Photographer’s Notes This photo is dedicated to Darrell Pepper, PhD, professor emeritus at the Air Force Academy, without whom these photos might never have been taken.
Earlier this month, my brother and I attended Aviation Nation, the air show put on by Nellis AFB to thank the people of Las Vegas for putting up with the noise and other disruptions of an active air force base. It's free. But getting there and getting back is NOT half the fun. Normally, you drive to the Speedway and take a bus onto base. That takes awhile because a half million of your closest friends all have the same idea at the same time. And after the Thunderbirds fly, everyone heads to the busses to return to their cars. There's a lot of standing around and waiting involved. Hours and hours of it.
But not this year. One of my brother's clients, Dr. Pepper, was able to get us credentials to park on base and view the airshow from the Thunderbirds' chalet. So we arrived a bit before 10:00 and enjoyed the show, including the Thunderbirds who flew a bit after 2:00 and we were off base before 4:00. All thanks to Dr. Pepper. Did I mention the chalet had seating and served food and adult beverages? Miss Nevada was there! And the cast of the Jersey Boys (who sang the national anthem to start the festivities) was there. Besides a great show, this was a GREAT venue.
During the show, I shot 3,200 photos. I shoot a lot of air shows, and these may be some of the best yet. I'm pretty happy with them.
This jet is an F-4 Phantom, a Vietnam era supersonic interceptor capable of Mach 2.2 flight for the 12 minutes it takes to burn all its fuel (it's thriftier at slower speeds). Also one of the loudest jets I know of. Its max takeoff weight is 60,000 and it can climb at over 41,000 feet per minute.
Verdict: F-4 is the 'muscle car' of the Vietnam era combat aircraft.
Post Processing • Convert from RAW (PSCS5 Camera RAW)
• Brightness (PSCS5 Curves Layer)
• Contrast (PSCS5 Curves Layer)
• Sharpen (Neat Image)
• Crop (PSCS5)
• Resize (Perfect Resize)
• Sharpen (PSCS5 USM)
• Color (PSCS5 Hue/Sat Layer)
• Darken Hills (PSCS5 Curves Layer – Masked)
• Lighten Plane (PSCS5 Curves layer – Masked)
• Sky Color (PSCS5)
• Save for Web (PSCS5)
Camera Data • Date: 2011.11.13
• Camera: Nikon D3
• Lens: Nikon AF Zoom-Nikkor 70-200mm f/2.8 VR DG IF-ED
• ISO: 800
• Aperture: f/7.1
• Shutter: 1/3200
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