Don't know about you but I love to put an appropriate figure in front of my aeroplane models. These used to be relatively inexpensive but costs have risen and 20GBP is not uncommon for one of the new, admittedly superb, figures from the likes of Model Cellar and CSM. There are also some terrible caricatures that I wouldn't use, even if free, but appear on ebay at premium prices - I am lucky to have a dozen or two good figures bought years ago but I'm always on the lookout for good figures at good prices.
One great source are the 1/35 sets from MasterBox, MiniArt and ICM. These are styrene and lend themselves to interchanging parts and are regularly offered on auction for quite low costs. For example, I recently bought three sets of 5 figures in bags (no boxes) for 15GBP! - that's about 1GBP each with shipping - or 15 figures for the cost of 1 resin masterpiece,
You're wondering what this has to do with the CSM Nieuport? Well, one set was MiniArt 35105 WW2 French Tank Crew - with an officer that looked a pretty good fit to me, for a Premiere Guerre. Aviation Militaire, pilote!
The CSM N17 entered my thoughts again - but maybe a French one......
I started on Monsieur, Le Pilote...
Sandy