RAF Photographer

Bail

Bail

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128
Name
Baillie
Edit My Images
Yes
Hello,

Having an interest in photography and always wanting to join the RAF i thought it would be understandable to try and join as a photographer. I am currently 16 and just starting A-levels but when i've finished them at 18 i would like to give a shot at signing up for it. So onto the reason for this thread, does anybody know anything about this job anybody that does it? I have a brief understanding but having asked many RAF careers advisers and they seem to know very little about the particular trade:thinking:

Any advice or feedback would be greatly appreciated(y)
Thanks.
 
A member called Arkady might be able to help as he is a photographer for the armed services (soon to be on civi street).

I'm sure he'll spot this.
 
Tulipone said:
I think that you may find that the photo trades in the RAF are in decline. I know several ex trade who have remustered.
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Yes i have been made aware of this, but i'll see what happens when the time comes to joining up may aswell give it a shot if it doesn't work out then i'll have to have a re-think.
 
Be very careful if they offer you a non photog job with the possibilities to re-catagorise once you are in ....This was a ploy the Navy used to use to fill those trades that were not so popular.

Having said that, I undestand there are now waiting lists to get in as the prospects outside the service are quite dire at the moment


Good luck in the service, should you make it

Tug
 
Ta Da...
and here I am.

RAF Phot branch are drawing-down as Ground Sections around the country are being closed...however, you can still apply.

My choice if I were doing it over would be to join the Royal Navy and go for photographic selection there. They have a far more grown-up attitutude to work and have proper 'top-cover' with an officer branch within the trade, which the Army does not (and consequently we get shi'ite upon on a depressingly regular basis).

The RAF is the only one of the three services that allows direct-entry for photographer candidates - RN and Army both require you to serve in a Front-Line role for a minimum of five years (Army) or three years (Navy).

Training for all three services is conducted at the Defence School of Photography (DSOP) at Cosford in the W midlands and is a 6 month course after which you will be posted to a Ground-Section for further OTJ training.

If you succeed in joining the RAF as a photographer candidate, you will be sneered-at by the Navy and Army students, all of whom are better photographers (and better human-beings if truth be told) than you will ever hope to be. Get used to it. It will be you place in life to be looked down upon by the Senior Service and the Army and you will feel priveliged to bask in the Light of their Glory, however unworthy you may be...

RAF do not deploy as Combat-Camera to Afghanistan, but do deploy to Cyprus and Saudi, so you may occasionall surge 'forward' to Bastion to cover some in-camp niff-naff and trivia.
 
Arkady said:
Ta Da...
and here I am.

RAF Phot branch are drawing-down as Ground Sections around the country are being closed...however, you can still apply.

My choice if I were doing it over would be to join the Royal Navy and go for photographic selection there. They have a far more grown-up attitutude to work and have proper 'top-cover' with an officer branch within the trade, which the Army does not (and consequently we get shi'ite upon on a depressingly regular basis).

The RAF is the only one of the three services that allows direct-entry for photographer candidates - RN and Army both require you to serve in a Front-Line role for a minimum of five years (Army) or three years (Navy).

Training for all three services is conducted at the Defence School of Photography (DSOP) at Cosford in the W midlands and is a 6 month course after which you will be posted to a Ground-Section for further OTJ training.

If you succeed in joining the RAF as a photographer candidate, you will be sneered-at by the Navy and Army students, all of whom are better photographers (and better human-beings if truth be told) than you will ever hope to be. Get used to it. It will be you place in life to be looked down upon by the Senior Service and the Army and you will feel priveliged to bask in the Light of their Glory, however unworthy you may be...

RAF do not deploy as Combat-Camera to Afghanistan, but do deploy to Cyprus and Saudi, so you may occasionall surge 'forward' to Bastion to cover some in-camp niff-naff and trivia.
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Ok that's a great help thanks alot, so your advice would be to join the Navy doing another career and then switch over to become a photographer after 3 years, do you not think that's taking a big risk? I mean what if after those years they're not looking for any photographers or another problem comes into the equation?
Thanks.
 
the the photography trade has been merged in with the reckon trade (atleast in NI), I did some unpaid work a few months ago, expect to do alot of sitting at your desk and taking photos of very boring things.
That is only my experience though in Northern Ireland perhaps if you are posted somewhere else it may be more exiting.
 
If you succeed in joining the RAF as a photographer candidate, you will be sneered-at by the Navy and Army students, all of whom are better photographers (and better human-beings if truth be told) than you will ever hope to be. Get used to it. It will be you place in life to be looked down upon by the Senior Service and the Army and you will feel priveliged to bask in the Light of their Glory, however unworthy you may be..
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First thing to learn is never listen to a brown job. If it's not done by numbers they can't do it, and as for the rum, bum and baccy boys - well 'nuff said;)

Stick withe boys in blue you're allowed to think for yourself:clap:
 
Bail said:
Hello,

Having an interest in photography and always wanting to join the RAF i thought it would be understandable to try and join as a photographer. I am currently 16 and just starting A-levels but when i've finished them at 18 i would like to give a shot at signing up for it. So onto the reason for this thread, does anybody know anything about this job anybody that does it? I have a brief understanding but having asked many RAF careers advisers and they seem to know very little about the particular trade:thinking:

Any advice or feedback would be greatly appreciated(y)
Thanks.
Click to expand...

Hi mate,

I've just left the RAF, not sure how the photog trade is going.

Have a look here http://e-goat.co.uk/
It's a web site purely for RAF issues, serving, ex, thinking of joining :shrug:

Register on the site, post your question as above & I'm sure you will get your Q answered.

There are recruiting staff on there as members.

Hope this helps,

Mick
 
Arkady said:
If you succeed in joining the RAF as a photographer candidate, you will be sneered-at by the Navy and Army students, all of whom are better photographers (and better human-beings if truth be told) than you will ever hope to be. Get used to it. It will be you place in life to be looked down upon by the Senior Service and the Army and you will feel priveliged to bask in the Light of their Glory
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However.............. you may get to go to:-

America, Canada, Belgium, Holland, France, Denmark, Sweden, Croatia, Mexico, Philippines, Abu Dhabi, Bahrain, Egypt, Turkey, Spain, Oman, Saudi, Italy, Cyprus, Sardinia, Corsica, Norway, Austria, Kuwait, Iraq..................to name a few. :banana:

While you may be working hard in some of the above, there were many many times when the Queen was paying for some particularly nice hotels (That’s a brick built building with a bar, Arkady :naughty:)

So to coin a phrase “you decide” :wave:

Mick
 
Yes the RAF do tend to enjoy air-conditioned lovliness while the real work is being done by others grovelling in poo-infested ditches in Helmand.
Now, sitting here gazing out at a lovely sunny morning, my Moral High Ground feels even better.
The RAF are due to be merged with the Army and Navy anyway: transport goes to Virgin-Air, the strike capability ('cause we really need fast jets to intimidate all those guys wearing suicide vests, don't we?) goes to the RN and the helicopters are split between the Army and Navy.
It was a bad experiment, doomed to failure and any decent small airline manager could do a better job than the RAF does at moving things and people around - anyone who's been through Brize Norton knows the truth of which I speak.

The RN is expanding it's photo branch while the outlook for the RAF and Army is actually looking a bit bleak: the RAF are drawing-down from a high of over 600 to a more manageable 150, but that still means a few postings available while they last.

The Army is deciding whether or not it even needs NCO-photographers - apparently an officer with a P&S and a cam-corder can do the job of a three-man Combat Camera team - no really: a Major on the same deployment as I was on last yeear managed to convice the Big Bosses that he was capable of doing all our jobs simultaneously.
Funny, but I never actually saw him out on he ground where the bullets were flying, just schmoozing around Bastion and some of the FOBs drinking coffee and trying to shag some of the more attractive journos that visited...
We were discussing this the other day - big meeting up in MoD with our Master Phot and other RLC big-wigs - I picked the right time to leave by the look of things - there may be only three or four more years of 'proper' work for us before we get re-traded as clerks...lol

If you're into photography anyway, you'll come to the attention of the photo branch in whatever service you eventually decide upon.

I still recommend you join the RN... Then immediately go and find the Fleet Photographic Unit nearest you: Lt Cdr Paul Cowpe or Lt Cdr Stu Antrobus are the guys you need to talk to.
They'll give you all the info you need to manage your career so as to expidite your transfer as soon as possible.
Remember they'd rather keep you 'in' than have you sign off completely, so if people give you the run-around, threaten to actually leave.

Also what jobs will you do?
As an RAF phot, your bread and butter will be at best, desk-top portraits and group photos, or if you're lucky enough to be posted to a base with operational Squadrons, defect photography on aircraft (when it breaks, you photograph it) - that's if you get to touch a camera at all...more likely you'll be posted to a ground-section running a Fuji Frontier and printing everyone else's photos, just like the bloke in Tesco.

As RN or Army, you will at least get a variety of jobs to do.
 
kekaru said:
the the photography trade has been merged in with the reckon trade (atleast in NI),
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If you look you'll see the Cosford school mentioned by Arkady earlier in this thread is a satellite of Ch1cks@nds and thats slime central :naughty:
 
desantnik said:
If you look you'll see the Cosford school mentioned by Arkady earlier in this thread is a satellite of Ch1cks@nds and thats slime central :naughty:
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Ish...we still have Mainstream and Operational Stream.

Ops is generally blokes from other cap-badges who do a two week 'camera-handling' course which enables them to get basic surveillance and 'I was there' imagery.
The Professional (mainstream) or PR course is still six-months and you'll not be going to Chicksands, as that is, as Des points out, covered by the Green Slime. Though the RN do still have some IA (Image Analysis) billets available which are non-photographic in nature - you 'look-at' but don't 'take'...

Cosford is pretty much being run by the RN now - the top-corridor is all RN Warrants and Officers and Geoff Sellars, the School head is ex-RN. It's been known by us as 'HMS Cosford' since before I went there... The department heads are mostly RAF or MoD civvie and you'll have hours of fun trying to work out why you're spending a month and a half perfecting macro defect photography when the Army don't do any of that and only one week on PR...:wacky:
 
Bail said:
Hello,

Having an interest in photography and always wanting to join the RAF i thought it would be understandable to try and join as a photographer. I am currently 16 and just starting A-levels but when i've finished them at 18 i would like to give a shot at signing up for it. So onto the reason for this thread, does anybody know anything about this job anybody that does it? I have a brief understanding but having asked many RAF careers advisers and they seem to know very little about the particular trade:thinking:

Any advice or feedback would be greatly appreciated(y)
Thanks.
Click to expand...

Not an RAF photographer but know a good few in the RAF and have had a natter,,,,

An RAF photographer is an all encompasing role, you travel a lot shooting in many situations, even some covert operations on top of shooting at the air base like the planes and familys etc.

Joining provisions as I have also looked at it,, they generally pick you based on how social you are and how much drive you have (this is what I was told) as you have to be able to interact well with everybody.

And having just looked,,, it says so about it on the website (RAF CAREERS) :D
 
Arkady said:
The Professional (mainstream) or PR course is still six-months and you'll not be going to Chicksands, as that is, as Des points out, covered by the Green Slime. Though the RN do still have some IA (Image Analysis) billets available which are non-photographic in nature - you 'look-at' but don't 'take'...
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IA is run @ Ch1cks@nds - its a joint school of photographic interpretation.

You get all sorts on that course, mainly brown, some dark blue (some of which are laydayees, ahem, :naughty:) which is kinda odd considering the stuff comes from the light blue world in the first place. Things that crawl in the mud or float on the water shouldn't be allowed in the nice clean air (y)

But yes, thats all about staring at other people's holiday photos, looking for interesting places for others to put their beach towels.
 
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As I said above, each service has its own photo interpretation folks to process stuff from their resources, but those folks don't take the photos, they just stare at them.
 
I think its a dying trade in all 3 services to be honest. I know a few RN togs well and if they are based on land they are doing the mundane passport photos, wings parades, aircraft damage etc every day, they thinks it's **** but are happy not to be getting jobbed off doing pointless crap. If deployed they get tasked by Fleet to shoot for various publications and PR stuff. Arkady has it pretty spot on with the entry requirements for the RN, one guy i know was a engineering mechanic before changing branch but the competition was fierce and he was a very competent photographer before he applied (reckons that's the reason he was successful). On the plus side you do get a very nice camera set up :)
 
Ozei said:
It's likely to be even worse when Cameron's mob slash everything by 20% in the October review.
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True. They'll probably have to downgrade from Nikon's.
 
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