Category Archives: photo

Korean Air Dreamliner on Test

I had a couple of encounters with the same jet while it was on test. (It’s brake dust already showed up in this post.) This 787-9 is, by now, part of the Korean Air fleet. I saw it depart from Paine Field one evening in pleasant light. The low sun angle really brought out the shape of the underside of the wing in a way that normally you just don’t get to appreciate. It showed up a second time while I was out to get the farewell flight of the Delta 747 which I wrote about here. It came in at a similar time and the wet weather helped to make the pale blue color scheme pop a bit more.

My Copy of Lightroom Got Sick

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After a previous update to Lightroom (6.12), it became almost unusable. Importing would take forever and, once the images were in, it would grind to a halt. Keywording and editing became a nightmare. I was struggling to work out what was wrong. A check on performance showed the processor wasn’t busy but the RAM was maxed out. I couldn’t understand why. The first thing I do when Lightroom behaves strangely is to delete the Preferences file. This file can get corrupted and mess with the performance badly. Just delete it and restart and things are often fixed. That didn’t work in this case. When the new version of Lightroom was released, I hoped this would fix everything but sadly not. (Meanwhile Photoshop itself is working just fine on this system.)

I had a long session with the Adobe tech support people which got me nowhere. After telling me this was normal, they realized it was not when our screen sharing crapped out as a result of the machine slowing to a virtual standstill. They tried a bunch of simple stuff and got no further than I had on my own. They suggested a second session would be needed and then promptly sent me an email telling me that the issue had been successfully resolved. Not sure how they concluded that. Meanwhile, I wondered whether there was an issue with my Windows installation so decided to do a completely clean install. This had some slight benefits but basically the problem still remained.

I have done a bunch of scanning of similar issues and I found out a technique the support team can use to tweak performance. There is a config.lua file that can be created in the presets folder to influence the system. I have added this file and it has certainly made a few things work better. It has also slowed some things down as well which isn’t ideal. This was not a solution though. All it did was make the program slightly more usable.

Another session with Adobe ensued. This time we got into the permissions for some of the folders that contained the catalogs. Lots of time to reset these to give greater authority. I was told this is sometimes an issue with large catalog files. Lots of time later, I found that nothing had really changed. The whole thing would still get bogged down very quickly.

Then I read about Lightroom 7.2. This was a new update that was supposed to address a lot of performance issues. It was supposed to make better use of multi-core processors as well as larger RAM configs. I had seen a sequence of updates not improve things – my issues were clearly not the normal performance problems although I had previously experienced some of them too – but I was hoping that, if they had changed the architecture of the software, maybe whatever was causing my machine to have problems might have been tweaked/replaced. If not, I was seriously considering the need to buy a new system since this was so horribly inefficient.

I waited for the release date to come around when I knew the update was on its way. Then I got an update to the iPad version and it said the new version of Camera Raw was included. This must mean it was close. A day later, the update dropped. I downloaded it immediately and opened up. Hurrah!!! Everything run fast, the RAM levels were moderate and stable, everything was happening as it should. My system lives! Let’s hope this isn’t a false dawn.

One More Chance With Virgin’s A340s

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Substitutions on the Seattle route are not just limited to Lufthansa. Virgin Atlantic has been flying the route with the 787-9 but, as with a lot of the Rolls Dreamliner operators, Virgin has been suffering from engine shortages while the blade cracking problems are dealt with. They have brought the A340-600 on to the route in the interim. I thought I wouldn’t be seeing these again after the last examples at SFO I saw but I got another chance. Not great light but it was good to see one more time.

F1 Engines (New and Used)

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I was too young to see a Saturn V launch. My one and only space launch has been a shuttle flight and that was very impressive. I can only imagine how cool the Saturn V was to witness. Maybe when the new generation of heavy launchers comes into service I will get to see something similar. The power for the first stage was provided by the F1 engines, five of which were clustered together. We made a trip to the Kennedy Space Center a long time ago and a Saturn V is on display there lying on its side. You can get face to face with the engine nozzles.

More recently, we checked out the Apollo exhibit at the Museum of Flight, here in Seattle. They have a display of an F1 engine but this one is not looking so pristine. This is because it is a used engine. Not just used as in test firing used but used as in flew on a mission, free fell to the ocean, hit the sea at speed, sank to the bottom of the Atlantic and stayed there for decades. Jeff Bezos, founder of Amazon, funded a project to recover the engines from Apollo 12.

The nozzle is gone which is no surprise given how thin it is as you can see in the pictures of the undamaged version. However, the combustion chamber and the turbopump seem to have come through the experience in remarkable shape. The injector plate is also on display and has been pulled out of the assembly to show it off more clearly. The F1 was quite a feat of engineering – 1.5 million lbs of thrust and the pinnacle of 60s technology.

Two More 737s Heading to Renton

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At various times I have seen the fuselages for new Boeing 737s heading by on the trains through Seattle. Usually I am a distance away from them and I get a shot that is a bit hazy and less than distinct. Recently I was working in a yard alongside the main tracks as some equipment was being loaded. I had my camera to hand to record the loading process as a train came by behind us. Initially I figured it was just another freight train so didn’t pay attention. Then, I caught the color of the fuselages out of the corner of my eye and realized a couple of new jets were onboard. Before it got too much further, I was able to grab a couple of shots.

Some Modern Supercars

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When a museum has a wide variety of vehicles to look at, it seems a bit cheesy to spend too much time looking at the modern supercars. It feels a bit like being a kid with a picture of a Countach on the wall. However, supercars are pretty cool and worthy of a look. On the main floor of America’s Car Museum, there were a few pretty great looking cars.

Ferrari were well represented with some lovely looking modern motors as well as a Testarossa. That car took me back to the 80s. An Aston Martin was also there along with a Lamborghini Aventador which was pretty special. Porsche was also well covered. A 918 first caught my eye but I was quickly drawn away by a Carrera GT. This was only the second example I had seen. (The first was actually driving along Wacker Drive in Chicago, something that would make me very nervous in a car that expensive!)

Seasprites Don’t Show Up Too Often

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The first time I ever heard of the Kaman Seasprite was in the 1980s when Airfix released a new kit of the SH-2F variant. I thought it was a cool looking model but I wasn’t very aware of what it was used for. It was already getting towards the end of its time in service with the US Navy with the SH-60B Seahawk becoming the platform for shipboard helicopters. A few export programs went forward but these were not particularly successful.

I am not sure whether I have ever seen a Seasprite for real prior to visiting Evergreen at McMinnville. They have a corner that is stacked with helicopters. A Seasprite is one of the collection and I was pleasantly surprised to see it. Given the number of airframes they have in this corner, everything is jammed together. This made it hard to get a nice angle on the Seasprite but I was able to get a few shots anyway.

New WSDOT Locomotives

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In the days running up to the introduction to service of the new WSDOT Siemens Charger locomotives, they were stored in the yard in Seattle awaiting the clearance to run. I was down there for another project and all of these shiny new locomotives were just asking to have their picture taken. How could I refuse? Sadly, one of these locos was involved in the accident a few weeks later.

Lufthansa Retro Jet

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Lufthansa have painted up one of their 747-8I jets in a livery that is based on their old color scheme. Until recently, the Seattle route was being flown with a 747-400 so I didn’t anticipate the chance to see it. Then, in the aftermath of the Air Berlin bankruptcy, Lufthansa deployed some 747s on domestic services to bolster capacity. This meant some 747-400s were pulled from routes and the 747-8I was subbed on to Seattle. I was down there on a crummy day to get the IL-76 and the special jet was due in. I figured I couldn’t miss it, even if the conditions weren’t great. The light was not great as it came down the approach but the shot from behind as it got to the threshold was a bit better.

Ducks Take a Bath After a Busy Day

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Walking back in to Log Boom Park from the pier, you get to the shoreline which is a popular spot for the ducks. They clearly like the shallow water and the multiple spots where they can come out of the water to rest. As I was approaching, they seemed to be in agreement that it was bath time. Every duck was taking a turn at washing their plumage.

I figured I would take a chance on the shots. Slow shutter speeds were worth a go. The problem with this is that the ducks are moving a lot so the chances of getting a sharp head/eye are a bit limited. However, if that does work out, the flapping of the wings should look more interesting than trying to freeze the action. Making use of the high shutter rate on the camera is a good way of improving the likelihood of some success and, I was okay with getting a few that worked out.