Tomorrow we start  again-

Tomorrow is the first day of training for the 2013 fire season and while it is always exciting I can’t help but to reflect back to last July and the loss that this community endured.  Tomorrow we begin again, start a new year, train with a heightened emphasis on procedures to mitigate the potential threats that we face on every fire.  While MAFFS 7 was an enormous loss for all of us in this small community of aviators we must press on, honoring the memories and sacrifices our colleges by getting better and safer at combating wildfires.

We wil never forget.

Fifi on Display

The last post was a little thin on content, sorry about that.  I had been going through some old photo’s and found this one of the B-29 from the Commemorative Air Force that I shot while it was in Southern California  on a tour.  I took my tripod, a couple of good lenses and waited for the sun to get a lot lower in the horizon.  I wanted something that looked better than a mid-day or low overcast morning shot.  I had so many of those already and wanted something with a little more depth.

This is an HDR I shot; 5 frames at 1.0 fstop difference.  I combined them all into HDR Effects and got something similar to what you see here.  I threw in the HiPass filter in Photoshop with a little bit of saturation and out this came.  It’s not bad, not great but …

Nose Art, the Pedestrian Art

I love old Airplanes:

This restored DC-3 is owned by Clay Lacy, former United Pilot, owner of, arguably, the best Air -to -Air photographic system in the world and is based in Van Nuys, CA.   This is a beautiful airplane, I mean spectacularly clean.

Shooting at an air show is one of my least favorite place to photograph airplanes.  Too many people, the light is usually flat and harsh and the shots are exactly what everyone else gets.  This one is a perfect example of strategic cropping,.  I had to get rid of most of the people and extraneous artifacts to make it look nice.  I converted this one to Black and white, ran it  through some magic in Photoshop and voilà

Montmartre- Paris at night is great, Paris at Christmas is better.

This is what you what you think, when you think of Paris.  It looks like a post card, even while your standing there looking at it.  This is the village square just to the west of Sacré-Cœur Basilica or The Basilica of the Sacred Heart.  At night it is even more beautiful than during the day.  On this night the rain had just stopped and have everything had that magical look that you see in every Car advertisement. Besides Paris in the rain fits the stereo typical vision that most people have.  Most-likely that came from the fact that it rains most days.  

I shot this with my D700 on a Travel Tripod about 7:00 at night.  I was waiting for my Niece to join me for dinner and couldn’t resist this view   This is an HDR shot, 5 frames all bracketed at …

The Last Flying B-29

I honestly didn’t know there was still one flying airplane remaining.  On this morning the fog had rolled in and created an early morning overcast that prevented the first few flights from taking off on time.  They pushed the schedule and got the first flight airborne about 13:15.  I made it out to the end of the runway with the airport manager so I could get some shots of it taking off.  I was surprised to see how lille runway it used, but without a payload to speak of  it makes sense. 

I shot this on a tripod using my Nikon 200-400 f4 at 400 iso.  I want the shutter to be slower to capture more of the prop movement, but I was afraid it wouldn’t be as sharp with the large focal length.

Vipers prepping for a night mission

The workhorse of the air to air, air to ground mission in the Afghanistan is the F-16.  The multi-role fighter performs all the tasked missions throughout the high altitude battle area by active duty, Air National Guard and Air Force Reserve squadrons.  Currently, the Air Force is preparing for this fighter to go the way of the F-4  with the F-35 coming on line soon, but like the Phantom the F-16 will go down in history as a superior fighter.

LAST RAY OF SUNLIGHT

Thus is one of my favorite airplanes, small (by todays standards) fast and carries a big punch.  I have always loved this airplane, mostly for the way it looks, but also because the first time I saw Thirty seconds over Tokyo  I thought there wasn’t a better looking plane anywhere.  It has that “badass” look to it.   This one is based in Camarillo, CA and offers rides throughout the year, mostly during special events such as an air show or other pre-publicized events.  You can see m0re details here. 

“Fifi”

The only flying B-29 left in the world; “Fifi”  based in Addison, TX with the Confederate Air Force.  During the week of March 18th the Flying Fortress visited Southern California and specifically the So Cal chapter of the Confederate Air Force, located at the Camarillo Airport.  During it’s three day stop-over it flew 4 times, caring passengers around the local area for approximately 45 minutes.  The first day was delayed due to weather but finally got off the ground at 13:10 local time.  This is the first time I have ever seen the airplane and the only time I have seen one fly.  The Air Force Museum in Dayton OH and the Smithsonian both have beautiful static displays, but there is nothing like watching it fly.

I got out to the airport about 18:30 and waited for the sun to go down, shooting some HDR with my D700.  Fortunately the crowds had …

The Los Angeles International Airport is broken up into a North and South side, with terminals on each.  On the south side is where United, Delta and American are located.  These are the three major airlines that fly to west, doing the majority of the international departures.  Runway 25R is the preferred runway for these three carriers because of its proximity to the terminal.

In this case, American 267 was departing off 25R enroute to one of the islands.  I shot this with may Nikon D4 from the C-8 intersection.  Thanks to the LAX airport office I was able to shoot from this great vantage point.