Aviation Photography – Where Did It Start For You?

Growing up between Kinloss and Lossiemouth, aircraft feature heavily in the earliest memories of my friends and I. This is my first aviation photo, taken around 1968, of two Keflavik-based Convair F-102A Delta Daggers (56-1447 and 56-1419) of the 57th Fighter (Interceptor) Sqn, frequent visitors to RNAS Lossiemouth…

I have always enjoyed taking photos of aircraft since I was given a camera for my 13th birthday and used it to take some photos when we flew up to Iceland.

I think I got into it more seriously when I got my first digital camera in 2004, I really made it crack on an afternoon at BHX when we were having a trip to BRU early in that year!

Now when we fly anywhere I like to get as many photos (and also videos) as I can, as flying on holiday is generally the only time I get to go to an airport. I have found MAN, BHX, LCY, NCL and EMA good for photography from the departure lounge, BRU can be a little difficult owing to the positions of the airbridges which often block out good views of the aircraft.

Airliners are my favourite subjects, any type of airliner and any livery, but I did like bagging the BA World Tails when I saw them.

I use a Kodak compact camera, which suits me well, it is easy to carry along with my video equipment and takes decent shots. I would love to give an SLR a try one day though.

There are some great photos in this topic, brings back some memories 😀

HP81 – you are so lucky to have that beauty in your photo collection. That is one plane I wish I could have photographed!

Those shots of Manchester brought back good memories when you could walk along the terraces within feet of the aircraft,shame those days have gone.I think the only time we were shifted was when either the Aer Lingus or El Al flights came in.

An interesting thread Paul & it looks like you got off to flying start, those photo’s are very respectable.
I cannot say the same for myself, I have always been more enthusiastic than capable. It started in the early 70’s when I borrowed my Dads Brownie & cycled down to Stansted to watch the likes of Channel A/W & Lloyd International, I was then given a Kodak Instamatic of my own! & snapped away until progressing to 35mm in 1978 & finally an SLR in 1980, I didn’t go digital until 2006 & I am just about to get an Olympus e-620 for the new decade.
Here is the very first effort & an early instamatic shot followed by one of the latest albeit taken through glass.

My serious interest in aircraft began sometime in 1977 with the logging of registrations and my photographing of aircraft started at the very
beginning of the 1980’s. My first 35mm camera was a Miranda (an original Japanese manufactured model, not the variant marketed by, I think,
Dixons some decade or so later). I still have this camera, stored in a shoe box for posterity!
In subsequent years I have had a variety of 35mm film cameras including manual focus Minoltas (X-GM & X-700), and auto focus Canons (EOS500 &
500N).
In 2004 I bought my first digital camera – a Konica Milnolta Z1 – which I used in tandem with my 35mm film cameras until Agfa withdrew from the slide
film market. I decided then to convert totally to digital and bought myself a Canon EOS350D, and some time later upgraded to an EOS400D.
With the temptation to try other manufactures wares – and the usefulness of eBay! – last year I changed my ‘kit’ and now use a Nikon D80. Very recently
temptation got the better of me again and I bought into Pentax – a K10D – which I have yet to put through it’s paces, so only time will tell how I rate my
latest DSLR.
Anyway, enough of my ‘hobby history’ and on to the few images that I have uploaded to accompany my post. I am the first to admit that they pale in
comparison to the quality of most of the images that are regularly uploaded to this Forum. My only defence is that they are scanned images of original
slides which date back almost 30 years, and it is well known that 35mm transparencies degrade over time, and added to which, I still haven’t quite
mastered the art of scanning anyway.
Thank you for looking,
Regards to all,
Peter

PH-DNL DC-9-32 Manchester May 1981

N1035F DC-10-30CF Manchester June 1981

N741TV B747-271C Manchester May 1981

C-GXRC DC-10-30 Manchester May 1981

9H-AAK B720-047B Manchester July 1981

N915WA DC-10-10 Gatwick May 1981

G-BFCD TriStar 500 Gatwick May 1981

The aviation interest/hobby has been life long,natural progression was to photography when i could afford a proper SLR camera,a film Nikon F55 in 2004.Bought a fuji S5600 in 2007 & quite quickly gained some good skills going to a Nikon D50 in summer 07,I was very happy to acquire a Nikon D80 in spring 08,the quality of my lens wasnt what i liked (sigam 70-300mm),so completed my final jigsaw piece in terms of quality by getting a sigma 70-200 F2.8 in summer 08,since then ive been fine tuning my skills,so ive posted a comparison of my 1st digi stuff to my most recent:

to a Fuji S5500 (which I also still have!) 4 megapixels and a 10x optical zoom seemed like heaven to me at the time.

I too had this camera at one point, before finally upgrading to the Canon EOS 400D at the end of 2007.

Aviation photography began for me in September 2003 when I arranged to meet with Andrew (A330Crazy) for the first time at Heathrow. Not holding a driving licence at the time and never having used public transport to the airport before, I travelled from my home in Reading, all the way into London, and then sat on the tube all the way back to Hatton Cross – a journey of more than 2 hours! Eventually, I met up with Andrew and we spent much of the day at Hatton Cross, snapping away. Of course, the results were not fantastic – what do you expect with a cheap camera? – but I was pleased enough with them, and even managed to get a handful onto JetPhotos.net. For somebody new to aircraft photography, this is quite an achievement, and when the first shot is accepted, you want to keep going!

In the six and a half years since my first proper trip to Heathrow, I’ve been back again many times, and further afield, too, including up to Manchester for the forum meet back in August 2005, the Paris air show, Zürich, Glasgow, Dublin and Malta.

Unfortunately, having been overseas for a little over a year now, the trips to Heathrow have not been happening, but I am looking forward to getting back next month and picking up where I left off.

Hi Paul
Quite an interesting idea!
For me it started with a different hobby……train spotting in about 1955 which had a different “image” back then.Virtually nobody could afford a camera and it was all about collecting numbers…..preferably ones your mates hadn’t seen and were jealous of!
Got into aircraft for a few years around 1960/62 then interest waned ’til my first flight in 1969 on a Bristol Britannia
Around 1980 I felt I could not “spot” every aircraft and that I’d rather get a photographic record of what I COULD see.It’s still the “collecting” thing to me though.A camera is rather like a spade i.e. you don’t need one if you haven’t a garden.In my case I wouldn’t have an interest in photography if I weren’t ‘graphing a/c and it’s still about the buzz of competing for the unexpected catch to tell others about.
I’m not really interested in photographing the mundane over and over again or in looking at other’s results in that category.
I do lots of trips,previously with very poor film equipment but post-digital with Canon 400d’s and decent lenses…also Leica and Panasonic “bridge” cameras and am experimenting with used Pentax DSLRs.The mission is to “cop” the unexpected and it’s more often than not in vain.
Here are but 2 exceptions and one (the Yak) is one of my favourite pictures regardless of the subject a/c.
Yak was very unexpected at Bergamo in 2007 and was gobsmacked to see a 707 (last time I saw one fly) at Salzburg in the same year

Best regards to all
Barry

The interest in the hobby started september 1994. At the time there where not enough of customs and military police to guard all seaports and airports (this was of course pre-Schengen). My dad was a police officer, and every 3 or 4 years he’d be stationed at a large port of entry for half a year.

The port of entry he got assigned was Schiphol. At the end of his tour of duty he gave the full family a guided tour. We’ve been all over Schiphol: the maintenance hangars, a trip inside a 742 at the hangar (including cockpit!), aprons, runways… with the exception of the tower which was off limit even for police I got the full works.

It then took several more years before I got to the airport again. I was too young to go alone, and my dad had had his share of Schiphol and did not want to go back. When I went to college in 1999 I got the student travel card, unlimited train use on weekdays, so I got to Schiphol a lot more.

In 2003 I got my first digital camera, a Sony F717. Here are my first digital shots:

I know there are guys here who’ve been shooting longer than I’ve been alive 🙂

Paul

Would you believe 1956 with a box brownie..i’ll have to dig ’em out and try and scan them 😉