Mixed show photos

Point taken

Good observation on my reply but happily it isnt in the obbsessive behaviour pattern and nor is it likely to be.My analogy of getting one over was purely meant to express my satisfaction of being able to match if not better sometimes a reult that could have been obtained with say a fast 2.8 Nikon F/F lens.
The image I have in my mind of what shot I,d like to have before I go out is the most important point of focus I have before I go out and my thinking around a means to an end includes trying to adopt small things in my mind to help me get that shot I am after and maintain concentration towards getting the frame I want.

Once years ago at a practice day at Barton aerodrome I managed to get a ticket to watch the days events,it was awe inspiring and there was a few well known names with cameras wondering about and speaking with some of them made me miss some fantastic shot of an Avenger beating up the airfield with some really low banking passes.The moral of my small story is since that time I had decided to concentrate on my camera and what I had brought it for and had instilled into myself something to think about to keep me focused in getting a good image.Even they didnt bother to lift their lenses up for some shots and when i had asked them why they said they had plenty shots of that aircraft!!. They had dropped there guard on there main focus and rested on their laurels and it had taught me to have some strict way of maintaining my concentration so as not to let the same happen to me.

There was a period a few years ago when a lot of people were all guity of this behaviour and it was at the time when digital was in its infancy on the internet and most people were using the old 35mm format of film and slide.It was awsome sometimes to look at some photos on the forums that were so clear and well detailed and many of the members of the particular forum would ask the particular contributor were they using a Leica or top of the range Nikon.This questioning would often be met with a wall of silence as to how the contributors photos could have “got one over” on their contemporarys on the thread at the time.

Of course now some years later the cat is well and truly out of the bag and manufacturers know there is a massive market out there for people to ” get one over” on the other photographer by an endless amount of very good equipment being made ,with no end in sight of where it will all end as the megapixel battle will always attract the discerning photographer.

On a different tack but one which highlights the value of things and the path we are on now leads me back to the new language of money over morality.Its a sad world where a girl can get her breasts out and earn a million and a war hero who fought in WW2 can hardly pay his food or heating bills due to the outlook the government have on business,similarly a brilliant musician like mark knopfler can have one of his brilliant songs rejected in prefernce to a song from say the Spice Girls who cant even play a tune because it might make more money.I know it doesnt seem to have much in common with your original reply but I have just wanted to point out where my values and focus are in general and run my values along the same lines with thoughts on my hobby with the photography and hope both sets are equaly as healthy .

Seems like we all have a rant and that was mine ,thanks for reading.:rolleyes:

Sanity has prevailed. 😀

I really love the feeling though of getting one over on the boys with the really expensive gear and my best lens to the moment is a 70,250mm canon i.s lens and most of the shots you saw on the thread were from this lens.

I’m not really sure ‘getting one up’ on anyone is all that much of a good thing to aim for; most people who think like that often end up more concerned with with trying to prove a point than actually creating images, although I did upload (and have accepted) a shot to Jetphotos a couple of years ago that I took on my mobile phone while I had my 30D around my neck, just to highlight it isn’t always about equipment. That said, now I’m a screener on JP I think I’d probably reject it now!

Paul

Good vibes from over the border.

Scotty those were good words of encouragement and have been placed on board.I have only been going a year or so with my D30 and havent built up a good enough collection of shots to start on like you blokes who seem to have no end of images.

Of course I was into the old stuff, slides and print film and have had some of that stuff digitised but it looks bland compared to this lovely sharp digital age imagery that we see so much of.I had a canon 3meg compact and for a couple of years chose this as my new camera to try and keep up with the Jones,es in the new age.

I really love the feeling though of getting one over on the boys with the really expensive gear and my best lens to the moment is a 70,250mm canon i.s lens and most of the shots you saw on the thread were from this lens.

Status Quo stopped on tour in the Gosforth Park hotel in 74/75 near newcastle and I met the whole band and got an L.P signed for someone else who worked there but a good band none the less.Played at the Mayfair I think.

I think you should post to “A-Net”,”JP” etc… (surprised you have’nt already going by the quality) BUT please, please continue to post your work here too. As you can garner there are a lot of members here who enjoy to see a good shot or two.
PS Dire Straits yech!:( hehe
Actually not too bad really,but, throw me some Rammstein or Quo and i’m bouncing :D:D

Music to my ears

Just took a long look at your sites Paul and like Scotty some brilliant colourful shots,like the waddo lot and the b/w spit/lanc,blue harvard,vampire and top down shot of airliner.Your site was also similar in that it was threaded together with music as well.

As this has become a none photographic thread anyway I,m sure the flock wont mind me talking about the musical tastes you and Scotty have.Got to say I like Dire Straits and after a couple of beers and some Telegraph Road I think of the ranting flock on there way to work on Mondays really glad to partake in some more androgynous behaviour and then at night search the forums to see if anyone has not conformed and then get ready for their ritual rant and rave.
One thing though they have made me decide to post what I might consider my half decent shots to sites like you have shown in your last post,so subconciously they have been constructive in making my mind up there,so they do have some usefulness.
Thanks again.:)

Now if a thousand people sit outside (probably more at Cosford) who do not pay the entry fee, the show makes a loss and then is cancelled where do we go next?

This is probably wrong. I suspect the vast majority of people who sit outside wouldn’t have paid for entry in any case, so the event has actually lost nothing.

If, heaven forbid, members of the public were injured or killed due to standing in that very spot when an emergency arose, do you really think that would do anything other than irretrievable damage to not only flying at Duxford but also at any other active airfield in this country?

You could apply that logic to a thousands of situations. What if G-YMMM had splatted a few people at Myrtle instead of making it into the airfield? What would happen then? Would there be a several mile exclusion zone set up around every airfield in the country? Of course not. Would flying in general be banned? I doubt it. If people standing in public and easily accessible areas is so dangerous, then why are they public? As someone who works on events with the public all the time it’s our job to make sure the general environment is safe for the public to enter it, and if I allow the public into an area that isn’t safe and someone gets hurt, then it’s my fault, not theirs. I don’t see how this situation is any different but I’m more than willing to be corrected if I’m wrong.

What a sad way for this thread to end up. Frankly, I don’t really care whether people shoot inside or outside the event; we’re not talking about someone bootlegging a concert and making thousands out of it that the artist sees nothing of, we’re talking about people taking a few photos and doing what they love. If all I wanted to do was shoot aircraft in the air then I’d be sitting outside the field as well, especially if funds were a little tight. I really do think some people need to lighten up a little and quit having a go at others for no real good reason. The thread starter has kindly shared his images with us and has had a ridiculous amount of crap thrown at him for absolutely no good reason beyond peoples’ personal peeves. Please take them elsewhere and leave us to appreciate the photos posted here.

Paul

P.S. Nice photos!

Photo based sites

Perhaps its a better idea like what you have done to send good shots to dedicated sites that deal with the image and the image alone.The photos such as mine are looking a bit like pop up shots in some moral computer game.

Seems like photos from the past where aircraft flew low towards the crowds and over them bring some warm nostalgic glow to those good old days without these crowds of ranters anywhere around.You wouldnt have heard a word 15 years ago when nobody said a word about the low flying at Biggin Hill as the photo opportunities there were brilliant and so was the flying.

What does get me is that on a daily basis large jet aircraft fly over massive housing estates in London and theres none of this lot of ranters up in arms at the peril of the homeowners who are sometimes just 75 feet below in danger of a jets fuel pipes freezing up at the last moment and then what happens.If we look at the ratio of continual flying 365 days a year compared to 6 afternoons a year and think that a few people in the way of a small aeroplane constitute a greater danger than an estate full of occupied houses constantly having airliners flying above them with hundreds of people on board then I give up.

The heart of the matter though is money and they think by destroying other peoples enjoyment it will solve the problem,they are wrong.There are lots of areas anyway around that particular site that afford good vantage points it just means I,ll have to buy a more powerfull lens.So unless the ranters get the whole area banned unless they are going into the show it wont stop me from getting that little bit different image.

Lets face it we all do it for a hobby to enjoy, as there are thousands who do it but only a handful who ever make any money or full time work from this activity why try and spoil something we enjoy.An aircraft in the air can be just as dangerous from the moment it takes off to the moment it lands.

Come to think of it I can recall more aircraft coming to grief or near miss after landing,Lanc,Fury,are 2 that I recall and these were both inside the airfield boundry.The lanc one as I recall made a lot of people jump out of some scaffolding erected to help photographers get better shots.Where were all the ranters then.:confused:

LOL not much diff between Robbie the broo and Mr.Burns really….”Excellent”!! no apology necessary.
Seriously though, it’s a shame your thread has descended into chaos (myself in the firing line for that too) I thought your shots are cracking, just don’t see how the process involved in garnering the shots should have any bearing here.
Come on people, if you can’t offer a word of praise/thanks or constructive criticism try saying nothing. No wonder some excellent photographers/contributors to the forums fall silent!

Quick ammendment

Big sorry to you Scotty for getting the important name of Robert the Bruce mixed up with Mr Burns in the last post.As we all should know it was Robert the Bruce and the spider in the cave.
This correction was more important than this subject.:);) Looks like the sheep are still fast asleep.

Well done

Good answer Scotty and well thought out.This thread is becoming a little like Robby Burns and the spider in the cave,and the spider managed to make good of the thread,web.
Thanks Again.JB.:)

Some fair comment there.Wyvern,and i am not familiar with the politics involved around the Duxford air show arrangements,if the land owner does not want people on his land, he has the right to remove them,of course,however, since “EH” was not moved on and was left to it then that appears a bit of a moot point? Indeed, were a tractor/farm machinery in the field at the time of (god forbid) an accident requiring a crash landing in the field, should Duxford demand the land owner to keep his land clear at all times? or traffic lights be installed on the M1 for use when aircraft are on finals? ludicrous i know. You correctly say that being near the end of a runway is a dangerous place to be,but, then anywhere around an airfield/airport is dangerous.. I would think a handful of people 60 feet below a landing aircraft less of a hazard to it than thousands of folk(incl. adventurous young children)being seperated from props/jet intakes by a few feet of grass and a temporary 3 foot high fence?
Air shows will ALWAYS have (as they’ve always had) people around the outside watching, in percentage terms under 1% of the crowd inside.
I just feel an injustice being done to “EH” here, as he says it’s his choice whether or not to pay in to a show (as evidently he did by his follow up shot from inside) Air shows will go on, and believe me if an air show was to cancel/end it certainly would have nothing to do with the lost revenue from a few people choosing not to go in. IMO of course.

What nonsense! What “risk” is someone putting themselves in by being in a farmers field (taking care not to destroy any crops) over the road?

Er.. no. Those who stand in that field, under or near the flight path of approaching aircraft are, believe it or not endagering not only themselves and the aircrafts crew, but also the very existence of flying at Dx.
I have it on very good authority that the airfield manager himself has repeatedly asked the landowner to give the Police permission to move said bystanders out of that field and, if they so wish, to other areas outside the airfields boundary.

Common sense will tell anyone that aircraft are at their most vulnerable when landing or taking off, and in any such emergency the last thing a pilot needs is a group of people standing right where he needs to put his machine down. You only have to look at the tragic case of Martin Sergeant, lost with his Spitfire in France due to bystanders in his flightpath which forced him to stay in the air longer than was necessary, leading to him stalling and crashing.
On top of that it was only last year that P51 ‘Miss Helen’ literally just made it onto the airfield at Dx after suffering power loss on approach.

If, heaven forbid, members of the public were injured or killed due to standing in that very spot when an emergency arose, do you really think that would do anything other than irretrievable damage to not only flying at Duxford but also at any other active airfield in this country?

Where you stand sir is your choice, but you need to be made very aware of the potential consequences of your actions.!

Thanks Scotty

It was good to read your post and have your support about my stand on this subject.At best youve at least seen what goes on down there scotty after having done a job there as you say.
Since an earlier part of this year Duxford came under the spotlight on another web forum and of course like a load of sheep in slumber once the word “Duxford”is mentioned they are all back on their feet and waiting for direction.My mother who was Scottish by the way used to say when i was being silly and irratating,”Away and play on the motorway”and wish she could tell this p.c lot with zelos where to go.:)

Anyway your point about the images was taken on board and many thanks for that.I have viewed both your sites and see you travel near and far to get your images and they are of a high standard,colourful and well constructed.By looking at them you must have had an idea what you were wanting to see in your frame before you got to the location/site.Many people who take photographs dont have this as an agenda before they set out but you will know the opposite of this as a must.
I wonder how many have followed in other peoples footsteps though who have paved the way to a good image,one springs to mind with all those jet airliners just feet away from a very small fence landing in some exotic location.Do you see them ranting on about this to the authorities over there saying you mustnt do that or theyll close the airport down,”No”. Thanks for telling me about Leuchars show and i look forward to viewing more of your work.
Just a last word though I wonder how much these people would think about their own safety if they were given passes to stand at the red and white vans at the piano keys or around and near them like we so often see sometimes,they still come close dont they.Would they refuse the back seat ride with the Red Arrows because they fly feet apart.If they really rant on too much theyll create a situation like they have in West Germany before anything happens.:confused:

The number of people who freeload at Duxford is getting rediculous and the IWM needs to act before it’s too late. You are not only putting yourself at risk, but potentailly the airshows themselves. So inconsiderate. 😡

What nonsense! What “risk” is someone putting themselves in by being in a farmers field (taking care not to destroy any crops) over the road?
Duxford pulls in a massive amount of revenue at the show each year from enthusiasts right down to the family day out,so, a few photographers who choose a better location for their art away from the hustle and bustle of a crowded airshow won’t have a huge impact on their profits (E.G: Anyone who goes to Leuchars air show specifically to take shots remain outside as the crowd line is south facing…but, Leuchars still manage to put on the airshow every year,and,weather dependant,fill the place)
Indeed i was working on a job in Cambridge on one of the Duxford show days this summer, and shot some participants that flew over me….should i have then jumped in my van,ran down to Duxford,bought a ticket,then return to my job?!!
If the organisers at air shows were more like you maybe they would erect a huge opaque dome around the air shows so that only the paying punter can see the show! ridiculous!!
Get of the OP’s back folk, he has shown some great shots… a credit to his art, that may not have been possible from any other location!:mad:

Yes I have sat out side an airshow and watched without paying, 1979 Weston Park was the last one when i was 11.

I have been to Fairford, Waddington, Old Warden, Little Gransden, Cosford, Duxford etc this year and the amount of people watching from outside is growing and no, do you really think that one person expressing an opinion against freeloaders would be listened to.

2 points if you wish

1, The Sabre pilot at one of the shows at Duxford, I think it was September called the tower to complain of people walking along the taxi way that had walked across the fields, caused him to be concerned, if he is saying there is a problem then it is an issue. If this person had been injured do you think the papers would report accurately?

2, by default of been on this forum i am an enthusiast and understand that most acts are brought in and not given freely, is it £10,000 for the Vulcan? Now if a thousand people sit outside (probably more at Cosford) who do not pay the entry fee, the show makes a loss and then is cancelled where do we go next?

I pay my money, it goes to the organisers, they make a profit, i go again. My choice. No air show, i dont go.

Thankyou

Thanks Darren,
For you support and because of this I,m going to give you a clue to what the answer might be ,I wonder if theyll be able to guess.As they say a picture paints a thousand words.
Cheers.:cool: look at them folk on the hill.:dev2:

The number of people who freeload at Duxford is getting rediculous and the IWM needs to act before it’s too late. You are not only putting yourself at risk, but potentailly the airshows themselves. So inconsiderate. 😡

Some images were up for people to look at and make critiscism about and in my book as an amateur photographer of all things aviation thats what I want them to focus on and not what I do in my affairs with money or time.

Well said, that man.

Morale Question

A good reply,but I,m not staggering around thinking about my reply.Hand on heart can you honestly tell me that you havent taken a photograph from over a fence,road or bush at an airshow without paying.

Give me your honest answer about this and I might think if its the truth or not like you think I,m not a fare paying showgoer.;)