Aerial Photography

r1flyguy

r1flyguy

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Hi all,

Anyone into aerial photography? other than those lucky enough to sit as rear gunner or navigator of fast jets and the like.

I'm talking photos of local towns, landscapes, etc.

If so, how do you get into it, where/what do you fly in? what camera equipment are you using?

Or are you in a position where you would like to try it?

Any interesting info appreciated


cheers
 
Not personally but I know a man who does a fair bit of it generally from light aircraft...I suspect more and more aerial photography will be done with UAVs as they have become a lot more accessible to the general public, hell I'm thinking of treating myself to one :D
 
As a private pilot I have taken many people up to shoot (all non-commercial) there home town, crop circles, landscapes etc and the costs are not to prohibited. I normal hire a Cessna 172 (because its a high wing plane) for about £140 her hour and just split the costs with the number of passengers, so if there are 3 others with me then its only about £35 per hour each.

Kit wise I'm happy for people to use up to a 70-200mm but most will use a wide angles but this really depends on what's being shot.

I'd suggest you pop along to your nearest flying club/school and ask if anyone is willing to offer they services.

Hope this helps

Ian
 
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I've done it a couple of times from small cessnas. A bit of a pain to do because of the wing supports but as long as you've got a good pilot and enough time for a good few goarounds, it's fine. Polarising filter is pretty important.

The 'pro' way is a helicopter with the door taken off. Check out Jason Hawke's brilliant work over some of the biggest cities in the world, but especially London.

asking your local flying club may or may not work - you need a different license and designation (or something like this, from how it's been explained to me) for the flight if the purpose is aerial photography - however, especially if you're not so particularly after photographing anything in particular, a trial lesson might give you the opportunity to get some snaps :)
 
Hi all thanks for the replies,

I think I need to be clearer,

This what I actually fly for a living,


Untitled by r1flyguy, on Flickr


And in my spare time at EGBW



I'm actually interested in taking decent shots from aircraft and holding a commercial Licence I'm legal to actually be paid to fly ;) but that's not the point of the post, more so, I was wondering if there was anyone, amateur or otherwise who did this and what lens they used or if anyone fancied coming along for a flight one day to try it out.

EGBW is the code for Wellesbourne Mountford by the way which is within a short hop of the Cotswolds & Malvern Hills
:)
 
Hey Matthew, good to hear from you again, hope your well.

If you fancy meeting up for a flight give me a shout, ill only charge you in the way of advice ha ha

Actually I was at Wellesbourne the other day and my little lad was asleep in the back of the car so parked up at the emergency services RVP car park and noted near the tower was a WWII style aircraft (some distance away you see ;)) I watched it depart and then do a low fly by only to discover it was a spitfire....
Gutted my lad was asleep as I would have been over to it like a shot and drooling

An iPhone video of its departure that I took does not do it justice lol
 
I'm not bad thanks :)...I'm sure we could sort something out :)....I'm not bad not been able to do much for the last couple of months due to a bit of a car crash putting me out of action with a dodgy ankle, but that's starting to get better now :)
 
I'm on a flight at least twice a week, either between Riyadh <=> Jeddah (Saudi Arabia), or Riyadh <=> London; and due to this excessive travel and my photography hobby decided to do aerial landscapes ... For this I use my Leica M9, M now, along with any of them fast lenses f/2 or faster.

As I'm shooting through a window that will, most likely have condensation / frost / dirt on it, the wide aperture will clear it out as I focus at a hypothetical subject a few meters away.

The compactness of the Leica, and then tiny manual focus lens, means I'm not in any awkward posture as I compose through the passenger windows. Lenses I use depend on what I'd like to compose for, but given the distances they don't make a lot of difference really, I use 75/1.8, 50/1.5 and / or 35/1.4 ... with the 35/1.4 I need to concentrate a lot harder to ensure that I don't get any of the window frame in the shot.

To ensure that I get great land shots, I book my flights for late afternoon, whenever I can, this way by the time the flight takes off and levels it's almost sunset, which yields amazing shadows.

All that said, I'm not a pilot and don't have the luxury of shooting out go the cockpit ... and I'm not too sure the visibility / view is any better in them large airliners?!?
 
Wail said:
All that said, I'm not a pilot and don't have the luxury of shooting out go the cockpit ... and I'm not too sure the visibility / view is any better in them large airliners?!?
Click to expand...

I have the best view in the world, sometimes ;)


Tokyo at night by r1flyguy, on Flickr


RWY 16R Narita Int by r1flyguy, on Flickr




Only just getting to grips with the basics of photography, every days a learning curve
 
The night shot of Tokyo, that's pure yumminess ... So too is he causeway.

Yup, I'd say you've got the bet seat & view for sure.
 
r1flyguy said:
Awesome, I'm sure I've seen a few vids of RAC rallies using similar
Click to expand...

Just incredible what they can do, how much they can carry, where they can go, how easy to fly. I think there's a small mountain of health & safety and legal regs heading their way though.
 
HoppyUK said:
Just incredible what they can do, how much they can carry, where they can go, how easy to fly. I think there's a small mountain of health & safety and legal regs heading their way though.
Click to expand...

Still not quite as cool as shooting from the front seat of a B744 at 38,000ft :D
 
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I had a go once. First time going up in a chopper with the doors removed got the heart rate pumping!
 
great post and you really do have the best view in the world!!
 
aha, wow, apologies, my post may have come across as aimed *slightly* below you, haha! Great pictures, you must get some amazing sights.
 
....I used to to do a bit on the Isle of wight with Archeological unit. Shooting out of a 152 shooting Infrared at fields etc . Bit cramped for me. A PA 28 is a sqeeze. We used to fly out of Wellebourne a lot and go to Cowes week.

r1 FLY guy do you know David LaMaitre. He is a member at one of the clubs there. We fly with Dave now and a gain....

I'd rather be a Pilot than a full time tog..... I'll go up with you any time you want too
 
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Hi Daryl,

Haven't come across the name.

There's a few clubs there, the main ones being 'Take Flight' where I'm a member, Aeros & South Warwickshire Flying School who's club is next to the Vulcan and O-Track.

Agree on the 152, better for photography but too cramped, I fly 28's as they ave no twins at Wellesbourne.

I'll drop you a PM with more notice next time I go as I'm going tomorrow at midday, but no doubt Ill go again in the Second week of December so I'll give you a shout.
Would be good to see what kind of photos you can achieve unless your just coming along for sight seeing :)
 
Some great shots there, I think some of them could be further bettered with a few tweaks.

Whenever I take shots through plane windows I find the results need a contrast boost. I do get a bit carried away with the contrast sometimes,

This is an example at 34000ft over India last month with a 5DII and 50mm 1.8:


Cloud Bomb by ACW#, on Flickr

This shot is stopped right down to f/6.3 and a shutter speed of 1250th. Apart from the occasional dirty window, I don't usually find any need to shoot wide open at f/2.8 f/1.8 and the like.

Then this is an example taken with my humble point and shoot over Arizona:


Somewhere over Arizona by ACW#, on Flickr

This was f/5.0 on the compact, so plenty of depth of field.

The point and shoot didn't capture as much detail, and there wasn't as much room for image adjustments but as a window snapper I think it held up ok.

Both had a fair dose of slider movement in Lightroom.

What kind of adjustments do have you tried on yours?
 
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I hope you don't mind as your edit box is ticked, I had a play around with one of yours.

It was two clicks and a graduated ND for the sky.

Maybe I've gone a tad too far with the example, but I think it shows how much detail is still in the image.

Before:


After:
8386002879_2d640d6f66_o_2.jpg
4

Results could be a lot better if you edit with the RAW files :)
 
Can you please explain what you did, besides the Grad. ND; I'm particular cursor as how you got rid of the haze ... if you don't mind :)
 
Someone did this around my area taking pictures of the surroundings then went round all the houses afterwards selling his shots. There was some nice stuff he had of my house and the surroundings. I bought two pictures lol.
 
Hi Adam,

Nice edit

I'm not long into photography so other than basic editing on iPhoto there's not much more I can tell you!!!

I'm learning as I go basically and picking up tips on here as you do

Here's a couple I took on Saturday, kinda rushed & heavily cropped, sharpened, contrast & saturation increased.
From 2500' up and Was using my 650D with 15-85 lens.


Worcestershire Race Course

Untitled by r1flyguy, on Flickr


Ragley Hall

IMG_6594-2 by r1flyguy, on Flickr


Shakespeare Theatre & Riverside


IMG_6614-2 by r1flyguy, on Flickr
 
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Wail said:
Can you please explain what you did, besides the Grad. ND; I'm particular cursor as how you got rid of the haze ... if you don't mind :)
Click to expand...

Hi Wail,

Although my aim was to boost the contrast look, I actually left the exposure and contrast sliders on 0.

General:
+13 on the temperature
+20 on the tint
-21 on the highlights
+60 on the shadows
+100 on the clarity
+31 vibrance
+11 saturation

Tone curve:
-2 highlights
+7 lights
+4 darks
-20 shadows

I have it already saved as a custom preset, so literally two clicks and it was set. If you use Adobe Lightroom I can email the preset over to you. Hope that helps :)

The amount of flying you do I bet you've got a whole treasure trove of shots!
 
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r1flyguy said:
Hi Adam,

Nice edit

I'm not long into photography so other than basic editing on iPhoto there's not much more I can tell you!!!

I'm learning as I go basically and picking up tips on here as you do

Here's a couple I took on Saturday, kinda rushed & heavily cropped, sharpened, contrast & saturation increased.
From 2500' up and Was using my 650D with 15-85 lens.
Click to expand...

Good shots, lovely views. Very jealous! Slight bit of haze that could probably come out with post processing.

You say heavily cropped, are you finding the 85mm a bit short for the results you're after?

I've occasionally used the 70-200 which I find can be good for detail shots if you plan on adding any other lenses to your collection. You've got the length combined with the 2.8 aperture making it feasible for night detail shots too.
 
I think the 15-85 is a bit short for shots at 2500 feet, I can go lower but as it was my first sortie with my camera in a light aircraft I thought I would just take a few shots, adjust for conditions and take a few more.

A 70-200 2.8 is on my list and once I can afford it, justify it & actually do it justice, I'll purchase one lol


It was a little hazy,

With the crisp winter days coming, the shots 'may' get better.
 
This chap Damian is a contact of mine on Flickr, he does a fair amount of aerial work so maybe able to offer you some tips and advise, he has always been extremely helpful to me in the past :)

http://www.flickr.com/people/tupperware_pilot/
 
wow! those aerial pics are awesome, think I need to hire a local cess, I would like to use a gopro mounted somewhere outside the aircraft, then use the remote to control video and stills, I'm wondering would the pilot allow this if at all possible?
 
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ACW said:
Hi Wail,

Although my aim was to boost the contrast look, I actually left the exposure and contrast sliders on 0.

General:
+13 on the temperature
+20 on the tint
-21 on the highlights
+60 on the shadows
+100 on the clarity
+31 vibrance
+11 saturation

Tone curve:
-2 highlights
+7 lights
+4 darks
-20 shadows

I have it already saved as a custom preset, so literally two clicks and it was set. If you use Adobe Lightroom I can email the preset over to you. Hope that helps :)

The amount of flying you do I bet you've got a whole treasure trove of shots!
Click to expand...


Thank you very much for the detailed feedback :thumbs: ... Lightroom is what I use, and only use, for all my PP; if you don't mind, I shall send you my email in PM :)

Unfortunately, while I travel a lot, I want to cut that down as it is taking a toll on me physically, socially, and mentally. That said, yes, I got some really lovely aerial landscapes over Saudi, Red Sea, Mediterranean, parts of Europe, and UK (leading into London). Naturally, Lightroom does all the digital asset management for me; but the problem is trying to find the time to process and choose what can be keepers :(

Again, thank you very much for the detailed feedback :)
 
Good photos, I normally only use a drone to do my photoshooting in the air. Never try to shoot photos from a flight.
 
Barney Strumble said:
wow! those aerial pics are awesome, think I need to hire a local cess, I would like to use a gopro mounted somewhere outside the aircraft, then use the remote to control video and stills, I'm wondering would the pilot allow this if at all possible?
Click to expand...

I know some of the go pro mounts are tested up to 100 mph but not sure how much more!
Basic Cessna's and Warriors cruise between 90-120'ish wind & aircraft type pending.

There's a couple of locations you can mount one, maybe the tie-down hooks underneath the wing etc, another option would be to 'make' a holder that fits over the fuel cap so its clamped down when you put the cap on!!!
I've never done it, other than from the inside of the 744 cockpit as I don't fancy seeing a £300 GoPro disappearing into the agriculture a few thousand feet below me ;)
 
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