Helicopter/Aerial Spotting

[Radi K]

Only for reasons of pure curiosity I'm wondering how some of the regular spotters go about doing aerial spotting/photography at Sydney or LAX etc.

What are the costs involved - do you guy with others? How do you get clearance from ATC etc. What type of camera gear do you take up with you?

[Nigel C]

At Sydney, most, if not all local helicopter operators can do doors off aerial filming. I believe a flight plan is still filed, and the specific requirements of the flight are discussed between ATC and the pilots, i.e. preferred altitude, location for the shoot both on approach and after landing.

I was lucky enough to help shoot the Qatar arrival into Sydney in March by invite from the contracted photographer. This shoot involved both the city flypast as well as the landing and water cannon salute shots.

The gear I was using on the day was a Canon 1D MkII with 24-105L lens, and a Canon 7D with 100-400L lens. The long lens was great for the city approach, arrival and touchdown shots, while the short lens was handy for the actual city flypast as well as overhead shots after arrival.

Having a zoom range of essentially 31-640mm (allowing for crop factors on the 2 different cameras) was invaluable for what I was after on the day.

Here's where you can see some of the shots http://yssyforum.net/board/showthread.php?t=10959&highlight=Qatar&page=2

[Paul S.]

Hi Radi,

They attached link should answer your question re LAX

http://www.star-helicopters.com/aerialservices_planespotting.html