Wild Horses - The Mustang

 This particular P-51 Mustang has been in the Planes of Fame Museum's collection for several decades. I remember seeing it in the mid 1990's. They seem to take very good care of it as it still flys quite regularly. My close up view of the aircraft reveals her glossy smooth appearance.

One of the truly wonderful things about being retired is that I have the freedom to visit these museums during the week and avoid them during the weekends. This means I am typcially visiting during slow times and I don't run the risk of getting in the way of other visitors and vice versa. I just setup my tripod and take my shots. As usual I draw the attention of the museum docents who are typically curious about what I do with the photos. When I show them examples of aviation photos on my blog they typically show a little sign of recognition but don't say much other than "Looks like you "photoshopped" that photo". The truth is while I once used photoshop extensively, I rarely open the application these days. I injest the photos into Adobe Lighroom and use Luminar Neo to merge my exposures into one HDR image that I then occasionally lightly post proecess them back in Lightroom. 

The Passion and the Fury

During a recent visit to the Yanks Air Museum in Chino, California I had the opportunity to meet the general manger of the museum. Unlike most other visitors I often arouse some interest and frankly speaking some concern from facility managers. I think this is because unlike other visitors I typically show up with a tripod mounted camera which includes an external monitor and sunshade. Sometimes I have that tripod mounted on a rolling dolly as well. if this were not enough I often wear a camera vest with two more cameras hanging at the ready on my left and right sides. I also am pulling a rolling camera case with additonal lenses and extra batteries. As you can imagine, I in no way blend in or resemble the typical museum visitor. In fact, I tend to stand out quite a bit. 

I am quite used to museum managers approaching me and asking what I intend to do with the photos I take. As you can imagine, many of these museums want to control or at least be aware of the sale of any photos or videos taken on their property. Although I always pay my admission to any museum I visit, I understand this desire and have no issues with this. Paying admission does not grant me permission to ignore any rules put in place by the museum and I am not the guy who breaks the rules.

In any case, I met the general manager of the museum and had a couple of very nice conversations with her during my visit. I explained how I used the photos I take. I did feel compelled to discuss HDR photography and why I use this method. In brief, I want to capture the most detail I can including detail in both shadow and highlight areas and in additon, I want to control how much of the scene is in focus. Taking 9 images using a tripod gives me this ability. I showed her a couple of over exposed shots on my monitor and she could see so much detail on the FJ1 Fury aircraft shown below so I think I got my point across. She let me know that the museum would not want me taking photos on the property and then selling them. I understood this desire clearly and will comply. 

Most of the Yanks museum's exhibits are kept indoors and the lighting is good but not super bright. Given that I want to shoot in a manner that gives me significant depth-of-field I have to stop down my camera lens which of course limits the amount of light that enters the camera. This makes it impractical to hand hold the longer exposures which on this day were a long as 30 seconds. 

One happy note, I do still find that my techniques need improvement. This is typically most obvious when I return home and download photos to my computer and view them on my very large high resolution monitors. I note any shortcomings and make a plan to correct them. For this reason I am planning to return to Yanks next week to take better shots. 

I showed the general manager some images from my online blog of aircraft I have taken at the San Diego Air Museum, the USS Midway, and Gillespie Field. She expressed an interest in using some of the shots I took the day I visited. I sent her an email with a few shots taken at the Yanks Museum but have yet to hear back from her. I assume my email inadvertantly eneded up in her junk folder. 

It is definitely my passion for photography that compells me to lug around so much gear and on this day it brought me to the FJ-1 Fury aircraft on display at the Yanks Air Museum. 

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The 1946 FJ-1 Fury was the US Navy's first operational jet aircraft. Only 33 were ever built and only two survive today. Initially sporting a pair of unsept wings, the exploitation of captured German research into swept wing aerodynamics resulted in the follow on to the FJ-1, the swept wing FJ-2 aircraft. The aircraft's black paint makes it the perfect candidate for HDR photography as a single exposure will most likely leave that back paint appearing nearly featureless. You can see how much detail I was able to capture in this black paint using the HDR method.

A6 Intruder - Classic Design, Might Need Some Work

This is not the first time I have seen this Navy A6 Intruder aircraft. About 15 years ago, I was wandering around the Yanks Air Museum's "boneyard" in Chino California and came across two A6's . I photographed them then and posted them to my blog and my flickr photo stream.  This past March, I visited again and was somewhat surprised to find these same two aircraft still sitting there waiting their turn to be restored. My uninformed guess is that they will still be there 15 years from now. Aircraft restoration is a long process once it gets started and these aircraft show no signs that any restoration is in their near future.

Inside the Discovery Cube

This past March my neice, her daughter, and boyfriend stopped by to visit me just prior to a beginning a trip to Disneyland. Since they were celebrating her daughter's birthday we decided to visit the discovery cube science museum in Santa Ana California. I purchased tickets in advance so we wouldn't have to wait in line to enter. The museum had lots of interesting and engaging exhibits and I of course was carrying around my camera, well two cameras to be accurate. I think I was one of the only visitors carrying a real digital camera that day. Most people were using their cell phone camera. At one point we visited an exhibit about rockets which illustrated how rocket propulsion worked in relation to payload and fuel. This exhibit was located inside a giant cube which is the museum's most recognizable architectural feature. As we walked in, I looked up at the giant cube soaring above me and immediately decided to take a series of HDR sequences to later stitch together into a big panorama. At the center of the cube was what looked like a real rocket engine.

 

San Diego Air and Space Museum

San Diego has had something for more than 70 years that I have often wished Los Angeles had. A dedicated and comprehensive Air and Space Museum. San Diego has been the site of significant aviation milestones and events. In addition to being considered the home of naval aviation, it also was home to Ryan aircraft which was probably best known for helping to design and build the Spirit of St. Louis for Charles Lindberg's solo trans-Atlantic flight. 

Los Angeles also has a long history of participation in aviation and space flight. Lockheed's Skunk Works developed the first jet fighter, the first stealth aircraft, and the fastest manned aircraft. The North American company developed the Apollo command and service modules that took the first men to the moon as well as the space shuttle. McDonnell Douglas both designed and built passenger airliners in Los Angeles County for decades. 

Despite this impressive history, Los Angeles has never had a comprehensive air and space museum. There was once a small museum, but the exhibits were merged into a much larger science center. It seems the desire for a dedicated museum does not currently exist. The California Science Center is building a museum extension to house its collection of aircraft and spacecraft including the Space Shuttle Endeavour. It will probably be many years until this extension will open to the public.

For this reason and others, I love visiting the San Diego Museum. The entrance features two aircraft. The Convair F2Y Sea Dart and the A12 Mach 3+ spy plane. There are many additional aircraft and spacecraft exhibits inside. I have added several photos of these below. 

 

 

More than Zero

The photo below is of the world’s only authentic flying A6M5 Zero fighter.

Designed and built by Mitsubishi in Japan during World War II, it dominated the skies anywhere it flew. It dispatched most American built fighters it encountered in battle brutally and quickly. So much so, that the United States began a deliberate effort to develop aircraft and tactics that could blunt this highly effective weapon. At the start of the war, the American P-39 was one of the best aircraft it had to deal with the threat, and it was no match. Japanese Zero pilots quickly learned that the P-39 could not climb with them and used their aircraft’s superior high-altitude performance to their advantage in defeating the P-39 on many occasions.

The secret of the Zero's stellar performance was due in part to its well trained and battle proven pilots as well as it’s lightweight construction. Unlike other fighters of the period, it completely lacked armor protection for the pilot and the fuel tanks. a fact that US fighter pilots found out when they fired incendiary bullets at the zero causing it to quicky catch fire and blow up in midair. 

Many years ago, as a volunteer docent at the Planes of Fame Museum in Chino, California, I had the great honor of showing a group of former Japanese Zero pilots this very aircraft. I would guess most of them were in their 80’s at the time and had traveled to the museum specifically to see the aircraft. It was my understanding that for most of them, this was their first opportunity to see a Zero since the end of the war. Upon entering the hanger which housed the aircraft, without exception they all began to cry and tried to hide their emotional response from one another by wandering off between the other aircraft in the hanger until they could compose themselves. It was a very emotional day. I always find it heartbreaking to see an old person cry. I admit I had to compose myself as well. After a few minutes they all gathered around the aircraft once more and suddenly began shouting a salute to the aircraft in unison. When they were informed that the aircraft would be flown for them that day there were more tears and many more during the Zero's triumphant return to the skies overhead.

I would imagine with so many years now having gone by since that emotional day, most if not all these men have passed away and most probably there are no longer any living memories of flying the Zero during World War II.

This specific aircraft was captured by the US Marines on June 18, 1944. It was returned to San Diego where it was evaluated, and test flown by many pilots including Charles A Lindberg. Eventually it was declared surplus after the war and was scheduled to be destroyed but the Museum acquired it in 1950 and restored it to flight status in 1978.

It has made several good will tours of Japan where it was displayed and flew for huge crowds all over the country, becoming the first Zero to do so since the end of the war.

Run Silent, Run Deep

During our recent trip to Chicago, Kathy and I visited the Science and Industry Museum. While I had wanted to go to the museum on prior trips, this was my first visit. In my planning for our vacation, my research revealed that the museum had a World War II era German U-boat submarine in their collection including the sub's enigma cipher machine which enabled it to communicate securely with the German Wehrmacht Kriegsmarine headquarters in Berlin. The captured sub also included a full complement of 22 torpedoes. If this were not enough, the museum has created a submarine pen resembling those built by the Nazi's in France at Saint-Nazaire. The photo below does not do justice and cannot convey the scope and scale of this world-class exhibit. The sub itself is about 250 feet long while the pen is longer than the length of a football field. Enormous! We purchased a timed ticket to tour the interior of the sub which was very interesting. The crowded interior was somewhat unexpected given how huge the exterior appears to be. This panoramic image is comprised of 3 sets of 9 HDR sequences for a total of 27 individual images. I want to return and try to find a way to shoot with my gorillapod since tripods are verboten!

Stanley Field Hall

Kathy and I spent a couple of weeks in Chicago this past October for our annual fall vacation. As I will explain in another post, it was an eventful trip - but on the day we visited the Field Museum everything was still ok. We arrived before the museum opened and I think we were the first guests through the main entrance. I asked Kathy if she would mind if we went directly to the dinosaur hall so I could take a bunch of HDR photos before those exhibits were flooded with other visitors. As usual she agreed to put up with my nonsense. We were given a map to follow, and we quickly ascended to the upper level of the museum, gained our bearings, found the right door, and wound our way through the huge Griffen Halls of the Evolving Planet exhibit, a 27,000 square foot space. We rushed past a lot of very interesting things that I hoped we would have time to return to later that day. We arrived in the dinosaur hall to find it completely empty of other museum visitors. Mission accomplished! There was only a technician servicing the Mold-O-Rama machine. I did end up getting some great images as I had hoped. This even though I was shooting without a tripod. I'll post some of those photos as well. Once finished with the dinosaur hall and it not yet being time for lunch, we decided to walk over to the other wing of the museum, passing thru the Stanley Field hall, a spectacular space with white marble walls, vaulted ceilings, and columns that run along its full length. It also contains two huge dinosaur specimens. The Maximo Titanosaur that must have shaken the ground when it walked and the Spinosaurus which is believed to have hunted underwater and is depicted in a swimming pose. There is so much to see in this enormous world-class museum. We have never been able to see everything in a single day. I am already looking forward to our next visit!

Stanley Field Hall

Maximo the Titanosaur

The Spinosaurus

San Diego Air and Space Museum's Scooter

Here is another flawlessly restored A-4 Skyhawk. This one is wearing the the livery of the USS Hancock's attack squadron 212, aircraft 302 which was once piloted by commander Frank C. Green who was lost over North Vietnam on July 10, 1972 during an armed recon mission. He was listed as missing in action until 2008 when his remains were recovered. He was interred at Miramar National Cemetery in 2010.

The USS Midway's Scooter

The Douglas A-4 Skyhawk was a very versatile aircraft. Originally designed as a nuclear bomber, this aircraft was able to fly from many smaller world war II aircraft carriers due to it's small size. It fulfilled many roles including air-to-air refuler, light attack, and even filled the agressor aircraft role for Top Gun. The US Navy Blue Angels flew it due to it's nimble performance and ease of maintenance. This small reliable aircraft quickly earned the nickname Scooter.