Airshow Advice
 

Hi all, I may be going to Duxford for the Autumn Air Show on Sunday 8th October 2006, Can you give me any advice on taking pics especially metering, which lens to use etc.
I have a D200, 300mm VR 2.8 and 70-200mm VR 2.8 and TC1.7

Cheers

I would take either lens, but if you take the 70-200 do take the tc. The tank bank is a good location as it is elevated and the aeroplanes taxi right past you and you also catch them taking off, or landing depending on which runway they use.

We are considering two of my preferred lens solutions. I have superb images from both. I find 70-200 with 1.7X TC (340mm f4.8) usable at effective f8 as the primary lens will be near f5.6, its sweet spot. However 70-200 at f2.8 is soft but sharpens quickly at f3.5/4 , using a TC at the point where the primary lens is poor is not a good idea. When I use this combination weather must be bright and I use aperture priority - not a good idea to get decent prop blur from those warbirds at Duxford. 300mm f2.8 is an excellent lens, I am sure this is already known however it attracts attention and maybe difficult to use in a crowd, 300mm will be adequate at Duxford but 340-400 perfect depending what you want and where you decide to set 'base camp'.

Be aware that Duxford has runway headings 24/06 and the crowdline will be on the North side so the sun will be in your face and lens until 4pm or so. On top of that the Autumn show will have the lowest sun so silhouette/backlit shots will be the order of the day. Please do read this wrong post 4pm the lighting will be good and excellent shots will result. As Ollie suggests the bank near the tank museum might be best for lighting as it you will be shooting to the East so sun will come round faster in effect.

Now, metering mode - with these lenses I find metering very accurate so matrix mode will be spot on.

Hope this help, dont forget to share your photos when you return!

Ollie and Stephen, thanks for you excellent advice. That's not good news as far as the lighting go's hopefully after 4pm there will be lots to see. Not sure what you mean heading 24/06 does that mean north/south?

Stephen do you mean the sweet spot for the 70-200 + TC1.7 is @ F8 or F5.6? I tend to struggle a bit with lens getting shots near to the 300mm VR sharpness. I know I cannot expect the same sharpness though.

Cheers

24/06 is the direction of the runway is if you where a compass i believe. Stephan will be able to give you a better anser, he does fly himself.

70-200VR f2.8 is soft at f2.8 but increases in sharpness quickly at f4, by f5.6 the lens is very sharp on a par with 300VR f2.8. If a teleconverter is put behind any lens sharpness will decrease and CA (chromatic aberration) will increase. If you operate the camera in aperture priority aiming at f5.6 for the primary lens (effective f9.5 shown on the camera with 1.5 stop loss on TC17) then you will achieve nice results but life is a compromise so I suggest aperture priority at f7.1 where the primary lens will be approx f4.5 - sharp enough.

Airfields that have a single strip tarmac or otherwise offer two runways and the numbers are magnetic headings to the nearest 10 degrees. Runway 24 (240) is the magnetic heading of one runway and as the prevailing wind is from the west (270) this is the most likely to be in use on any day but if conditions favour 06 (060) then the will use the opposite direction as 060 is the reciprocal of 240 on a compass.

Now, back to Duxford. The display line (A-axis) will run along 240/060 degrees and the crowdline is on the North side of this line. As the sun rises in the East and sets in the West travelling through South the sun will be in your face and force back-light conditions until such time when the Sun travelling through South to West goes beyond 240 degrees, at that point approx 4pm lighting will be favourable. In July the Sun is not as great a problem as in Autumn as the Sun is higher in July but becoming low in October. Therefore directly in your eyes until 4pm or so.

Hope this helps.

I have never been to an Autumn show at Duxford but I have been to the September show once or twice and lighting was becoming a problem for photography.

I used just a 70-200 F2.8 without any converter at DX for Legends back in July and got some good results. The bank adjacent to the Land Warfare museum is the best spot to shoot from using your 200mm. The aircraft tend to take off and do their display run in over this point, and they pass close enough for the either the 70-200 or 300 to be more than adequate without the converter, but don’t expect to be able to see the pilots tonsils.

Unless the weather is very dull I use an ISO of 100, set the shutter speed at 1/90 in TV and pan with the target. You’ll get good “disc” prop blur at this shutter range.

Good luck

Thanks for all you help on this, hopefully I will get some nice sharp pictures with the 70-200.

Cheers

Good luck with it. I look forward to seing some results.

I may go to Old Warden Airshow coming up on the 23rd Sept or 1st Oct for a tester. I guess the planes will by travelling at a considirably slower speed so probably be good practice?

Cheers