CloudHead

September '23 Recap

Author

Giel Sweertvaegher
October 02, 2023

Time for the September recap! This month was mainly dedicated to editing the many photos I took over the summer. I'm nearing the finish line, and I'm looking forward to getting back to editing videos in October. While I didn't have much behind-the-scenes content to share, I aimed to make up for it in the 'worth sharing' section.

Thanks for reading

Giel Sweertvaegher

Last month’s work

🆕 I still don’t have any new YouTube videos, but I promise to at least upload one in October.

🆒 My favorite Instagram posts I made this month: Italian Master at sunset back in 2019.

⬇️ My worst performing Instagram post: a couple of photos from a shoot with a Ducati Multistrada.

⬆️My best performing Instagram post: Thunderbolt behind the Skyvan last July.

Behind the Scenes

🥲FOMO

There’s not much to talk about this month because I barely did anything. I mostly suffered from a serious dose of FOMO because the Aviation PhotoCrew did some really neat stuff: Italian Harriers in Italy; The last Buckeyes and Phantoms in Greece; an amazingly varied program in Belgium, and currently they’re making some of the best pictures in California. Next week promises to be just as good in Arizona.

Interestingly, after two weeks of intensive photography, I find myself relieved to take a break from it. However, when I see some of the images, I immediately regret not being there. I'm well aware that I tend to make these experiences more grandly in my mind than they might actually be. It's a perspective I need to work on, as at this rate, I'm missing out on more projects than I'm participating in.

🇧🇪 Belgian Air Force Days

I did have the chance to catch a couple of planes upon arrival of the Belgian Air Force Days. I had to work that week so I only had one free afternoon. You can find a small preview here, but I’m still busy editing.

🤖Generative Fill

I had a photo featuring the Canadian F-18's alongside the Canadian Hawk, but the wingtip was unfortunately cut off. I reached out on Instagram, asking if anyone could help fix it using AI, and people came through! After seeing their results, I decided to download the latest version of Photoshop and give it a try myself. The outcome looked quite decent, but upon closer inspection, I noticed that the wingtip didn't quite match the other side. I decided to manually clone and than use Generative Filll to fill in the background and expand the image. The combo of manual cloning and AI seems to be giving the best results.

💾 Last try

Speaking of Canada, I'm making one final attempt to recover some of the lost video footage. A friend of my brother suggested using a program called PhotoRec, which has been recommended to me by three different photographers. One of them even claimed to have successfully retrieved photos that had been overwritten more than a hundred times. While my files are videos, I'm still holding onto a last bit of hope.

🚁 Vertical Mag Contest

I entered the Vertical Magazine photo contest with a couple of photos from the Austrian BlackHawk and German Tiger and CH53. They shared one of my shots and it got a whopping 20000 likes. One of their most liked photoposts (Maybe even the most liked.)

Worth Sharing

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  • If you’re into hiphop like I am, you will like this video. The best sampling in 50 years of hiphop. It only goes to show how incredibly well made these songs are.

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