An Old Rangefinder and a Balloon Festival

"Don't bring a tofu knife to a gunfight..."

This would be my first year to attend the annual Plano Balloon Festival in Plano, TX. In yesteryears, I've been wanting to go, but there were always excuses, events, what-have-you.

To make it interesting, I decided to bring my M4-P to the event. My favorite film with this camera is the Kodak BW400CN. While 99% people out there were toting some kind of zoom lens cameras, I decided that this would be a good place to practice taking pictures of people, which is as much fun as trying to take decent pictures of the balloons themselves.

So, without further ado, here are the pics:



At this point, the field was almost dark, lit only by street lights. Btw, this is one reason that I'm amazed at the M4-P, handheld, almost dark, I still get a picture.



You have to anticipate when the balloons are lit when something like this can be seen. Yes it would be more awesome if I was about 10 feet from the balloon, but, with the lack of "press pass", I'd have to make do with what I have.



Some of the other photographers who seems to be more "prepared" than I was to take pictures of the balloon. Most of them don't even see me pointing an unassuming small black camera at them.



The kids are kinda restless because the balloons are just sitting there...

Then all of the sudden...



As the day grew brighter, more balloons took shape.



The tension is mounting, like this guy ... fully poised to capture that moment...



More balloons getting ready for take-off...



Lift-Off!!!



Turned around to see a frenzy of concentration...



... trying to capture this picture...



Then as soon as all the balloon were gone, people start packing up. Here a nice CanoNikon couple :)

On the walk back to my car I spotted this beauty:



... well, I can't pass it up, can I?



All in all, it's not a bad morning for an old, unassuming rangefinder camera.