Lancair EVOT
This has been by far my most anticipated Air to Air photoshoot so far.
The idea of photographing the only flying Lancair Evolution Turbine in Germany intrigued me since I have seen it on December 17th 2020 for the first time.
Knowing what an EVOT was, but never having it seen in real life before, I was pleasantly surprised to see it parked at my Homebase in Friedrichshafen
After some phone calls the C office in Friedrichshafen was so kind to link me up with the phone number of the owner, Achim.
Achim is one of the kindest people I’ve had the honour to meet. He was up for a photoshoot right away and we started forming a plan, despite him being based quite far away in Cologne.
With my personal standards in regards to weather and landscape conditions being extremely high and Achim’s schedule tightly packed, finding a suitable morning/evening for a photoshoot was arguably the greatest quest to the whole mission. We stared planing in January of 2021 and it wasn’t until May 2022 after a couple cancellations in which Covid played its part too, everything fell into place.
Having flown many different airliners throughout his career, Achim is considered a highly skilled professional, which made it a pleasure working with him. However Achim and his Co-Pilot Sebastian, also a commercial pilot didn’t have much to any formation flying experience.
I value briefings so much because in my opinion they make all the difference, Achim and Basti are professionals but have never flown in a formation such as I require it. We briefed general rules, safety procedures and tricks to execute a safe and efficient shoot with killer photos as the result.
What can I say, Basti and Achim were absolutely on their game! The formation worked out perfectly, we achieved very close distances and the resulting photos speak for themselves. One reason for the success has to be the crew dynamics inside the Lancair. Achim said they switched roles and responsibilities throughout, which enabled the pilot monitoring to relax a little from the frankly tiring process of formation flying over a long duration, monitoring systems and traffic while the pilot flying could focus all their attention to the formation and my calls.
I want to take this page to especially thank Achim for making all of this possible and of course Robin, one of my photo-pilots who always finds a way to be available and fly!
Onwards and upwards!