AVIATION
Pro aviation photographer Kris Christiaens shares his tips on how to capture airshows….
Kris Christiaens
Belgian aviation photographer Kris Christiaens became fascinated with the wonderful world of military aviation about eight years ago. Today, Kris tries to portray aircraft and helicopters as creatively as possible at numerous airshows and other aviation events. To see more, visit www.kc-photography.be, @kris.christiaens on Instagram
Mankind has always looked up and wanted to fly. With the advent of civil and military aviation and photography in the 20th century, it didn’t take long for both to be combined, allowing us to capture better than ever the immense power of airplanes and helicopters and the beauty of flight.
Not just for big lenses
Anyone who regularly attends airshows or spotter days and takes pictures during such events will have noticed that a lot of people use huge telephoto lenses, and these tend to be extremely expensive. On one hand, the large lenses do provide you with a lot of millimetres at your disposal, allowing you to get close to the action, but this is still no guarantee for good and beautiful photos. The art of photography is to play and to be inventive with different types of lenses so that you do not always take the same kind of pictures.
When famous formation teams such as the French Patrouille de France or the British Red Arrows put on a show, you can effectively use a wideangle lens to capture the action in its entirety and produce successful photos. If you do still want to take pictures with large zoom lenses such as a 500mm or a 600mm, you can rent them for a few days, making it much more affordable. This will also allow you to experiment with a different focal length and build up more variety in your photography portfolio.
Less is more
Large airshows such as the Royal International Air Tattoo (RIAT) at RAF Fairford are very impressive for beginner photographers and obviously have beautiful participants and shows on offer, but there is also a downside to these popular airshows. In recent years, these types of events have grown and can attract more than 100,000 people in a single day, giving them a commercial, festival atmosphere and the essence is not always aircraft and air shows any more. In recent years I have discovered a lot of smaller events that sometimes have much more to offer photographically and are also just more cosy and pleasant. For example, a fly-in at a lo
