Tag Archives: airliner

More Airliner Crossing Shots

While up near Heathrow, while I was mainly bothered about the arriving airliners, there were a lot of high-altitude aircraft criss-crossing the skies. Every once in a while, their paths would look like they would converge. Obviously, they were at different altitudes so nothing that special, but I did find myself tracking them to see if I could get something like a crossing shot.

It wasn’t to be. A few got pretty close but never was I to get the really cool shot of a crossing. Never mind. Here are a few of the ones that got closer during the day.

This Paint Job Would Have Been Quick

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This Brussels Airlines A320 came into Heathrow one weekend. I am not sure even now what the livery is supposed to represent. All I know is that I love it and am delighted that they went to the effort to paint the jet like this. I am assuming there are a ton of vinyls involved in this rather than having it all hand painted but, either way, it looks amazing. If it was painted, that is even better. What a great change from the average livery.

Cathay Pacific A350-1000

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If you are a regular reader, you will know I love an A350, you will also know I like late day light on planes. How about the combination of the light and the plane. In this case, it is Cathay Pacific – an airline that has a livery that works quite well with a warmer lighting set up. In this case it is an A350-1000 which has pleasing proportions although the -900 is not a bad looking jet either. I was happy to get this one.

The Ramp Action at Barcelona

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When I made a trip to Spain for work, my route took me through Barcelona. Not a city I have visited before, but I do plan to return. I hadn’t brought a main camera with me since it was a brief work trip, and I was travelling light but I did take my old M6 along with me. Going to a new location can mean some different airlines. However, these days the airlines across Europe are usually the same ones. Ryanair is everywhere of course. There were some converted freighters sitting on the opposite side of the airfield from my terminal. I grabbed a few shots in the brief time I had which wasn’t long given that the schedule was pretty tight.

Virgin Atlantic Names of Planes

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Since they first started flying, Virgin Atlantic has been naming their planes with slightly quirky titles. Many airlines have names on their planes, but they are more often something like cities, rivers, castles etc. Features of the country that the airline is based in. Virgin has a different approach, and they do like a good amount of pun activity in their names. This can also be reflected in the registration of the aircraft with the letter combination sometimes tied to the name.

I have seen this naming over the years and never really given it much thought. However, on a visit to Heathrow a while back that was aiming for something specific, I naturally got to see a bunch of Virgin jets arriving. I decided to get a few close-up shots of the names at the front and then decided to check out what other names I had come across. This is not a comprehensive list of the different planes, nor do I plan on making it a goal to get them all, but it is a fun look at some of the names that they have gone with.

United Eco Liveries

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While I was shooting from a distance, I did get a shot of a United 767 heading into Heathrow. This jet is painted in the sustainable aviation fuel livery. I reminded me of a 737 I had seen from them in an Eco livery. Add to that there is the Max 10 that was involved in the fuel trials with NASA and I have a few of the United special liveries. Here are those planes.

Thinking Back to LAX and Old Favourites

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I’m not sure what it was that got me to these pictures. I was working on something other project and then found myself looking at some shots from a visit to LAX a long time ago. Two planes jumped out at me from that day. One was a Lufthansa A340-300 and the other was a British Airways 747-400. Both were taking off later in the day and the light was very nice. I decided both deserved a re-edit.

The backgrounds for both jets were a little busy and so I decided to try something similar to my processing for airborne shots but that I hadn’t done much on the ground. I used the smart masking tools to select the aircraft. Then I inverted the mask to select the background. This allowed me to take the lighting down for the background and also make things a little cooler with the white balance. Then I could warm up the plane a little more and brighten it up. This helps to separate the aircraft from the background and make it more the focus of the shots.

The BA fleet of 747s are long gone now and passenger 747s are definitely a rarity. The Lufthansa A340s are still operating but only because of the delays to new aircraft deliveries. It won’t be too long before they are heading to the desert. This will be a nice reminder of the fun stuff I used to be able to photograph.

I Guess It Is Farewell for UPS MD-11s

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The crash of the UPS MD-11 when one of the engines separated at rotation resulted in a grounding of the entire fleet of DC-10s and MD-11s. The process for returning the fleets to service continues as I write this, but I recently heard that UPS has decided that they won’t bother to return their fleet and will accelerate a retirement process that was already being planned.

Since Boeing Field was somewhere I got to spend a lot of time and was a location that got regular visits from UPS MD-11s, I got to see them on a regular basis. I left before they did but now no one there will get to see this beefy jet in UPS colours again. Here are some of the shots I have got of them over the years. I do hope that other operators will still have a need for their examples and this won’t be the end of the road for this type.

Turning in on the Approach

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I have posted some previous shots looking up the approach at Heathrow as the jets are lined up for landing. The reason I have chosen to post this is that there is a bit more of a dynamic element to it. I like the jet crossing in the background before it turns back in to align with the approach path. The combination of the spaced out planes and the view of the turn in seemed pretty cool to me.

BEA Gets a Reprieve

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The British European Airways liveried Airbus that British Airways has been operating for a number of years was due to be disposed of. As new jets come into the fleet, the older jets are headed for parting out. However, the delivery rate from Airbus has apparently not been enough to meet the requirements of BA and they are having to send some older jets for major checks when they become due rather than park them. This will give them an extended life until the new jets can make it. This one was scheduled to go but has now been sent for a check. What I don’t know is whether it is due a repaint or not so we might or might not get to see it again.