The Blue Angels

The Blue Angels were in town this weekend, along with several other air-filled entertainment acts who performed at the Jones Beach Air Show. I try to make it there every year to check out the awesome planes in action and hopefully get some great images. For the first time, I was able to take my son Christopher with me and he loved it.

We headed over to the beach on Friday to check out the planes at the practice session. The practice session is cool because you pretty much get the full air show without the weekend crowds and traffic. It really is awesome and Chris was loving it. Armed with headphones to protect his ears and sun block to protect his skin, he was ready to see some fast-flying jets and acrobatic prop planes. I love to photograph these air shows. Chris and I get to relive the experience when we get home and review the images.

 

 

 

 

 

This type of photography is very different from the event style photography I am used to. It brings a whole new set of challenges, but the fundamentals are very important. Just about every setting on my camera is different from how it is usually set. Metering mode, shutter speed, aperture, focus drive, focus points, and advanced picture settings are all critical to capturing good images and these settings all well thought out in advance.

These planes move a lot faster than the bride and groom coming down the aisle or people dancing at a wedding reception. They are moving anywhere from 300-800 mph. Focusing on these planes is tough if you plan on getting some close up shots. You can’t use the single shot mode because by the time you achieve focus lock on the subject, when the shutter opens, it is already out of focus. they’re that quick. I use a combination of manual focus and AI Servo. AI Servo is an auto focus mode that allows you to follow a moving subject and keep sharp focus on whatever subject is moving in the frame. Beware of birds flying around in your frame when shooting into the sky. This may throw off the focus. That’s why I choose manual focus most of the time.

Another obvious factor in which to give serious consideration is that you are shooting into the sky. If you do this while the camera is set on program mode or any type of creative mode where the camera chooses the aperture or shutter speed based on the metered scene, you will usually end up with an image that is seriously underexposed. This is because the sky is very bright. The camera will stop down the exposure so the sky is not too hot and this will in turn make the subject that much darker. You can still use creative modes (I prefer aperture priority).  You just have to use exposure compensation. I actually used aperture priority mode for most of the shots I took, with +1 2/3 or +2 stops exposure compensation. The exposure changes slightly while moving around constantly, so the camera figures out the exposure and adds 2 stops to whatever it figures is correct. This works pretty well.

I also usually always use a center focus point and spot metering when shooting events if i’m using using auto focus. I focus lock on certain spots and adjust composition after I lock focus and exposure. While shooting these planes, I used a center-weighed metering mode with more focus points because I could not adjust composition and I did not always want the subject in the center of the frame.

It is fun to change things up a bit. Not to mention, enjoy a beautiful day with some great company. I hope whoever is reading this enjoys the pictures. Happy Summer!