General Discussion

I love when I’m afforded an opportunity to explain how I approach given photograph(s), it means I’ve made something special or at least someone curious. Although, I’m not sure the questioner is happy they asked after I do a detailed TMI data dump, lol.

On this day, I was at a doctor’s appointment in south Tampa, but was watching for the departure, time not publicized. Luckily, my appointment was over and departures were to the south or I would never have made it to a location for a northern departure. I had to scramble and find a location after AF1 began to squawk on the runway. I found a spot on the Causeway between Tampa and Clearwater, so I was literally at sea level, and just took the shots I could at about 3nm. I was so surprised at how good they turned out. I have included a link to a slideshow of many, but not all, of this particular type photo as well as a link to all my airplane shots.

I did not have my long 1200mm lens, which is what I normally use for this type photo, only a 500mm, so there is a lot more sky than I prefer. All the other examples in the slidedeck are with the longer lens. This proves my opinion the best camera and lens is the one you have with you, and just being there is most important of all.

The trick to this series of photos is that AF1 is banking to the right while climbing, which lowers the wing to my plane of view and makes it look as though I am level with or above. This is something I specialize in and really enjoy, finding locations where this is possible and predictable, immersing myself in flight paths as seen from the ground, by mapping them on Google Earth. Searching for public spaces with an appropriate angle of view to that flight path, generally 30 deg or less, to no more than 45 deg (which is approaching belly shot territory), and no more than 3000’ in altitude, before gear down or after gear up, where I can lurk without being arrested (parks and commercial parking lots). Probably the most important filter then is, finding the funnel point where planes from all directions must bank to line up with or depart from, in this case 1L/R south or 19L/R north. In the best of cases this puts me on the same plane of view as the wing. Another trick with a long lens at great distance, say 3 to 5 nm, geometry gives the appearance of being almost level with the airplane. Simple in concept, difficult in practice, and I should mention the locations change per time of day, must always have the sun to your back.

This is the flight path of AF1 departing TPA, I am the black dot.


This is my Google Earth research and lurk map:


This is my slideshow “flying alongside”
https://jamesdevore.smugmug.com/SPECIAL-SLIDESHOW/n-P57Kks

This is just about all my airplane photos
https://jamesdevore.smugmug.com/60-YEAR-JOURNEY-IN-PHOTOGRAPHY/A-LITTLE-BIT-OF-EVERYTHING/PLANESPOTTING