Aerial photography tips after first flight [amateur advice]

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On Sun, 03 Jul 2005 14:32:50 GMT, Ryan <quakeserver149@yahoo.com>
wrote:

>An old friend, an 86 year old former WWII B-24 bomber pilot took my
>brother and I to the air yesterday. With my camera and my 80-200 f/2.8
>lens in hand, I was the passenger in the back seat of a Grumman Tiger
>which was purchased in 1980.
>
>It was a courtesy flight in a low wing aircraft and the entrace/exit was
>a sliding canopy. There were no windows which I could open. I would
>normally prefer the front seat I think, but the right seat went to a
>passenger with flight experience.
>
>Per the preference of the pilot, we took off at 8:00 a.m. The air is
>cooler in the morning which means the engine performs better. Living a
>distance away, I arose at 5:30 a.m. Knowing that I am prone to motion
>sickness I had taken some bonine along the way.
>
>After the preflight checks, we taxied down and took off from a small
>unmanned airport. At first I didn't know if I'd find best use out of my
>28-75mm lens or 80-200mm. Soon enough I settled on my 80-200, and not
>too soon because you cover ground rather quickly and you need to be
>ready straight away.
>
>Having studied in advance, I tried not to bounce off the window. The
>windows are curved plexiglas.
>
>If you must shoot through the window try to keep yourself on the shadow
>side of the plane. It's even better if you can have the pilot pitch the
>plane so as to put your window into the shade of the plane. This
>yielded the least visual interference in my photos.
>
>We did slow down and roll back the canopy when I was over my favorite
>farm. Of course you know it will be windy, but wow it's *very* windy!
>I had one pass in which to get that shot. The wind is not very bad if
>the canopy is back only a few inches, but I was in the back so it had to
>go all the way back. This unleashes wind almighty. (The propeller is
>right in front of us) I lined up through a small gap of air behind the
>passenger and in front of the canopy and rattled off pics about as
>quickly as I could. I nailed a few and missed a few due to moving
>around. I stowed my glasses for this and there was so much wind, it was
>hard to keep my eye open while sighting the photos.
>
>I might have tried manual focus set to infinity, but from experience I
>know that I always bang into the focus ring and goof it up.
>
>From what I had studied, I decided to use 1000/sec shutter speed. Using
>shutter priority, this put my aperture usually around f/3.5 at ISO 200.
>In doing so, I gave up the sharpness I may have had at f/9 or f/11, but
>there are so many factors trying to motion blur your photo in the first
>place, I can't imagine anything else working. (Vibration, plane turns,
>turbulence) We flew on a sunny beautiful July morning so the air
>couldn't have been much better.
>
>The windows did start to steam up in the back and thought I was doomed.
>Luckily, the pilot opened the vent.
>
>I had better results when shooting through the closer window rather than
>the farther window. I sat on the right, and got better results through
>the right side windows. With the left window being farther from the
>lens, the interference seems to be a bit closer to being in focus.
>
>In-camera light meters usually assume that the sky is in the top portion
>of your photo. That isn't the case when looking down at the ground, so
>expose accordingly.
>
>In order to look good, all of my photos needed more than the average
>post processing. The left side of the histogram was always left empty
>and I brought up the levels in every case (the right side didn't clip).
>I clipped off a left portion in each circumstance which didn't change
>the photo balance overall, it made the colors richer. Closer
>observation revealed it was only the red channel that I was clipping. I
>made other adjustments as per my preferences. Bumped up the saturation
>a little bit and most every shot looked better with some degree of
>unsharp masking applied. This brings out the vegetation and structure
>lines.
>
>The more I looked downward, the more even were my photos. The more I
>looked toward the horizon, the more gradient existed, which after
>editing yielded a blue effect at the top of the frame. I still makes a
>neat shot, but it is different than normal. This is much more prevalent
>if I am shooting through a window which is sunward lit.
>
>If you've got a pilot with patience that is a big asset. I was just
>along for the ride, so didn't have the ability to assert anything very
>strongly. If I had it to do again, I'd try to circle a property twice.
>Once a complete wider circle without banking much, and then a 2nd
>tighter and closer circle. In my case, we were going around once and I
>had to get what I could. If I were paying for a ride, I'd have the
>pilot go around again, or slowly fly by in a direction that I wanted,
>always favoring my view.
>
>I high wing craft may be easier. This plane has the wing underneath the
>passengers, so the pilot needs to bank, or else you look forward or
>backward for your shot. The ultimate would probably be as others have
>said, get a harness, tether yourself in, and sit in a doorway looking
>out the side. I think you'd need your aviation goggles for this.
>
>The pilot, who knew our parents as little kids, would not accept any
>compensation for the likely $25 in fuel that was burned in 45 minutes.
>Instead, I snapped a few portraits of him sitting in his plane and
>talking. I'm going to print off a few 4x6 and probably a good 5x7 and
>mail them along with my letter of thanks.

Thanks for all the great tips. I have been wondering how to best do
this.

Ted Morton