Photos

H. M. Royal Artillery

"Artillery lends dignity to what would otherwise be a vulgar brawl"

Photos

The Battery in Action

Almost all of the pictures on this page that show fire coming from the muzzle of a weapon are frame captures from videos.
Starting with the first spark at the touch hole, the total time fire is visible during a cannon shot is 1/2 second.
Unless you are very lucky, it's nearly impossible to capture this by taking a single frame picture.
With small arms, fire is visible an even shorter time.
The photos shown here are in no particular order.

Mr. Avery fires a flintlock musket while Drake readys a swivel gun.	Lady Triss unloads a blunderbuss.
The King has just commanded "Sound the Cannon" to open the festival.	Sir Robert fires the closing shot after a long day at FlaRF.
Lady Triss shoots the Daniel King Howitzer at FlaRF 2009.	Sir Robert fires the last shot on the last day of FlaRF 2009.
4th of July night shot. Who needs fireworks?	Lady Triss with her Noisy Cricket.
Captain Drake having fun with a 3 pounder.	Mr. Avery moniters safety while Drake and Cat ready a broadside.
Captain Drake with his fine pair of swivel guns.	Firing #1 while #2 stands ready.
Sir Robert fires a shot across the bow at the First Annual Ft. Lauderdale Pirate Fest. We were on the the New River and the echo in "condo canyon" was awesome!	Abigail, Gin-Gin, Lady Triss and Catalina Our Women of Weaponry. (WoW)
Hot Babes with Firearms. It doesn't get any better than this!	The business end of a 3 Pounder.
'Cannon on a Stick' speaks - Loudly!	Gin-Gin and Lady Triss, the 'Blunderbuss Twins' in action.
This is why it's a really bad idea to be down range while we're firing cannons.	The photo on the left and this one are two stills from a video that was made with a remotely operated camera on an unattended tripod.

Notice the tripod on the left. It's 35 feet from the gun. A person standing that close would have been badly hurt.	These are the same shots as the ones above but viewed from the side. You can see spark trails in many of the cannon photos on this page. They are rarly seen with the naked eye.
10am - Sir Robert fires opening while Mr. Avery makes sure the patrons remain at a safe distance. (The blue thing floating above the cannon is lens flare)	6:25pm (sunset) - Closing the Faire at the end of a long, but fun, day.

Mr. Avery shows the crowd how it's done.

ON THE WAY!

Opening shot, last day of Faire 2005

OOPS! The wall blew up.Wonder how that happened?

We begin the festivites with a pistol shot	BIG...
BADDA...	BOOM!

Another photo looking "down the throat".	Mistress Cat shows the guys that the girls can do it too.
Lady Triss showing off with 'Cannon on a Stick'.	Capt. Drake lets fly with one of his swivel guns.

Looking straight down the muzzle.	Memorial service salute to a fallen commrade - 2008 Camelot Days
Notice the jet of flame coming from the vent. You can see this effect in most of the photos here.	That's why we use linstocks to fire the cannons. It keeps us at a safe distance from the vent.

Frame 1. Our motar at the moment of firing. The ball is still wrapped in flame.	Frame 2. The ball is just now visible leaving the smoke and flame.
SPLASH! The entire event from the first frame with fire to this one was just over 7 seconds. The distance was about 250 yards.	Since 2000, the closing volley on the last day of Faire has been dedicated as a memorial to the friends and fellow performers that we have lost during the previous year. The dedication is always announced and explained to our patrons before we shoot. This picture shows a part of the crowd we had on the last day of FlaRF 2015.
Sunset on the opening day of FlaRF 2015 as seen from our camp. We have the best location on the entire faire site	2015 was crazy. On Saturday of the 5th weekend we got 5 inches of rain in a matter of hours. The entire park was flooded and the faire closed early... But not by much.

The finale of our daily cannon demo is a live mortar shot. The ball is just visible in the smoke. The vertical piece at the rear is a shield to prevent the vent flash from reaching the crowd. The mortar is always a crowd pleaser.	A night shot with the mortar. We glued glow sticks into the finger holes to make the ball visible in flight.
Captain Drake unloads at the First Annual Ft Lauderdale Pirate Festival. We were on a narrow floating dock and had to lash the guns down to make sure they didn't recoil into the water.	Test firing the golf ball mortar. The ball is visible in the center of the picture just above the tree line. We got a 300 yard shot into the lake without using a maximum powder charge.
Downrange from the 3 pounder at Boynton Beach. Photos like this are always from remote controlled cameras.	The Fog of War.
Looking down the muzzle at the very instant of firing. Boynton Beach 2018	Captain Drake firing an echo shot in front of our camp immediately after Sir Robert fired closing at the front gate.
Mr Avery has just given the FIRE command.	A closer view of the mortar. The dark spot in the center of the column of smoke and fire is the bowling ball.
During our show at Flarf, a ghost pirate ship unexpectadly fired at us. We returned fire and hit the powder magazine. It didn't shoot at us again.	One of our mountain howitzers firing the final shot of the last show at the 2021 Boynton Beach Haunted Pirate Fest.

Sir Robert watches while Mistress Cat unloads a one pounder at the 2019 Fort lauderdale Pirate Festival.