Month: August 2009

I took a few days off from publishing and marketing the new book last week to go up to the Oshkosh AirVenture 2009 in Wisconsin. It was great to get away from all that is happening here. The weather was great, there were new friends to be made and all in all it was a great time. The largest commercial aircraft was at the show – The Airbus A380 double deck airliner. The new Virgin Atlantic VMS Eve, the aircraft designed to deliver the first commercial spaceship to orbit. The spaceship will be suspended between the two fuselages of VMS Eve as it fly’s to altitude before releasing the spaceship to ascend into orbit.

I spent time on detail images of many aircraft, some worked, some did not, but that is photography! The air show and flights of planes like the A380, VMS Eve and the big C5M made for great images. I hope I have captured the air dances which the aerobatic pilot’s performed over the skies of Wisconsin. The weather was perfect, giving us all wonderful clouds to work with as our backdrop. You had to anticipate the pilot’s moves to frame the planes against the clouds. With speeds in excess of 200 miles an hour thinking fast and a steady hand made for a great time creating images of the show.

Now it also makes me think about how being an aerobatic pilot is a lot like anything else, but especially publishing, and photography. You have to have a plan. The pilot knows his or her routine backwards and forwards. You can see them walk through it on the ground, their arms and hands doing the maneuvers as they walk the pattern out. They must also anticipate everything, from wind adjustments to variations in the place they actually end a maneuver to get back to show center. Nothing is left to chance. It must be the same way in publishing. Lead times are critical for book stores, event and media planning must be done months ahead, in order for you to have that same dance the pilots have in the sky. Only planning out ahead will give you your goal, whether publishing a book, making a photograph, or dancing in the sky.

 

To see more images use this link: http://www.mackphoto.com/blog/Oshkosh/

Enjoy!

Richard Mack