Your flight instructions guide
 

Welcome to our flight Archive. Have fun browsing!

 

Article #156: A digital photo shooting session of airplanes in an air show

(Browse for more articles)

 
A few weeks ago I went with my friends to that evening I saw the results of my
see an air show. The schedule was packed tired grip - the later digital photos
with acrobatics and many types of planes. were not as sharp and steady as the
The highlight of the show was the blue earlier ones.
angles with their jets doing dangerous When I saw the results of my work my
routines. I took my camera hoping to reaction was to go and get those fancy
capture some good digital memories of lenses with an image stabilizer built-in
that show. them. There are two types of image
I took my digital SLR camera to the air stabilizer one that moves the sensor and
show. I put it in my special camera bag one that actually uses gyroscopes in the
alongside an extra battery and lenses. I lens to move a floating optical element
used an eight mega pixels DSLR with a that compensates for shakings. The latter
100-300mm zoon lenses. is more expensive and provides better
I decided to shoot as many photos as I results. I saw some people walking around
could knowing from my experience that in with the Canon image stabilizing zoom
such cases the rule of big numbers works lens I am not sure how effective it was
very well - shoot as many photos as you for them but it sure did look impressive.
can and you might be able to find a few There are also drawbacks to using image
photos which are really unique. So when stabilizers and actually some of these
the airplanes started to fly around I drawbacks are very relevant to my air
pointed my camera at them and from that show photo shooting. Moving the camera
point on I watched most of the air show erratically to track an acrobatic
through my camera's viewfinder. airplane can confuse the image stabilizer
I set my camera to automatic continuous that can detect that movement as being
focus. I had my finger holding the unwanted shakings and try to compensate
shutter button half way down most of the for it. If I had an image stabilizer I
time while I am moving the camera to would have had to use different practices
track those fast flying airplanes. I when shooting my photos like trying to
could hear the camera's motors working pan the camera on one axis and at a more
hard moving the optical components in the or less constant speed.
lens back and forth to keep the focus Overall I was able to choose some great
right. I also set the camera to burst photos of airplanes flying around doing
mode so whenever I decided the acrobatics very close to each other,
composition was worth shooting a photo it airplanes with some birds flying in what
actually shot a fast sequence of four seems to be in the photo as very close
photos. The idea behind that was first to proximity and other digital photos of
get more photos to choose from - with airplanes in different situations. These
fast flying planes these four photos were will serve as good memories of that air
really different from each other - and show and as a lesson for getting better
second to maybe be able to capture some equipped in my next air show digital
motion in a sequence of photos. photo shooting.
As time passed my hands got tired from More information on digital photo
holding the camera and my stable grip was printing and photography is available on
not as stable anymore. Unfortunately I - a site about digital photo print
did not bring a tripod - and probably I service Ziv Haparnas is an expert
would have not used it even if I had it technology writer. Mr. Haparnas writes
since it is hard to track airplanes about practical technology and science
flying above using one especially when issues. This article can be reprinted as
you are with thousands of people walking long as the resource box including the
around you. When I looked at the photos backlink is included.






1 - A - B - C - D - 2 - 3 - 4 - 5 - 6 - 7 - 8 - 9 - 10 - 11 - 12 - 13 - 14 - 15 - 16 - 17 - 18 - 19 - 20 - 21 - 22 - 23 - 24 - 25 - 26 - 27 - 28 - 29 - 30 - 31 - 32 - 33 - 34 - 35 - 36 - 37 - 38 - 39 - 40 - 41 - 42 - 43 - 44 - 45 - 46 - 47 - 48 - 49 - 50 - 51 - 52 - 53 - 54 -