of the nights of the big fireworks shows. After we close up our Light Painting Photography booth for the night, we grab a bite to eat and then watch the show.
This year, Wayne stopped by on multiple days. The first night, we went to see the Warbirds after we had dinner. I observed that many of the aircraft had tarps over their canopies. Later, I was told that it was to keep moisture out of the cockpits, as not all of them are watertight any longer. A few were not tarped. One of those was “Sweet Revenge”, a stunning P-51D Mustang, with a mirror-polished finish!
I thought about that plane all night. The next morning, I asked Wayne if he’d like to light paint an aircraft with me during the fireworks that night. He was pretty excited about the idea! The aircraft that I had intended to light paint that night was “Sweet Revenge”. I thought I’d challenge myself to see if I could light paint something that reflective. If the plane’s owner was there, cool; if not, I was just going to set up and do it (if it didn’t have a tarp on it) – well, because it was there!
The "before" photo taken prior to light painting "Old Crow", a P-51-D Mustang.

Here’s what the base image looks like. Once it got a bit darker, Wayne and I got to work on the light painting!

Then, It Was Gone

When we got to the Warbirds that night, the plane wasn’t there. I was more than a little bummed out. Most of the other Warbirds were tarped, so I thought we were probably not light painting that night.
Then, some people arrived nearby in a golf cart. I struck up a conversation with one of them, a gal named Melissa. That’s when she informed me that Sweet Revenge was leading off the Airshow that night, and her husband, Ray, was flying it! Just a couple of minutes later, Ray and Sweet Revenge flew right by us!
I talked to Melissa a bit about my plan, and she told me that I might be able to light paint a P-51 that night, but she preferred that it be one of their aircraft. Sweet Revenge belonged to someone else; Ray was just piloting it for the show. She would talk to him about the idea when he returned from his flight.
What I didn’t know was that their aircraft, also a P-51, is a pretty gosh-darn special one; it was none other than Old Crow!

C.E. “Bud” Anderson and “Old Crow”

"Bud" Anderson with "Old Crow", a P-51-D Mustang Fighter.

A great photo of C.E. “Bud” Anderson, along with “Old Crow”. Thanks to Ray and Melissa for supplying these photographs of World War II, Triple-Ace, “Bud” Anderson!

Clarence Emil “Bud” Anderson (January 13, 1922 – May 17, 2024) was an officer in the United States Air Force. During World War II, he was the highest-scoring flying ace in his P-51 Mustang squadron. He was a triple ace with 16 1/4 aerial victories while flying with the 357th Fighter Group.

He flew multiple P-51s during his service. All of which he named and painted “Old Crow” after the cheap bourbon whiskey, a name he jokingly told his friends was for the “smartest bird in the sky”.

Photo of Ray and Melissa Fowler with C.E. "Bud" Anderson at a social event.

A nice photo of Ray and Melissa with C.E. “Bud” Anderson.

Toward the end of Anderson’s two combat tours in Europe in 1944, he was promoted to major at just 22 years of age! Afterward, he became a test pilot and a fighter squadron and wing commander, even serving a combat tour in the Vietnam War.

Anderson retired as a full colonel in 1972, after which he worked in flight test management for McDonnell Douglas. He’s a member of the National Aviation Hall of Fame, and he continued to speak at aviation and military events into his 100s! Bud received an honorary promotion to Brigadier General in 2022.

C.E. "Bud" Anderson and Ray Fowler standing by "Old Crow", a P-51B Mustang Fighter.

Ray and “Bud” Anderson by the P-51B version of “Old Crow”.

The Liberty Foundation

A little side note is a good idea here. I should mention that Ray is the Executive Director of The Liberty Foundation Inc. The Liberty Foundation works to restore and preserve aircraft so that their stories can be told to future generations.

I intend that the light painting of “Old Crow” and any other of their aircraft that I light paint for them will help to raise funds for that purpose. The plan is that these artworks will be for sale in the store found on their website.

Light Painting “Old Crow”

Once he returned from his flight, Melissa told Ray about what I had in mind, and they green-lighted it! Ray took the tarp off, got everything ready, and they left to go watch the AirVenture nighttime spectacular fireworks show (and, it IS spectacular!). Wayne and I were left alone with this wonderful aircraft. Time to light paint!

We got going by lighting the landing gear and other smaller areas of the plane. Once the sky got darker, we light-painted some of the surrounding aircraft, including “Sweet Revenge” (it’s behind “Old Crow”, on the left side). “Gunfighter” is directly behind, and “Old Crow”, the P-51B version, is behind and to the front.

Then, we made several passes over other parts of Old Crow before the fireworks got going. Then, we took a “time out” to watch and capture the fireworks images to possibly use in the sky.

Once the show concluded, Wayne and I finished up as Ray and Melissa were returning to put Old Crow to bed for the night. Mission accomplished! A huge thank you to Ray and Melissa for the opportunity to light paint a piece of aviation history, and to Wayne, for his help!

Fireworks, and a beautiful light painted photograph of the famous P-51D Mustang Fighter, "Old Crow".

The finished light-painted artwork of “Old Crow” at AirVenture 2025!

More to Come

Old Crow was the first of three light painting projects that I created for Ray and Melissa. The second one, CubCrafters XCub N920RS, we’ve recently shared. The final artwork is below, and you can read all about it by clicking on this link.

A cool light painted photograph of CubCrafters XCub N920RS.

The CubCrafters XCub N920RS. This cool light painting was created a couple of nights after we light-painted Old Crow.

The third, Douglas DC-3 N728G, is coming soon, and it has its own very unique story!

“Old Crow” – The Movie

As always, we’ve got a short “Build Video” with the images that went into creating this cool artwork, and then all of the steps that went into making it. The link to it on our YouTube channel is below:

Wayne and I took 143 images that night, and more than 80 of them were used to put this beauty together.

If you would like to see more light paintings, we’ve got a dedicated Light Painting Photography Website that can be found at www.MichaelAndersonLightPainting.com

Thank you for taking the time out of your day to read our story! – M&J

“Old Crow” © 2025 Michael Anderson Photography

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