I finally completed processing my photos of the Rockford Airfest (Airshow) 2011. Any photographer will tell you that airshows require special care to avoid mounds of extra effort in post processing. This is primarily due to sensor dust and variation of exposure depending on the direction you are taking a photo. Even with new camera bodies that have dust removal mechanisms, it still isn’t enough to avoid the issue due to the extreme nature of photographing distant objects on bright skies.
I have a few basic tools to remove dust and attempted to clean my sensor as well as possible before the event, but I wasn’t completely successful at keeping the sensor completely dust free. The second issue was that my K-5 was having issues, which lead me to re-seat the lens a few times as I was trying to diagnose the issue. That meant even more dust would get into the camera body. The final issue was that while putting spray-type sunscreen on my arms, I managed to get speckles on my DA* 300mm’s UV filter and wasn’t smart enough at the time to remove them because them seemed pretty insignificant. I had a microfiber cloth with me, so I should have in retrospect…
Here are a few highlight images from the event:
A 22 degree halo was visible for quite a few minutes at the show this year. Taken with the K-7 and 14mm f2.8 lens.
Smoke trails and sharp turns make great photos.
One of the close ups (or a crop, that I can’t remember at the moment):
Probably not called “cosplay” in this situation, but there were a few super heros at the event:
A nice wide “dutch” angle shot:
There is something about that Oracle plane that results in sharp high contrast (auto contrast setting in Photoshop):
One of the many parachutists at the event:
Smoke trails and stunts together:
