Flashing the Beaver (DHC-2)

[biggerry]

hah, get your mind outta the gutter

In preparation of the light painting minimeet, I thought i would have a bit of practice on something other than my car, this beautiful dehavilland beaver has been lovely restored and in very short time will be getting back in the air. The position of this subject was not too bad, the only gripe being the wreck in the background and a seneca off to the left. This particular aircraft in its current paint job, pure white, lends itself to BW conversion which I had in mind for this session, hopefully this can also convey some of the original feeling of this aircraft. On a side note this is definitely one of my favorite aircraft, they just do not make them like this any more, a bit like the old school nikon lens, built like tanks and can take some abuse..

I struggled a bit with the lighting here, being such a large object i had to get my dancing shoes on to get around the scene to get it lit up, one thing that really improves these type of images (cars etc) is lighting up the interior, gettign a strobe in the inside would be awesome, i did try this but i ran out of time in my 30 sec exposure and could only ever get a couple of flashes thru the window in an attempt to light up cockpit.

anyways, on to the images, any comments and suggestion would be most welcome...

[aim54x]

Where was my invite to this shoot?

Great stuff but I think it may be time for bulb exposures for you Gerry. I love the black and white..it really transports you to another time.

[norwest]

I very much like the lighting. Well done Gerry.

[biggerry]

Where was my invite to this shoot?

After the light painting minimeet I plan to do some more planes, hopefully by that stage I will have half an idea on how to do it effectively (i had batteries run out half way thru this one), if you are keen then I will organise something, surenj also voiced some interest. Additionally it is a matter of what aircraft are available and what access is like....I will keep you posted

bulb exposures for you Gerry

yeah i was concerned about the noise/hot pixels so I thought keeping it under 30 seconds would be a good place to start, even at f8 with a polariser and a pair of dancing shoes you can get it lit up pretty well. Also on bulb i felt it would not pressure me into getting on with it and I would dawdle

[Greg B]

These are all great, but I like the first one in particular Gerry.

And although the "DHC-2" gave it away, this is a candidate for
best thread name of the year.

[colin_12]

Nice beaver
Nothing like a tank with wings.

If you get the others in to help then you won't have to rush about so much, many hands and all that.

[surenj]

Nice BW Gerry! The only thing I could think of would be, backlighting to highlight the edges and to give it an industrial feel by showing those bare lights.

[Definitely interested in a airplane shoot!, We need to do a Mcnally style shot as well ]

[auxr8220]

i like it, one thing i would like to see is a full plane shot

a softbox set up on a pole would allow you to get to higher angles with an object of this size.

[biggerry]

a softbox set up on a pole

lol, you wrote this just as I posted the same thing about your ralliart car

i like it, one thing i would like to see is a full plane shot

yeah, i need more space and a helping hand for that - so that is the goal for next time..

backlighting to highlight the edges and to give it an industrial feel by showing those bare lights.
[Definitely interested in a airplane shoot!, We need to do a Mcnally style shot as well ]

hey Surenj, I had that in mind, but need some way of triggering the flash sitting behind the aircraft or near the wheel - thats where you come in i think

Nice beaver

hehe, thanks colin, not every day someone says that to me

And although the "DHC-2" gave it away,

Thanks Greg, i thought I had better put that qualifier in there.

[jdear]

Any reason why these sort of shots can't be a photoshop composite of flashed photos? Flashing where you want the light to appear and then compiling it into one gorgeous frame

ok... so you need to be fairly proficient in PS for this technique. Im hoping to try it out when my new car arrives in the next few weeks.

[biggerry]

Any reason why these sort of shots can't be a photoshop composite of flashed photos?

no reason at all But then you would not have all the fun of running around like a looney and tripping over everything

I guess from my point of view I would like to minimise the PP work and try and get a out of camera image pretty close - however that is all due to being time-poor. I would be interested to see the results of this technique though, it would really allow you to get those hard to reach areas lit up better.

[jdear]

example of flashing and comping in PS:

http://www.flickr.com/photos/knottyy/2920838992/

[chasem]

WOW, that plane is so beautiful!