Author: Editor

Three photo trips now done, more editing carried out, desired word count within touching distance, and one more museum to visit to complete what’s needed for Volume 1.

That the final museum is in London, which means a train as there’s no way I’d drive there,  not that I’m driving far after the last photo shoot as the car came back making a nasty noise which I correctly identified as a wheel bearing.  I may have the engineering skills to do the job, but lack the relevant tools to actually get the bearing out, but critically, a garage with adequate space to get a modern car into, let alone a flat drive way and favourable weather.  So pay through the nose it is as the main dealer was the only place able to do it.  There goes a new lens….

You’d have thought museums would be happy to help people essentially give them free publicity by including their exhibits in books?  Certainly the RAF Museum has no problems allowing photography for this, yet others want a donation, on top of you paying to get in.  If they all asked for a donation, the only people making anything out of this project would be them and the publishers and it certainly makes you think twice about bothering.  Note to self, take photos first and let them ask questions later.  As for answering email when the relevant address is posted on a website, I can appreciate some places are run on a shoe string so you might get delays, but if the big boys can’t be bothered to reply, what chance does anyone stand?

The hardest part in putting my book together has been identifying if  a prototype aircraft for a type that entered service still exists and if so where.  This primarily because I can guarantee some bright, anorak wearing, soul will come calling once it’s published and say “there’s one here”.  Part of me says, it’s my book and I’ll include what I want, the other part says if I’m doing the job, it’s done properly and I include everything.  Consequently I now need another trip “down south” to take photos of something mounted on a plinth! Hopefully this will be another work assisted trip, doing a job that needs doing while putting me near enough to get photos.  We shall see.

A few weeks into getting used to the new camera and I’m probably not alone in thinking “Did I need it?” or “Have I done the right thing?”, commonly known as upgraders remorse.

In terms of camera kit, I’ve done a system change a couple of times over the years, once back in the days of film I switched form Olympus to Canon when auto-focus first arrived and Olympus simply didn’t produce a conventional auto-focus 35mm SLR camera and I was really happy making the change.  When digital arrived, I was fine as my Canon EF lenses fitted the new digital bodies and it was 20 years all tolled before I did another complete switch and moved to Olympus again to use the new micro four thirds series. Switching back to Olympus I was delighted with what I’d done, loved the new kit and the results it gave me, lighter and smaller kit meant I could easily take it on holiday in cabin luggage when needed, a great results.

This time, it’s not quite gone as expected and it may take a little while to fully appreciate I’ve made the right choice. It’s not the “why I’ve swapped again” bit, the new camera does exactly what I wanted it to do, the results are stunning and my reasoning has been vindicated. It’s the realisation that it will take a good while to build a kit up to the equivalent of what I had,  mainly because I’ve stepped up into the big league and there’s a price to pay!  Aside form a couple of additional lenses,  I’ll even end up having to buy a new set of bigger filters should I want them for landscape shots to avoid vignetting, I’ve no flash gun of any sort, so at some point one of those will doubtless be needed and of all things, more memory cards to hold the larger files it produces.  Talk about first world problems.

Here’s a comparison of why I switched to a full frame camera from Micro 4/3.  Although it’s got some natural light coming in from the side, the actual light level in the building were pretty poor.  This is taken at 10000 ISO and my Olympus would have been really struggling.

 

This is with my Micro 4/3 camera, same aperture, f8, a fraction faster shutter speed and 6400 ISO.  Click on either to see what I mean.

I managed to chalk off another trip to an air museum this weekend, the relatively short hop for me to Newark.  With a good collection of aircraft, both indoors and out, along with an interesting number of engines as well.

Also a first trip out with the new Nikon Z5 and I’m pleased to say it passed with flying colours.  It’s quite unnerving when shooting indoors in less than ideal light and you know you’ve set it to auto ISO, but you’re still surprised to see the viewfinder saying 12800 ISO and the photo is better than some you’ve taken one your old camera at 6400 ISO.  Definitely bought for the right reasons.

Having been to Newark before, I knew what to expect, aside from the roundabouts at the  junction to and from the A1 which are always a nightmare.  The museum itself doesn’t really have any of the aircraft types I’m most interested in, but it does have a number of others which provide excellent background and input to the “stories”.

However, what the museum does have are a large number of well maintained aircraft and helicopters, a number of which you won’t see anywhere else and some you can see elsewhere are in vastly better condition.  Since my last trip, it’s obvious a number of the aircraft displayed outdoors have had work done to  preserve them and a new coat of paint; the MiG-27 and Lightning T5 especially.

Out of all the photos I took at Newark, the forlorn looking remains of the surviving Avro Ashton is my favourite, rather sums everything up.

Next stop…no idea.  To get volume 1 out, I need another visit to the RAF museum at Cosford as a minimum and that’s a full day as it’s a lot of aircraft and a five hour round trip.

The deed is done, after 10 great years using an Olympus micro 4/3 camera and some excellent Zuiko lenses, I finally decided I needed to move on.  So via trade in at my favourite local camera emporium and a few bits sold to a fellow Olympus user, I’ve bought into the full frame mirrorless age and gone over to Nikon in the shape of a Z5.

It’s odd only having one lens to use, though how long that stays true is another matter.  But the one I have will do the job I need to do, whilst the camera will take grain free photos in lighting conditions that would have left my E-M5 floundering.

There’s a definite learning curve involved in moving systems, mainly getting used to the menus and what button does what, but for the minute I’ll settle for not catching the on/off lever at inopportune moments….

I’m not quite Olympus-less, I still have a 35mm Trip that I restored and a TG-5 Tough should I wish to swim with a camera or such like, but they can’t do photos like this this either.