Video productions for Planes of Fame Air Museum. It takes a team of dedicated people, almost exclusively volunteers, to make what we/I do possible.
With footage and coverage provided by the Planes of Fame video team, and selected contributors, We/I produce videos of some of the rarest warbirds in flight, air show performances, exterior and in the cockpit camera views and air-to-air footage available anywhere. As the videographer for Planes of Fame, I am given the support of the museum to produce these videos and to create a video history for
the museums archives. It is an honor to be among such people and be the one to provide the world a chance to fly with the worlds best Warbird Pilots in some of the rarest warbirds flying anywhere in the world today.
08/12/2025
I found the old TV show, called Steve Canyon, from 1959 on streaming and its like a remake of life when I was a kid. My dad was involved in flight test and weapons development at NOTC China Lake at that very same time and all the old footage, no CGI, brings back a lot of memories. The very first episode a pilot is lost due to oxygen depletion, which is exactly one of my first memories. Another episode is about a group of s**t hot pilots with their own way of doing things called the J Birds. In 1956, dad helped write and act in another film for the USAF featuring a group of s**t hot pilots who did things their own way, it was called, Of How They Flew, and they were called, The 498TH FIS, The Geiger Tigers. The Steve Canyon episodes certainly seem very similar to the characters I grew up around.
08/02/2025
My first flight suit, but not my first jet. F-106 at Larsen AFB, 1956-57. Right after this, photo, dad was reassigned to Lockheed Palmdale, as the G.E. J-79 Field Tech Rep, F-104 Starfighter development and flight test program.
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"Once you have tasted flight, you will forever walk the earth with your eyes turned skyward, for there you have been, and there you will always long to return." ~Leonardo da Vinci
Millions of people around the world have experienced flight in airliners. Many have flown in other types of civilian aircraft. Some people have been fortunate enough to experience an orientation or demonstration flight in high performance aircraft such as warbirds. A rare few get to experience “the magic” of warbirds in close formation flight. I am fortunate enough to fly as the videographer for the Planes of Fame Air Museum.
The world becomes a different place when we are in a formation flight in warbirds. The magic begins as the warbirds start to gather and form up in a close formation in the sky. As the formation build’s an invisible sub-conscious bond forms between the pilots as we begin to act as one in the sky. We change from individuals to one consciousness. The world ceases to exist beyond the formation and the panoramic view to the horizon. There is an unspoken trust, an understanding and a faith that all those in the formation place in each other while in formation. Once the formation is in place and we are in flight as one, the magic peaks as the rhythm of movement and the singularity of purpose has now spread across space and time among all those in the formation. Each pilot is focused on maintaining their position in relation to the next aircraft in formation. One in turn to another and this forms a kind of chorus of movement and a rhythm across the formation. We are one together, a mile high, between heaven and earth. We are united in our quest, and alone above the earth.
For each of us, there is nowhere we would rather be other than where we are right now. Even though I am now 60 years old, each time we fly at some point the memories of my childhood rise to the conscious level of my thoughts. I remember waving to the guys in the warbirds when I was a small boy at airshows. I remember dreaming about being one of those guys flying in warbirds. A part of me is the man doing a professional job, and a part of me is a child living out his dreams. I grew up having a dream and now I fly with the premiere warbird museum in the world in some of the rarest warbird formations ever flown. How else could this be described except as a kind of magic?
I have always had a “love” for the magic that is man’s mastery of the skies. I feel the magic in the rhythm and balance, the power and grace, of warbird’s in close formation flight. I see the magic as the wave of motion moves across the formation without any spoken direction. When we are in formation in the sky it is a very “in the moment” experience. The world fades away and there is just us. We are the only people in the world doing this, “We few, we band of brothers”. We are totally awesome.
About the same time I have the self-realization of how awesome we are, a big drop of oil from the engine slides across the outside of the canopy right in front of the camera lens. The awesomeness of the moment is ruined by a single drop of oil that I am powerless to do anything about. God has a way of giving us a perspective to see how awesome we can be…and an oil streak on the canopy to remind us we’re not all that.
