Tag: Travel

The Story Behind an Image, Part 7

Ever since 2004, I’ve had a passionate love affair with photography. And come to discover that I have a fondness with photos that comes with a story. Over the years, I have shot a few of them. Here’s the next story behind one of my images.

Part 7: The image that makes me smile

Any aviation enthusiast and or photographer who has ever been to a NAS Oceana airshow knows in the morning you do two things, shoot statics and shop for swag. During the airshow weekend, most of the squadrons based at Oceana sets up rows of tents and offers tons of squadron merch. From T-shirts, Cruise DVDs, challenge coins, coffee mugs to photos and illustrations. In 2008, I attended the show with two fellow photographers, Shawn Yost and Craig Scaling. All weekend long we were cracking jokes, quoting “Top Gun” and all around enjoying each other’s company.

Saturday morning, Shawn and I made our way through security, and met up with Craig. We made our way over to the “Squadron Mall” to buy all the swag we could not live without. Shawn and Craig both fancy squadron cruise DVDs and challenge coins. Zaps (squadron stickers) are my jam. After spending an untold amount of money, it was time to figure out where in the hell we were going to put it all. Remember, its morning. We still have a whole day of shooting ahead. You can’t hold on to all that swag and shoot jets?! You got to pack that shit up! After packing our swag into every nook and cranny of our cameras bags, we headed toward to show line to figure out where we want to shoot from. If I remember correctly, Craig wanted to head over to the static to reshoot something. Craig took off his backpack to put his DVDs away. With his hands full, he asks me to hold his camera. He then processes to stuff his DVDs into his overpacked backpack. With a devilish grin on my face, I nodded to Shawn. He instantly stuck the pose and I quickly framed them both and press the shutter. Craig had his camera set to continuous shooting and it shocked the hell out of me when I heard his shutter blasting away. And as quickly as it happened, I lowered Craig’s camera and Shawn recomposed himself. Craig asks for his camera back. ”You’re shitting me, Right?!” I said to myself. He didn’t realize what just happened?! So, I handed him his camera as if nothing even happened. Trying not to laugh, Shawn and I were both amazing he didn’t hear the shutter snapping away or pick up on what we just did. Looking back now, it was beautiful! Craig went off to shoot statics, Shawn and I in disbelief found a shooting location. We enjoyed the show, packed up our gear, and headed to the hotel. While there, dump cards, charge batteries, shower, dinner and get ready to do it all over again the next day.

Sunday morning, we woke up, got some breakfast, and head to the base. Again, parked the car, geared up, made our way through security, shot the show, and met up with Craig afterward. I do remember, we headed over to my parent’s house that night for a home-cooked meal. On the way over, We figure Craig would have said something about Saturday’s little photo shoot, but nothing. At my parent place, we eat, and we laughed. Heck, my dad even broke out his old cruise books when he served on the Ticonderoga (CV-14) and Saratoga (CV-60). Back in the hotel, we chilled, and eventually off to bed. Come Monday morning, we all headed our separate ways back home.

According to the EXIF data from the image, it was 10 days from the time I shot it to when Craig found it and email it to Shawn and I. He named the image “ShawnandStevearedead”. Key takeaways are. First, regardless of what’s you are shooting, Have fun! And second… Never let me hold your camera when Shawn is around!  

BE SURE TO CHECK OUT

< The Story behind an Image part 6

If you like what you see and read here, click the “Follow” and “Like” button. Along with feel free to leave a reply below.

Weekend in Miami

Over the long Memorial Day weekend, I headed down to Miami for the Air & Sea show. I haven’t started sorting through the thousands of images from the show. But here’s a few phots of Downtown Miami, my hotel views, and South Beach. The sites & sounds, the vibe of the city and the Cuban cuisine, Oh man! I was blown away. And if I’m honest, was a bit overwhelmed at first but I was there to have fun and I didn’t let it stop me from truly enjoying myself.

If you like what you see, consider hitting the “Like” button or maybe start to follow my little blog.

Until next post,

Steven

Air Power over Hampton Roads 2023

One can say that this was a return for both Langley Air Force Base and me, getting back to airshows. It’s been 4 years since Langley hosted a show and 5 years since I attended Wings over Houston back in 2018. And after such a long hiatus, I had one simple goal. To enjoy photographing an airshow again. To get reacquainted with the sites and sounds of modern fighters as well as iconic aircraft of World War Two being put through their paces. Surprisingly, my results were better than I expected. Without further ado, here are my photos from Air Power over Hampton Roads 2023.

Gear used:

Canon EOS 90D DSLR

Canon EOS 5DS R DSLR

Canon EF 24-70mm F/2.8L II USM

Canon EF 100-400mm F/4.5-5.6L IS II USM

Canon EF 500mm F/4.5L USM

If you like what you see, consider hitting the “Like” button and maybe start to follow my little blog. Until next post,

Choosing Light over Available Subjects

Albert Einstein said, “Insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results.” These wise words are so true even in aviation photography. The repeated attendance of aviation events based on a list of demonstration teams and performers over an event with great lighting conditions is crazy to me. And let’s face it, we go to events to see and experience living breathing aircraft take flight. Shooting static aircraft is really just a matter of waiting for the right time of day. We don’t get to choose what flies or performs in whatever light we want. But we can choose events with better overall lighting conditions. That we choose light over available subjects.

Such stunning light in the late afternoon

In this episode of “Philosophy about Photography”. I want to talk about choosing an event with purpose over subjects of opportunity. After attending countless aviation events over the past 17 years, I’ve become very critical about what show or event I will attend. Just because there’s an event nearby, doesn’t mean I’m going to it. I have a tried and tested trifecta of reasoning for attending an aviation event. For me, it takes great lighting conditions, multiple shooting locations, and subjects I want to see. And having only one doesn’t cut it.

Light and location go hand in hand. The quality of light at an aviation event is directly proportional to your shooting location, show/crowd line, and the path of the Sun. There are numerous other factors that must be considered. Such as, where’s the show/crowd line? And what direction is it facing? Where’s the Sun now? And where will it be later? Does the event cater to photographers? How late can I stay after the show ends? Also, there are events with good light only for part of the day. Wings over Houston for example, the show faces east and at the start of the show, the light is garbage. The good thing is flying tends to start in the late afternoon. The first few acts are backlit but before you know it and for the rest of the show the sun is at your back. NAS Oceana is the exact opposite. The lighting conditions are good until midday and the Sun crosses overhead and then starts backlighting the event just in time for the Blue Angels.

My reasoning behind having multiple shooting locations is, I feel one cannot capture the feeling or present the experiences of a show from one location. There’s just too much going on to show from one point of view. When you do, all your images have the same perspective and tend to look the same. And you quickly lose the interest of your viewers and they either click away to some other interest or continue scrolling past the rest of your photos. My remedy for this stagnation is to shoot the first half of a show in one location and then the second half in another for one-day events. And for multi-day shows, to switch up locations on different days. The results tend to show a more complete picture of the show and I’m able to tell a more complex story with my images.

How many of my sought-after aircraft are supposed to be at one of these well-lit events? I may get to see two or three per show if I’m lucky. But for me, I’m in it for the long game. And with warbirds being my jam, I tend to gravitate towards the larger warbird events like the Planes of Fame air show in Chino California, EAA AirVenture at Oshkosh, and Thunder Over Michigan in Ypsilanti. And even when I make it out to a show with quality light along with the aircraft I want to see, there is still no guarantee that I will add any unique images to my portfolio. Events get canceled, Mother Nature likes to start tripping on show weekends, and unfortunately, accidents happen as well.

Yeah, you can use Lightroom and Photoshop to add filters and layer masks to correct for crappy light. But those images will not be as good as ones shot in superior conditions. And the workflow of processing a set of images from a poorly lit event is tedious and time-consuming. I’ve been there, done that and no thank you. But at least we can pick events that are more in our favor to produce better results.

Thanks for stopping by,

Steven

%d bloggers like this: