Earlier this year, I was able to attend the Experimental Aircraft Association’s (EAA) annual “Fly-In,” EAA AirVenture Oshkosh 2014. The EAA had recently purchased a licensed Merlin Digital Asset Management system (DAM) to manage the thousands and thousands of pictures their staff of volunteer photographers produce.
I was on site to help them actually put their Merlin into production. There were about a dozen photographers shooting aircraft and aircraft related activities from dawn to dusk and beyond for more than a week. All their photos were put in Merlin so that editors could make selections for the website, slideshows and the daily newspaper produced at the show. A big job!
I carried my cameras just in case I had an opportunity to see some of the show during my short visit. Most of my picture taking opportunities came in the evening, while walking past the many aircraft on the way to the parked car. But, one day, when it was a bit quiet in the photo workroom, I did take my camera out to the edge of the runway to watch that day’s scheduled air show. It was a great place to just sit and watch aircraft of all sorts perform. From a Martin B-57 Canberra bomber, to Marine Osprey’s, to all sorts of experimental aircraft and stunt planes, it was plane-watching paradise.
My second place-winning picture is of the AeroShell Acrobatic Team performing. The team flies North American AT-6 Texans, a plane first used as a trainer for the United States Army Air Corps.
For the pixel peepers, the photo was made with a Nikon D800e using a 200-400mm f/4 lens with a teleconverter, so the equivalent of a 650mm lens. The picture was taken at 1/640 second at f8 at 100iso. I wish it were a bit sharper.