10.07.2014

It will have to be painted.





Flight


July 24, 2014 was another hot and steamy day in Florida with scattered showers, thunderstorms all around and plane reservation for the evening. If all went N99344 and I would go off toward the beaches to practice slow flight, steep turns and forward slips. I packed the camera, just in case. We took off a little after 8pm. Bottoms of the clouds were at about 2,000 ft., puffy little clouds all over, moving north-east. Thunderstorms to the north and north east. Some cloud buildup to the south.

The sky was our for the most part (me and the Cessna's). The only, distant traffic, we observed was a suspected AligentAir sneaking into St. Pete/Clearwater airport.

I got on with the practice maneuvers at about 2,300 ft. Steep turns went well, better than I expected. It's been a few months since I practiced them. Slow flight went really well.

With few minutes just to enjoy the scenery, I grabbed the camera and tried a little 'point and shoot' routine, expecting very little. It was getting darker by the second. There was some daylight left, but for the camera's eye, it was getting dark. The sky was flowing through its post sunset dance and everything in sight got a chance to turn spectacular, if only for a short while.

After few clicks along the path of a 360 turn over the beach, we turned south and descended with a forward slip. Turning east we called up Albert Whitted tower and a little while later, we were landing. By 9 pm we taxied toward the ramp, all finished for the night. Still baking in the plane, heat and humidity not letting up.

Pixes

Looking at the images that night only briefly, they seemed more disappointing than usual. I knew we had very little light and not the best equipment to work with. Still, it felt like there was  A LOT missing, but what?

What didn’t show was the emotional distance between the two worlds I’ve been in that day. Absence of work hassle, traffic jams, schedules, worries and frustrations is not readily apparent until one give it some thought.

After a few days the pictures began to look a lot better all on their own. Or maybe my appreciation of what happened grew.

Then it started sinking in. One of the images was good enough to be used as a reference for a painting.




(Final reference after some post production)

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