I had the joy of taking another tour with my buddies at Epic Helicopters on Friday.  The heli rides are not cheap but I love taking photos from such a unique perspective.  As we flew over Love Field (home of Southwest Airlines), the pilot let me know there was a Southwest Airlines flight landing underneath us.  I know that sounds dangerous but we were at plenty of altitude and the tower told us to fly over the airport.  As the flight landed we were in the perfect position for some great photos!

Taking photos from a helicopter is sometimes difficult and even moreso at night, but luckily my camera gear came through and I ended up with one of my favorite pictures ever!  Please enjoy this week’s Picture of the Week!

Southwest Airlines by way of Epic Helicopters

For the photographers: ok I got pretty lucky on this one.  I had an 85mm lens on my Sony a6300, giving me an effective focal length of 136mm.  At f1.8 and ISO3200 this meant a shutter speed of 1/25s.  I fired off a series of 6 photos, trying to pan with the jet, and luckily this one caught the jet completely in focus and the rest of the scene blurred.  It didn’t need too much post processing, just some level adjusting and a smidge of noise reduction and it was good to go!