RAF air photography has come a long way from faltering beginnings over the trenches of the Western Front during World War I, when unwieldy plate cameras were fixed on the cockpit sides of Royal Aircraft Factory BE2 biplanes. By the close of World War II, dedicated photo-reconnaissance Spitfires could photograph the enemy by day, while Mosquitoes could operate by day or night from heights up to 36,000 feet. With the quantum leap in recent decades of...