The last time I went to the Hill AFB Airshow (way back in June 2006, images here), I was only 26 and still innocent.  Also, I was mainly using the Tamron 70-300 macro lense.  In my opinion, one of the worst lenses ever made.  You’ll see all of my images have terrible fringing (Wikipedia article; long story short: the purplish hue along areas of high contrast).  Not just fringing, either, but I’ve always felt like something was off about the color in those images.  I’ve never been able to subjectively identify the problem, but let’s just leave it at this: it was a bad lense.

The one good thing about that lense was that it went out to 300mm, and on my digital SLR with 1.5x magnification factor that became 450mm.  In my current camera bag, the best I’ve got is my trusty 80-200 f/2.8, which will take me out to 300mm.  Not bad, but not 450mm.  I thought about renting the Nikkor 300mm f/2.8 from Pictureline but ended up not making the time to head out there.

Regardless of all these geeky NAS issues, I’m going to an Air Force base and I am going to see some of the most amazing aviation in the world!  Word is there will be appearances by F-16, F-22, F-15, B-52, C-130, … it’s enough to cause heart palpitations.  I’m sure you understand.