I have been to a handful of airshows since I was a teenager, mostly in Maryland and Cleveland, OH. All of those were big shows with the final act being either the Blue Angels or Thunderbirds. They are always very impressive. But I had never tried any of the smaller shows even though I live in northern Virginia, not far from Leesburg or Manassas, both of which have annual airshows. This year my family and I decided to try out the Manassas Airshow.

So here is my summary of the good and the bad of the Manassas Airshow in general but mostly for photography.

The Bad

This is my biggest complaint. I thought it would be a little less crowded but I guess the Manassas show has gotten much more popular over the years. Just like the bigger shows, it’s never easy getting in or out. You have to park in a lot and wait for buses to take you there and back. Why does it always seem to get hotter while waiting for a bus in a crowd of people? It was even more confusing at Manassas because there were three or four parking locations and it was not easy to find where to wait for the right bus to get back there especially with crowds of people standing around just as confused as we were. They need to fix that.

If you’re shooting some of the static displays or sometimes even aircaft in the air, you don’t always have the best backgrounds to deal with. This is true for the bigger shows as well.

Sometimes there are too many people or you end up with food stands in the background. Sometimes it isn’t too bad but other times it can ruin a shot. I had to crop way in on this one. And I think there are still too many people. It isn’t real sharp anyway, but you get the idea.

Or there are orange cones.

I just couldn’t get the angle I wanted without the cones in the shot. I can crop way in on this one but I wouldn’t get what I was looking for.

Here’s another one.

In post processing I could have tried to remove the cones or locally reduce the saturation so they wouldn’t stand out so much. Instead, for this one I tried B&W. Not too bad.

Those things just make it a little more of a challenge.

The Good

If you’re willing to deal with all of that, there are good parts too.

It’s not as noisy compared to the big shows. There are less fighter jets. This is good if you have little kids that don’t like the noise. Not so good if you like the noise and seeing the faster jets. They did have a Harrier at the end which was cool but loud. We also lucked out this year with some interesting dark clouds.

The Flying Circus from Bealeton, VA usually makes an appearance so you will probably get to see some wing walking. I like this one because it looks like he’s surfing on the wing.

There are still a lot of photogenic aircraft on display.

There are always opportunities for selfies.

And you usually see some interesting things other than aircraft too, if people watching is your thing.

See more photos from that day in my Flickr album.

Maybe we’ll try the Leesburg Airshow later this year. It may be a lot of the same thing but another chance to practice shooting is never bad.