An Arkansas pilot spent more than eight hours in the air between November 5 and 6 tracing the GTA 6 logo and cover art across the sky, using his flight path as the canvas ahead of the game’s November 19 launch.
Key points
- Pilot Benjamin G. McDaniel III flew an eight-hour route over Arkansas from November 5 to 6 tracing the GTA 6 logo.
- McDaniel took off from Bentonville Municipal Airport in his 1978 Cessna 182 RG, registration N1810R.
- The flight path recreated cover art details including a woman with a pistol, a sports car, an alligator, palm trees and a helicopter.
- The artwork is only visible through flight-tracking software, not from the ground.
- McDaniel, known as The Pilot Picasso, has previously traced the Mona Lisa, The Scream and Spider-Man using the same method.
Benjamin G. McDaniel III, who goes by The Pilot Picasso, has built a following for drawing recognizable images using nothing but GPS tracking and a hand-flown aircraft. His latest piece lands at a moment when anticipation for Rockstar’s open-world sequel is already running high, with fans marking the countdown in increasingly public ways.
How the Flight Path Became Art
McDaniel took off from Bentonville Municipal Airport in his 1978 Cessna 182 RG, registration N1810R, according to flight-tracking records published on FlightRadar24. The route traced the “Grand Theft Auto 6” logo in the style of the game’s official cover art, including a woman holding a pistol in a bikini, a sports car, an alligator, palm trees and a helicopter positioned at the top of the design, as detailed in Sportskeeda’s report on the tribute.
The imagery is invisible from the ground. It only appears when the flight path is rendered on tracking software, which is how McDaniel’s earlier projects have also been viewed. He has described his planning process as largely a ground exercise: sketching the design in the flight-planning app ForeFlight with an Apple Pencil, then converting it into headings, distances and turns the aircraft can actually fly.
A Pilot With a Pattern of Sky Tributes
McDaniel began creating GPS-tracked sky art in 2020 and has since logged roughly 1,830 flight hours, with 855 of them in the Cessna 182 RG. He holds a commercial pilot certificate with ratings for single-engine and multiengine land and sea aircraft, an instrument rating, and several instructor certifications. He graduated from Auburn University’s aviation program in 2022.
His past projects include a recreation of Leonardo da Vinci’s Mona Lisa flown over Arkansas and Oklahoma in September, which CBS reported took months of planning and about four hours of flying to complete. He has also traced Edvard Munch’s The Scream over Missouri and an image of Spider-Man, along with a flight spelling out “You are loved” in the shape of a giant fingerprint over western Washington County.
“I start with an idea, then break it into a path the airplane can actually fly,” McDaniel has said of his process. “All of the tracks are hand
flown, and I fly these solo.”
He has also been clear that none of his projects are commissioned work. “All of my pieces so far have been noncommissioned,” he said. “They are ideas and concepts I wanted to fly in the sky myself.”
No Sign of Rockstar Involvement
Nothing in available reporting suggests Rockstar Games had any role in planning or endorsing the tribute. McDaniel appears to have created it independently, as a fan marking the release of a game that has already drawn unusual levels of public attention, from community tributes to continued speculation over features such as the fully working buses and trains Rockstar has confirmed will appear across GTA 6‘s map.
McDaniel has previously described his sky art as a one-shot effort, telling an aviation outlet that “you get one shot” once the flight begins, since mistakes in the air cannot be undone mid-route. That pressure applies regardless of subject matter, whether he is tracing a Renaissance painting or a video game logo.
What Comes Next for GTA 6
Rockstar has set November 19 as the release date for GTA 6, and attention around the launch continues to build on multiple fronts, including questions about when a GTA 6 PC version might follow the console release. McDaniel’s flight adds to a wave of fan activity surrounding the game, though it remains an independent project rather than an official promotion.
