Last March, I did as I suggested, looked in hangars during the depths of winter to see what summer projects I could create for my camera. Rod’s PT-22 was just about to have its engine hung, and plans were made, once he got comfortable in his new aircraft to do an A2A. I was incredibly excited and started to make plans. Now here’s the caveat to this whole idea. One has gotta follow through with those plans! I find that life can get in the way of life. For the first month, we couldn’t get calendars to sync. Then the next month, we simply didn’t try because we were both too busy. Then Rod got busy with another aircraft and well, shinny, shinny, shinny. So, here it is almost a year later and we’re still planning that A2A. While that’s OK, I really want those images. When sticking your head in the hangars seeking those projects, keep this in mind. You gotta have time in the future now when you head inside when it’s cold.

The wings get in the way at times is putting it mildly. There they are all lined up, the light is sweet and the color popping, a group of aircraft like this, Speedmail and friends. If you go with a wide angle lens to get them all included and you end up with way too much space around them, and they turn out to be small in the frame. In this scenario, I like to go long, like 400mm, and then go to the side to compact the aircraft. Lastly, I don’t worry about cropping into the back of the fuselage. Most know there is a tail, so the mind kinda fills it in. In that way, you say the gangs are all here.

There is an old saying in wildlife photography, Don’t photograph a bird in flight against a gray sky. It has to do with “gray day” feelings and the range of light. I heard the C-5 long before I saw it. Once I saw it and those skies, I thought I would make any clicks, but I tracked in with the Z600f4TC for simple panning practice. Then the light struck the fuselage, and I let the shutter rip. Now, I look for that opportunity, whenever I can do gray on gray.

It’s actually pretty simple, walk into a hangar and photograph a plane. And it is for the most part taking into consideration a couple of things. The biggest is light. Hangars have overhead lights, which may or may not be nice light for a portrait. You can add to that, even overpower it, with the light coming in from the hangar doors. Here is the biggest trick to the hangar portrait, how far open or closed are the hangar doors to be? You can make the change. That’s a lot easier than changing a bad background. If you have an unwanted background, use exposure to make it disappear. Close the hangar doors to limit the light on the background if need be. If you have an immaculate hangar like the one above, it’s like walking into a studio with a white sweep for a portrait. After that, it’s all up to you to make the most of the hangar portrait.

The summer is when lots of flying is done. It makes winter an important time to catch up on needed repairs and get ready for when the weather warms up. An important part of maintenance is testing, and this often requires a flight or two. You’d be surprised how many of my A2A photo missions are maintenance flights. If you stuck your head into folk’s hangars who fly the airshow circuit, you’d be surprised by the photos you would come back with simply asking if they are doing any maintenance flights. It’s one of those things, just show up, it’s maintenance flight time.

It was a beautiful afternoon at Rainbow Ranch! We had a picnic lunch sitting outside, able to to just stare at this gorgeous, red Staggerwing. And behind it, a beautiful bluebird blue sky bald as could be. Argh. The light was hard, the sky boring, so I sat and enjoyed the killer lunch. Then the wind picked up, a mad scramble to hold down the contents of the picnic. As we moved the picnic to the safety of inside the hangar, I walked around and looked to the southwest. There on the horizon coming our direction were some clouds. It didn’t really take long to arrive, a sandwich and homemade ice cream were all, and they started to fill in. There weren’t many so I sat there ready to click. Then a cloud came in front of the sun and I jumped! It just took a picnic, a little time and luck to make the click. And the clouds for the save!