Images shown below are as they appear on the left side of the aircraft (i.e. with the left side of the fin flash leading) - in cases where there are no asymmetrical details such as coats of arms or text that cannot be reversed, the image may be reversed for the right side, such as with the Royal Air Force fin flash to keep the same side forward much as with a flag.
When a national flag is used, the left side of the aircraft is often the back side of the flag as it is normally flown. Exceptions include the pre-World War II German Third Reich's ostensibly "civilian" aircraft, which used a tricolor set of red-white-black horizontal stripes on the right side of the fin and rudder and the swastika in black, in a white circular field on a red band on the left side of the vertical tail surfaces, in the manner of the
Nazi Party flag.