Salthill Airshow 2007

It's been a while since this has happened but it was definitely one of my favourite photography outings of the year, with probably the best haul of decent photos in one day I've ever had. - I probably wouldn't have enjoyed if it wasn't for the opportunity to take photos, not for moral reasons or anything like that, it's just that the spectacle seemed surprisingly mundane despite the best efforts of the obviously talented performers. Even though I've always been delighted by such things as planes and other boy-in-man's-body sort of stuff, I found myself strangely bored and unmoved by the display. Still though, taking photos was hugely enjoyable; another re-affirmation of the reasons why I photograph and why I'm continually interested and enjoy it. (Well that sentence was a bit of a meal, wasn't it?)
I was worried about the performance of my humble camera - I've tried to take pictures of fast-moving subjects in the air before this (mainly birds), and to say that the results were underwhelming would be a massive understatement - I've never got a decent picture of a bird in flight, a type of photo I mistakingly thought I would be churning out on a regular basis when I first bought by DSLR. However, I experimented a bit with the settings on the camera and using a combination of 'closest subject' focus, and continual rather than servo focus mode I managed to catch the planes flying by more often than not.

And that was probably the most technical sentence I'll ever write, long-winded and badly structured as it was.

The event itself could have been a photography nightmare; constantly changing light, thunderous downpours and drab, cloudy skies could have ruined both my photos and more importantly, my camera. Luckily there were periods of sun in between the waves of rain, and having dramatic clouds rather than a clear blue sky actually helped matters rather than hinder. As I wrote above, I was immensely happy with my crop of photos, and here they are: