Aviation photography

M

Mike150

Senior Member
D70S said:
dang, do you guys have airshows every weekend?
Click to expand...

I go to the Naval station airshow down near Norfolk Va every year. It's 130 mile drive each way but worth it. There are also some local airports that have little mini shows throughout the year.

I forgot to mention one other thing in an earlier post. If you are going to use a CPL filter, don't wear polarized sunglasses. It really screws up what you see in the viewfinder.
 
M

m4ilm4n

Senior Member
D70S said:
dang, do you guys have airshows every weekend?
Click to expand...

I live two miles from the Flying Circus so every Sunday afternoon in summer is a free air show, and its 3 miles from the county airport that's home to the DC Region of the International Aerobatic Association, so even more stuff from that, plus I work a few miles from Dulles airport and the Smithsonian Udvar-Hazy museum (the Discovery flew over my office this past spring) - if you like aircraft, this is a pretty good place to be. At least I like to think so....
 
AC016

AC016

Senior Member
Here are some more. These are Squadron insignias. No, these were not taken with my D5100 or even an SLR. There was no such thing as a D5100 back in the early '90's!! lol:) All my film shots were taken with simple 35mm P&S cameras.

View attachment 17403
View attachment 17404
View attachment 17405
View attachment 17406
View attachment 17407
View attachment 17408
View attachment 17409
View attachment 17410
View attachment 17411
View attachment 17412
View attachment 17413
View attachment 17414
View attachment 17415
View attachment 17416
View attachment 17417
View attachment 17418
View attachment 17419
View attachment 17420
View attachment 17421
View attachment 17422
 
M

mac66

Senior Member
Hi, new here,

Was searching for this info, as going to an airshow next week. Anxious to try out these settings. Don't have the zoom, but will see what I can do with 55mm
 
M

mac66

Senior Member
Was at an airshow last week and ran into a pro-photog. He had a nice Canon with 200zoom, I have Nikon D-3100 with 18-55mm. Couldn't get the Nikon to focus on overflights. He had me change the metering to matrix and use the auto setting. Something about the Nikon, that it has great difficulty focusing in bright light, on auto. Got some decent shots of static aircraft, but overflights were overblown. Any ideas?
 
L

Lee532

Senior Member
For aviation photography I use AF-Continuous and either single point for one aircraft or nine points for a formation. The camera then stays focused on the subject as you rattle off a burst of shots.
I normally shoot manual so I can set the shutter speed and aperture but leave the ISO in auto and set up a max ISO that you don't want the camera to exceed.
I use centre weighted metering as the sky will always be brighter than the underside of the aircraft and shoot in RAW so I can bring up the shadows later in post processing.
For prop aircraft you want a slower shutter speed so you can blur the movement of the prop, usually around 1/200th. For jets I usually up my speed to between 1/600th and 1/1000th depending on the light available.
Hope that helps.

RAF Typhoon Finals by Lee532, on Flickr

Typhoon Finals by Lee532, on Flickr

Typhoon Approach by Lee532, on Flickr
 
T

TedG954

Senior Member
An oldie, but goodie. I shoot 'em on the ground...

Liberator.jpg
 
M

mac66

Senior Member
Great advice, thanks!

I don't have a zoom only 18-55mm, so see what I can do. Hopefully, I can get closer, lol! Love your jets!!
 
M

mac66

Senior Member
Being former Air Force, and a lifelong aviation nut, love your pics. Took a gander at your Flikr. Was stationed in England in mid-sixties and have a couple of old B&W images of the Vulcan. Another fav was the RAF Lightning. ;)
 
L

Lee532

Senior Member
mac66 said:
Great advice, thanks!

I don't have a zoom only 18-55mm, so see what I can do. Hopefully, I can get closer, lol! Love your jets!!
Click to expand...
Thanks Mac, you will struggle for in flight shots with the 18-55 and if you are looking to do more aviation photography I would definitely look at getting a longer lens.
 
M

mac66

Senior Member
Yeah realize that, so got an extra battery for my video camera. That said, I'll take a ton of photo's of static displays and play around with moving settings on the Nikon. (Airshow is next week and will post some pics) ;)
 
Top