Focal lengths / Beginner stuff

[gnirtS]

Im currently back in the UK for a few weeks and starting to reinvestigate my old hobbies of milair combined with photography so after advice.

Specifically is a 400mm focal length lens enough for aircraft in flight at a typical air display ?
Im using a 70D and 100-400L Mk2 and took it to the Swansea airshow for its first outing and came back somewhat disappointed.
I was positioned along the sea wall immediately behind the beach, centre of display line so about as close as i could get with a decent position. Roughly 20m or so from the official press photo stand.

The issue i had is for every single one of the display flights, even zoomed into 400mm it was nowhere near enough to get decent aircraft shots. All the images need to be cropped by as much as maybe 75% to get anything like a decently framed plane (and due to that the quality isn't great due to a low resolution). Nothing seemed to be close enough to even half fill the frame.

Years ago (15 or so) at airfield based shows i don't recall struggling anything like as much so is it a "new" ish rule about the display line being further from the crowd or was the setup at Swansea just further away than most and i just picked the wrong show?

Quite a few people there had 600mm beasts but also saw quite a few 400mm range lenses around.

I was thinking of the RIAT for a visit to play with photos but if 400mm isnt really going to yield any decent flying shots at all as its too short i'll probably save money.

Ive made the expected mistakes playing with focus points and exposure modes but nothing unexpected there but the focal length with severe cropping needed surprised me.

On a slightly related note, i was half considering visiting the mach loop for a day or 2 - same question applies:- is 400mm likely to be too short a length to yield decent size images without substantial cropping ?

(im not against cropping as such but when you're only able to use 20% of your total frame quality suffers, noise shows and so on).

[John flightpath]

400mm is normally sufficient. However, for the short-term use a converter. Think you'll find RIAT display oines are a little closer and you'll be shooting 200 to 300mm

Cheers
John 'flightpath,"

[gnirtS]

Thanks for that, as an example, the following image was taken at 400mm on the closest approach of the jet and directly in front of me so a "best case" from the weekend: (ignore the fact its a crap photo, including it just to show how much a crop is needed):



If this is "normal" my 100-400 isnt going to get me anything useful. If not, i may have a chance.

[Thunder]

If that was taken at 400mm the display line must’ve been over a mile away, that in my book wouldn’t be a normal air show. I used the same lens on a 80d last year in Greece and was getting decent results at 500 meters range and cropping in at times to 50%. At the end of the day it all depends on what you want and expect your images to be like.

[stickshaker]

I think there may be compounding issues - on the sea wall you were maybe as much as 200m behind the crowd line. At many seaside sites, the equivalent of being in the front row at an airfield is to be standing chest-deep in the sea. Plus, if it is curved bay, a straight display line will often be more than 230m from the crowd line at the centre of the bay. The aircraft also appears to going away from you so it is already past its closest point. It all adds up unfortunately.

[gnirtS]

I think a few things, the wall was maybe 75m back from the absolute allowable front of crowd line (whatever size LZ the parachutists use length ways, that was the distance of wall from the cones). The crowd line kept moving as the tide dropped which took it further away.
The bay is also curved and the display centre is in the middle so combining those could easily have put me a few hundred metres back.

The a/c going away was merely an example photo, that was about closest approach and jus a standard shot out of loads of similar "size" planes.

Weather looking good so i'll try my like as Yeovilton this weekend and maybe RIAT the week after if tickets are still available.