Living as a photographer in Lincolnshire, the one thing you can always be guaranteed of is a lovely sky to play with from time to time. I have always called the sky my canvas and this weekend, the palette was one that I had a great time playing with.
The BBMF Lancaster had had a busy day of carrying out flypasts and displays up and down the country, the most notable of these was as part of the flypast for the Kings' official birthday and Trooping the Colour in London. The flypast consisted of a large number of tri-service aircraft which had originally been due to fly for the Kings Coronation but sadly this was cancelled due to the inclement weather on the day.
I'd planned on capturing BBMF movements at RAF Coningsby rather than travelling down to London. My last London experience wasn't great returning home to Lincolnshire with 3 bruised ribs and a dose of Covid and I am still not great being in large crowds as a result, So, cameras in hand and a lovely breeze in the air, I whizzed round to the hangar fence and planted myself on the fence line to capture the team getting ready for the main event as well as the Eurofighter Squadrons taking part.
Having got the shots I wanted, I processed them, sent them to my agency and disappeared back home for a well earned afternoon of relaxation and to watch the flypast on the TV. I have had a busy week which has included photographing the tragic events in Nottingham for two days and needed to decompress. Sadly part of the job of a Photojournalist involves capturing photos of things that are less than pleasant shall we say. However we, as photojournalists try to do it with respect and I hope that that is what I did last week. So, with coffee and biscuits in hand, I relaxed for a bit.
As the day wore on, the Lancaster carried on her duties after the flypast heading to Northern Ireland and then to Scotland from where she flew over Lake Windermere in the Lake District on her way home. Some beautiful shots of this have appeared and it was tempting to go and do it but I was simply too tired to make the 3 hour journey. Instead I found myself staring out of the window in the early evening watching a rather lovely sunset develop over the airfield,
At this point my photographic eye started roaming to the area where the aircraft would be coming back to Coningsby and possibly a hangar break. It looked really promising and so I abandoned the sofa and biscuits, grabbed my camera and headed back to the hangar. 20 minutes my patience and instincts were rewarded with some lovely shots of the Lancaster coming home in a beautiful orange and yellow sky. All in all, it was a lovely end to what should have been a quiet day. Lesson learned, there is no such thing as a quiet day when you are a photographer. There is always one more photograph to be taken...
Prints of the Lancaster returning home at sunset are here in my shop if you feel so inclined to hang one of these on your wall.
