This entry is going to be a bit unusual for me; more of an anecdote that has an implied tip in it rather than a point blank “do this” sort of tip.

Everyone reading this is probably aware that I am trying to expand into aviation photography. Well, in the early days of trying to get into this field, one goes to airshows, public fly days etc. So when I saw a note about the Tillamook Air Museum’s November fly day on Facebook, I was pretty jazzed. They were flying some pretty cool planes and they’re close to home.

I went there with my uncle and we got there and asked in the lobby where would be the best place to see and photograph the flying. The lady there told us a few places and we took off. Taking her directions as best we could given our limited knowledge of the area, we ended up at a campground next to the fueling station at the airport. We photographed along the fence, where there were plenty of signs saying we couldn’t go beyond the fence. The location was good except for some telephone lines, etc. that were hard to shoot around.

Later, the big surprise came. After refueling an airplane the man working there invited us to hangout at the office of the fueling station. This got us a little bit closer and also moved us past the obstructions in our view. (Some of the images in this gallery were taken on the museum grounds, exactly where you’d go if you dropped by as a tourist, which I highly recommend. The hangar itself is a point of very historical interest, as well as the aircraft.)

So I have two points I’d really like to make here. As a photographer, I advocate absolutely obeying signs, etc that say you can’t go somewhere. First off, it’s the right thing to do, secondly, photographers abusing such things could lose us access to many places, and has already happened in a few cases. ONLY ENTER SUCH AN AREA IF INVITED.

My second point is that in a field like photography, connections you make with people are at least as important as your skill.