Aerial Photogrpahy - Tips?

chewed

I've been working on creating a local coummunity website for my village. I may have an oppotunity to go up on a light aircraft and take some aerial shots of the village and surrounding areas.

Has anyone got any good tips on how to get the best shots, type of lens I should use, best weather conditions, etc?

I have a Canon 50D with a 24-70mm usm lens. Should I be using a good wide angle lens?

CabanSail

Not having done any successful Aerial Photography, but from not doing it well & being a pilot when others have done it poorly.

The choice of aircraft is vital. I used to fly a Piper PA28, which was lovely for flying but terrible as a photo platform. It was low wing & you could not open a window, so were always shooting through plexiglass, which makes the image look blurred & flat. Something like a Cessna 172/182 is better. It has a High Wing & you can open the windows out (very noisy & windy). If you have a really cooperative person it is possible to have the right door removed, but it is unlikely that they will do this.

Assuming it is a high wing & the window is open, you will need to get the pilot to do a right turn over the area you want to photograph. You will not want to go too wide as you will then get struts, wing etc. in the frame, so the 24-70 will do fine. Shoot at a high shutter speed, as there will be lots of vibration, IS or VR can assist here. I would probably go for shutter speed at least 2x the focal length. You can open the aperture up if you are shooting down as you will not require a lot of DOF.

Weather is the other aspect. A clear day is best of course. You will get different types of shots depending on the height of the sun. At this time of the year the sun is never really overhead, so it will give you shadows the add definition to the shot. If you can get up closer to first or last light you will get some interesting shots as the shadows stand out. You may need to bump up the ISO though. On the rare occasions in Ireland when the sky is overcast the light will be diffused & shadows will not stand out. Not much you can do about that.

Xiney

I've never done arial photography, but a zoom may be more suitable for a small village, unless you're able to control the height of the aircraft.

You'd want to fill as much of the frame with village as possible of course, and if you go up too high with too wide a prime, you'll have a whole lotta nothing (well, countryside) in the frame.

Also, with the zoom, you'll be able to focus in on arial views of important buildings.

chewed

Thanks for the tips! I think it's going to be a high wing cessna so that will help in not having the wings in the shot. Also, the good thing is that the airfield is 1 mile from the village, so we'll be flying low enough to get a decent shot of the area. I'm hoping it will be a nice day....may have to wait until March/April though!

I'll post the shots up here (if they're any good).

Dodgykeeper

The most important thing about Ariel Photography is to have someone else shooting with you , in case you miss the shot, this person should shoot Nikon and be very apreciative of lads that get him up in light Aircraft, and buy pints after...............

Where shall we meet?

CabanSail

Thanks for that but I am OK.

Unless you meant someone else?

ThOnda

And get some inspiration on location selection.

Valentia

I've been lucky enough to take shots a few times from a helicopter and once from a balloon. If you are doing shots of a village or community I would suggest that you do a variety of wide and specific. Close up shots like the church, school, local landmarks, the old graveyard. individual housing estates. Then do a range of wide shots from different directions. Include rivers and streams. It is always interesting to follow a river's path from the air. If you have a choice of tines early morning or latish evening is best I think. The shadows will give relief to the hills and ditches. If you can get a bigger zoom small details like cattle in the field or intersections in a bust field can create amazing images. I'm thinking about something like these: