I went down to the local hobby shop today and talked with a guy there who gives classes. Based on his recommendations, I'm considering the Hangar 9 Alpha Trainer 40. It's far from pretty, but it's apparently very good for learning, and yet not so coddling that it is good for nothing else. There's some other planes available that have built-in sensors that will auto-level the plane when you let go of the controls, etc, but he said with those, once a month or so passes and you're comfortable handling a plane, you basically have to go out and buy another one to do anything fun. The Alpha has a relatively small amount of dihedral (the amount that the wings are angled upward), which sacrifices a little bit of level-flight stability but gives it more capability for aerobatics.

However, he actually strongly suggested that I try helicopters instead. They're definitely more maneuverable. The things you can do with an RC helicopter are ridiculous — things like fly up vertical and pivot around your tailboom, hover upside down two inches off the ground, etc. But he said that contrary to popular belief, they actually aren't significantly harder to fly than airplanes, and to prove it to me, he loaded up an RC flight simulator they have there called RealFlight, with a USB remote control. He loaded up a helicopter and let me try flying it and it really wasn't that hard once I got the hang of the controls. To contrast, he then loaded up the Alpha Trainer so I could see how that handles, and just like the helicopter, I immediately crashed that into the ground. But once I got the feel for it again, I did just about as well with the plane as with the helicopter. A helicopter also has the advantage that you can fly it anywhere, and don't have to go out to an airfield like with a plane. He gives free classes every Saturday in both types, so that's not really an issue (and also very cool of him).

Hmm. The upsides of helicopters are as mentioned: way more maneuverable, so the potential for way more fun. Able to use it anywhere you have a decent amount of space, which I think is a significant plus. The main downside is cost — there isn't really any such thing as a "trainer" helicopter, so the cheapest basic helicopter setup is about $750, compared to about $300 for your average trainer airplane and associated parts. That's a pretty damn big difference, though you do end up with a "real" helicopter that isn't really limited in capabilities in any way like the trainer.

One thing I thought would be cool is rig up a digital camera to take pictures automatically with a simple timer as described by Engadget, and strap it to the bottom of the plane and take pictures from the air. I guess that could be done just as easily with a helicopter, so there's no real difference there.