Duxford Spits - 'Two's better than one!'

Final offering in the Duxford Spits images. Thanks to Jim, Duncan

also for some of the better pics. Your comments appreciated.

Yep... still hating you :) I will get my better half to take some shots of me right now on some Velvia so that you can see exactly what shade of over-saturated green I am:)

 

Jokes aside, I love the XVI and the V heading off into the distance the most, but all of them are lovely of course!

The British are also lucky in that they never have to deal with the harsh shadows caused by direct sunlight, aren't they? Pat, just so you know what I'm talking about, there is actually a big ball of fire above those clouds which we have to deal with at North American airshows.

August, I just had a complete Fawlty Towers flash back!:)

August, I saw that fiery ball once. Didn't like it. Caused too many harsh shadows :-)

 

Pat, nice set of pics. I'm unsure about the ones where one Spit obscures another, it causes a terrible conflict in my head to whether I prefer clean lines or not. I mean, I like the images, but would I prefer clean lines?

 

Discuss.

Thanks for your comments - will discuss sun and shadows when it comes back up here, right now at this latitude it gets to 10-11 degs above the horizon at midday and poses few problems (and damn little heat!).

 

Alex, have to take the iamges as they come for this series as all are 'as shot' - no composites. I hesitated about the top left one but didn't have another decent 'pair' so included it anyway. The bottom right image works, I think as the essential outline of the furthest Spit is not lost. However, if I had been doing composites then I would probably have kept them apart - although there is a dramatic edge to be gained if you use a 'welded' image. Have a look at a couple of pics in the Formation gallery and compare the Arrows with the Snowbirds for impact (perhaps not the most apposite term to use there!) Pat

 

PS Formation gallery going up this evening.

Well, one argument for overlapping is that a major problem with long-lens ground-to-air pictures is they are usually two-dimensional. Especially the classic pic of a single airplane against a uniform blue sky. The long lens compresses the plane so it looks flat, and the sky provides no depth cues, so there is no sense of depth at all -- especially in the direct backlit or overhead sunlight that the great mass of airshow photographers prefer. Clouds in the sky help to add depth; so does soft or oblique lighting; and so does any terrain that you can get in the pic. But the presence of two or more overlapping aircraft probably helps more than any of these.

 

Clean lines have obvious virtues also, but I wouldn't make a rigid rule out of it. It sounds like one of those oft-repeated "principles" of aviation photography that seem to be geared toward spotters, serial number collectors, and slide traders rather than creative photographers.

 

August, good point about it adding depth. There's definitely some cases where it works, and Pat's bottom-right shot is a good example. I'm still having issues with the top-left one though - but don't get me wrong, Pat - I like it!!

 

August, Alex, Peter. You are both quite right about the need for some 'prop' for the eye when presenting an aircraft shot - one reason why I have gone so often to composites, even for fairly simple 'airshow' type shots. It is also necessary when selecting a background for an image to try and match the lens used - ie shoot your nice cloud formations with a 300mm lens, at f16 or tighter, to afford a comparable image sense.

 

Just posted such a shot with fairly simple P51 image(s) placed on a better (than Duxford) sky. Have a look (Classic gallery) and see what you think. Sorry, Peter, starting to run out of Spit pics - still some left for another day tho', you'll have to make do with the P51s. Have some 37 classic types in the archive tho' - pick another favourite and I will see what I can do!! Pat.