Helicopter, blurring rotor ??

M

Manninagh

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I'm in need of some advice, we have a helicopter visiting our area and I'll be taking my camera along. What shutter speed should I be using to keep the rotor blurred?
Obviously I won't have time to check my results between shots, so any recomendations will be appreciated.
 
My recommendation would be between 1/30th & 1/60th of a second. Any faster than this and you will start to freeze the blades. Just remember though that at these lower speeds, you need to keep your panning nice and fluid so as not to create any blur in the aircraft body. Hope this helps...
 
Thanks for the advice Canonman, I didn't think I'd need to go that slow.
I'm just hoping for some decent weather now.
 
I've just been looking at the exif on a few online shots and (presumably slow-moving or hovering) helicopters are getting a bit of prop blur at about 1/100 - 1/250 - you can still see the individual blades but they appear a blurred three times or so wider at the outside end. Number of blades, length and speed will obviously affect.

What length lens will you be using and how far away will you be? Will it be passing over at speed, will it be hovering close by? I would try to get as slow as possible - optimistically, I'd want to keep it no faster than 1/160 but I'd be concerned about introducing camera-motion blur and losing sharpness if going much slower. I'll presume you will be using 200mm or longer. I don't think I'd risk going as slow as 1/30 to 1/60 (I guess that I'd probably be using my 150-500mm towards the long end). You might be able to pull it off at 1/30 - 1/60 and keep it sharp but I don't think I could.
 
It depends which helicopter is visiting. Something like the chinook can be difficult and need very low speeds.
But most can be caught at 1/125s. You don't need complete circles.
An example of 1/125s on an Apache:


DSC_1601 by kas10, on Flickr

I've had a quick look through some of mine on my hard drive and most are around the 1/100s.

Kev.
 
I'd agree with the above and aim for the 1/100 - 1/125 range, if you have the chance, fire a couple off and check the image on your camera to see if you need to increase or decrease the shutter speed, to give you a nice crisp shot with the rotar blur you are after
 
It can be done at 1/30th -180th second, easier obviously if you have IS.
And the point is well made, don't expect a full circle with say a Chinook, unless you are very luck and at a very very low shutter speed.
The point that you don't 'need' circles, well, it depends on what you actually want to achieve, no, you may not need, but yes it can be done if you really want too.
 
With my limited experience I've found that 1/160 is about the fastest you can get away with for most single rotor helicopters, any faster and it pretty much freezes the blades. As said, Chinooks need way less.
My advice is take several shots using a range of shutter speeds and you'll soon see what works best. (y)

Btw, cracking shot Kev! :cool:
 
For another reference, this was at 1/30....

20100626_120715_8855_LR.jpg
 
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