[Theme] Planes, Trains and Automobiles

[MFloyd]

During refueling, I noticed this beautiful acrobacy plane, the Extra 330 SC; in the background a vintage North American T6, and ... the Alps with the Mont Blanc:


Nikon D5, Nikkor 18-35mm f/4 @ 25mm f/9 1/400 ISO 100

Taking off from Grenoble-Versoud  (Savoie - French Alps); a myriad of insects decided to gather on the canopy; but we had lovely weather:


HDR, 2 pictures with one 2 stops overexposed to compensate for the cockpit; 12 frames/s to minimize misalignment.
Nikon D5, Nikkor 18-35mm f/4 @ 19 f/10 1/125-1/30 ISO 100

[Peter McLennan]

Perfectly executed HDR, MFloyd.  You can't tell.

[MFloyd]

Thank you Peter, very kind 😊

And herewith some other pictures:


A vintage Curtis during an air show in France (La Ferté Allais)


Pilatus P-2-06


And another Extra 330 SC of the French Air Force

[Jakov Minić]

MFloyd, these are super crisp and clear. I love them!
You don't see plane shots with pilots in them so vividly as you managed to capture them!

[MFloyd]

Thank you Jakov, but the credit should go to my son, who is a professional pilot. I only did the postproduction.  Pictures taken with a D610 and the "Swiss Knife" Nikkor 28-300mm f/3.5-5.6.

[knb]

1. Spitfire takeoff
2. Hurricane in flight
3. Spitfire wing

[MFloyd]

I like very much the wing of the Spit 😊

[knb]

I like very much the wing of the Spit 😊

Thanks MFloyd, I think I like that one best too. The other two are pretty conventional.

I notice that you have some astonishing pictures here. I find it hard to get decent pictures of propeller aircrafts from the ground (due to the necessary long(ish) exposures). It would be nice to have the opportunity to take pictures from another plane, but that is not going to happen anytime soon I think.

The Rafale in the second post is very nicely done too.

[frankv]

Just back from a week in Italy, including the Monza Grand Prix. Have a few hundred files to cull, sort and process. But I have to present a quick edit of Lewis Hamilton during FP3 on saturday. Working on my panning skills.

[Peter Connan]

Beautiful photos everyone!

Some humdrum from me.

For several years, I have used shutter speeds as slow as I think might give me a few "keepers", and perhaps a couple of stops slower in hope of a minor miracle.

Looking at MFloyd's work, I am questioning the sanity of this decision. Seeing as I obviously can't maintain reasonable sharpness at shutter speeds slow enough to get a full prop disc, perhaps there's no point in using a shutter speedany slower than is necessary to show some motion?

[MFloyd]

End of September, I was at the beautiful Spa-Francorchamps race track (Belgium) to follow the European Le Mans Serie (ELMS) 4 hour endurance race, together with some other races:


Renault series


ELMS GTE Series


GT3 series


ELMS P2 series


ELMS P3 series

All pictures taken with Nikon D5; lenses: Nikkor 300mm f/2.8 VR II; Nikkor 28-300mm f/3.5-5.6; Nikkor TC20-E III (with the 300mm); Main exposure: ISO 100-200 1/320s f/8-11; AFC: group area. No "speed" Ps post-processing - all natural -; some Ps processing to remove fences.

Other images are visible here http://www.flickr.com/photos/110731726@N07/sets/72157673402782172

[benveniste]

My brother-in-law at the NASA nationals held at Watkins Glen.

[MFloyd]

....

For several years, I have used shutter speeds as slow as I think might give me a few "keepers", and perhaps a couple of stops slower in hope of a minor miracle.

Looking at MFloyd's work, I am questioning the sanity of this decision. Seeing as I obviously can't maintain reasonable sharpness at shutter speeds slow enough to get a full prop disc, perhaps there's no point in using a shutter speedany slower than is necessary to show some motion?

For cars I try to stay around 1/250-1/320s: longer, you can have beautiful effects but your keepers will dramatically fall off. For propeller planes, you might to go as low as 1/80s as in the next picture; the main secret is to focus on a part of the plane (group focus is excellent for this) and have it to remain on the same spot of the frame. In some cases I do not hesitate to apply Ps "speed" processing, but it is very labour intensive to make the propellers turn again (as well as the wheels), and will rarely match the quality of a natural speed blur.


Boeing B-17 bomber taken at 1/80s (Nikon D4s and Nikkor 28-300mm f/3.5-5.6) NO Ps post processing

To the contrary the picture (#3 of this thread) of the Dassault Rafale is totally post-processed

[Jakov Minić]

Frank Vevik and MFloyd, I remember the days when I used to go to Monza and Spa-Francorschamps chasing the crazy F1 circus. I have to say I miss it dearly and your photos brought back the memories.
I just refuse to go to tracks and watch 4 cylinder 1.6 liter hybrids, call me old-fashioned...

[MFloyd]

Don't worry, in the European Le Mans Series LMP2 series, you have fat V8 4.5 litre Nissan engines ....