These are pictures from an air show at Moffett Field in August 2002. These are all scans from prints.
This was something of an experiment for me since I'd been to this show before, a lot of the items were the same, and there was some confusion until the last minute about if I'd go at all. I wasn't sure what security would be like, so I left my bag in the car and all I brought to this airshow was a single camera and lens (100-400 zoom) with a polarizer screwed on in an attempt to darken the sky up a bit and reduce the reflections (as a result you can often see the pilots surprisingly well). There had been some fires and it was a little hazy. Anyway, I used it as an opportunity to try some different things.
One problem with shooting airshows is that it's hard to convey that it's not just a plane running around. If you take a picture of an airplane upside down, it pretty much looks like you just turned around the picture. So I tried to get a lot of shots with ground clutter.
How's this for clutter? This is a classic airshow move - you get some folks to hold the poles, and you cut through them with your airplane. You can do it at some crazy angle if you're so inclined and have the right combination of skill and lack of fear. I always try to get a shot, sometimes it works out and sometimes it doesn't. For this show, I totally blew Eddie Andreini's pass (It's OK, I got the shot at Hayward once), but this one was reasonably interesting. Jim LeRoy, the pilot, has a really nice one of this plane at Bulldog Airshows. If you get a chance to see either of these guys, do it, they're real pros.
Heritage flight. Pretty much the same deal as last year. There's a lot of detail in the print which is satisfying but I need to be a little more careful not to clip the back of the planes!
Again, another heritage flight. Note in both shots how the jet pilot is watching the prop plane. Here the planes weren't clipped but were too far forward (it generally works better if the space is in the direction of travel.)
The A-10 Warthog, coming in for a landing. The level of detail in the print doesn't come through in the web version, so I scanned the gun at higher resolution.
Check out the 2001 pictures.
Check out the 2003 pictures.
See the rest of Eljay.org - Travel Photos
and Trip Reports