We were out in Tucson Arizona visiting our Air Force son last week. It's hard for me to resist spending a day at the Pima Air museum. My wife and I put in an 8 hour day poking around the museum. We get there early and spend the first few hours outside in the expansive yard which has a couple of hundred planes. Afternoon temperatures hover near 100, but by this time we've finished our out door excursion and we go into the several indoor hangers to cool off.
I can't emphasize enough what a great museum this is, both because of the extensive plane collection and because of the people who volunteer at the museum ( it's actually two seperate museums as there is a B-17 bomber group here who keep their own seperate collection here ). Most of the volunteers are veterans/ex-military folks, many of whom flew/worked on the aircraft. They are a treasure trove of information and stories, and this also becomes a big part of our visit. Last May we speak extensively with a 92 year old vet who is replete with WWII stories. Sadly, he has passed away, so our conversation with him is more cherished.
This trip, we chat with an 88 year old B-17 pilot who is a member of the bomber group museum here. He's written a book about his flying, and I quite naturally get a copy which he happily autographs for me. Lots of stories and insights about this specific bomber group. For those of you who are history buffs, get out to Tucson and visit the Pima museum as it's about both the planes and the aging volunteers who make it so much more meaningful, especially during our Memorial Day visit.
So as you can guess, I sitting home here parsing through a weeks worth of photography from museum and the environs around Tucson. I post here a few photos from the Pima Air museum.
One of the problems of photographing a museum like Pima is the sheer size of the subjects. Some of these planes are huge and you've got to step way back to capture their scope and size. This ends up placing your plane against a background in which it can get lost. While I'm post processing some images I try a technique by which I select the subject plane and I do my normal sharpening ( I'm still working with JPGs and work only on occassion with RAW ). Then I invert my selection and I either partially desaturate the BG or I render the BG in B&W. The results are in these few photos here. I think that this is a nice technique for certain subjects which gives them more dimensionality and emphasizes their presence.
Anyone with Photoshop or Photoshop Elements and any size Wacom tablet can easily make the selections and conversions.
This image is of the B-36 J Bomber which was American intercontental bomber from 1948 thru 1959. It's a huge aircraft, but also absolutely beautiful with 6 props and 4 jet engines.
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This is a very rare plane. The Columbia XJ1. Intended to replace a Navy bi-plane, only three of these were ever built as the design turns out to be a dud. Two of these test planes were purchased by an aircraft engineer ( for $420 ) & he works to restore them until he dies in 1955. This specific plane was later sold to another man by his widow who insists that this plane had to fly at least one time. The plane flew to Chicago & had 3 other owners before it was loaned to the Pima museum in 1987 and it is finally donated to the museum in 2000.
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Another shot of the B-36 J . Working in direct sun requires one to adjust their EV setting ( +1/3 to + 2/3 ) to get the right shade exposure on the wings. And was getting HOT by this time. My wife and I hide beneath the shade of the wings of the big bombers. And I'm always keeping my camera on my hip to shadow it from the intense sun.
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This is a B-58 Hustler, the world's first delta wing bomber. They use cutting edge technology to figure out how to make a mach 2 plane that can fly at 70,000 feet or at low altitude to drop nukes and accelerate and climb away fast. Lots of problems whenever one designs an entirely new concept plane. 26% of the B-58s built ended up crashing as they work out issues with the design ( the higher and faster your fly, the hotter the wings get and new engineering techniques are needed, and multiple changes by the AF in the design/mission requirements create a myriad of problems with low altitude flight and landing gear configurations ).
All I know is that it is a beautiful aircraft when you walk around it. And it is from this plane that America learns to build the next generation of supersonic planes with new materials that lead to the SR-71 and the principles which lead to the composite materials which withstand heat and provide stealth
I hope that everyone enjoys the photos and the technique to emphasize the plane against its surroundings.
Lots of photo work remains, so I'll report back as I make more progress.
Barry
