Friday, Saturday, and Sunday I was over in Ephrata, Washington to do some photo/video work for an aerobatic contest that my local chapter was hosting and was able to get some really great shots! It was an incredible experience, having been my very first aerobatic contest. I was able to meet so many really great pilots, all of which gave me many words of advice and encouragement. Not to mention being surrounded by all of those sexy airplanes. I was going crazy with my camera and (new) digital camcorder. I was not able to fly for this contest, but will try to be ready for the next one in June.
I arrived at about 10:00 AM Friday morning as the first round of flights was just about half over. The weather was pretty bad, 30-40kt winds and rain. I didn't think they'd still fly in weather like that, but they did! It was quite entertaining to watch the pilots constantly drift out of the south border of the aerobatc box. Even the unlimited pilots were getting a lot of "outs" due to the strong wind. The best part, however, was when a Stearman flying the Sportsman sequence ended up flying BACKWARDS (with reference to the ground) on the top of his loop. Poor chap, that's a zero for that maneuver! lol Anyway, we did end up calling it quits early.
Saturday was quite another story, however. Beautiful sunshine and only a light breeze to keep you cool in the desert air. It was a cram session as we had 64 flights to get through as every catagory has three flights to do, plus the 4-minute free with the unlimiteds, and all of the unknown sequences.
For the morning flights 8:00AM - 12:20 PM, I was over by the judges photographing all of the competitors as they took off and headed for the box. The sun was facing the flightline which resulted in some challenges, but by going out to where the judges were ( just on the other side of the runway) I was able to have the sun to my back for the takeoff pics.
I took a quick break after finishing up the morning flights on Saturday at the judges line to go pick myself up a digital camcorder, a little Samsung MX10. Great little camera, and it's perfect for my needs! (only 2 needs, posting on Youtube, and easy to fit in a pocket!) I'm ordering a 0.45X wide angle lens adapter for it so I can get some good shots from inside an airplane next time.
Anyway, I shot just over 2,000 pictures over about a day and a half of flying, just finished the shots I had from Friday. Out of 294 that day 27 were to my standards. lol But that's actually pretty decent. (However, they are not up yet, I still need to go through the rest of the pics before I upload them)
But enough of that technical talk, here's the video:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i6Dg0DBlnpQ
Enjoy, everybody!
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