Tips for photographing airplanes and airshows

I have been interested in airplanes all my life so no wonder I have taken good amount of photos of them. Yesterday I visited RAF Leuchars air show and I have been going through my photos and videos of it. There are couple tips I learnt from others and by experiment.

Stationary planes are pretty easy and interesting subjects. Plenty of details and shapes to photograph but in case of museums the lack light is sometimes a problem. Many museums do not allow tripods so fast lenses with stabilizers are handy. At the airshows there are many stationary planes outdoors so no need to worry about lack of light. In many occasions it is possible to join a tour to get a look inside. Switch to wider and faster lens for inside shots as the interiors are cramped and dimly lit.

Flying planes are then a bit different case. Usually there is enough light but you are far away and planes are moving fast sometimes. A decent telephoto lens is necessary here and its focal length should reach at least 200 mm. A good place to practice is the local civil airport with airliners landing and taking off. Depending of your local law and regulations it might be illegal to photograph airport so check that before ending up arrested.

Planes landing and taking off are quite easy to photograph. I use continuos focusing (AI Servo in Canon) with the center point and I keep plane's cockpit under the point. In case of jet planes the shutter speed can be set quite fast depending how much motion blur is wanted for the background. With 200 mm focal length I would use at least 1/500s. Prop planes need slower shutter speed because too fast shutter speed freezes propellers and that looks awkward. I usually photograph propeller planes with shutter speed of 1/200 - 1/250s. Helicopters have even slower rotating blades so you need to find balance between motion blur and general sharpness.

Airshows have fast military jets and planes performing aerobatics. These are much louder so pair of ear plugs might be needed. Fast flying planes require faster shutter speeds in order to get sharp photos. The alternative is to shoot continuously and hope that one of the photos is a good one. The downside is the amount of photos, I usually take ten or more photos of a single pass and that means I end up having 100-200 photos of a single performance. A day at the airshow equals around 1500-2000 photos. Sorting those is not a matter of couple minutes.

Aerobatics with smoke trails are visually impressive and it helps to know the routine a bit. Videos from previous airshows can be found from youtube and those help to find out when and where are the climax moments. Prepare, shoot a burst and hope the best.

With 550D I had the chance to take video as well. Changing between still and video roles is not that simple and I lost some nice spots. In order to switch to video I had to attach the camera on a tripod, turn off lens stabilizer (ruins panning), switch camera mode, check exposure and focus the lens. The microphone on 550D picks wind very easily so the audio turned out to be mostly useless. Tracking fast moving planes performing loops and break turns requires practice and space around the tripod. Not that easy at the packed display line.

RAF Leuchars 2010 photos
RAF Leuchars 2010 videos
Edinburgh East Fortune 2010 photos