Aerial Footage - What lens?

[Mitch Martinez]

Hi All,

I'm going to be shooting aerial footage of Philadelphia from a helicopter soon and wanted to know what experiences people have had with different lenses... It's a two-seater heli so I won't have an AC with me; whatever lens we lift off with is the lens I'll have on the camera for 60 minutes.

I was thinking the 18-50 Red Zoom would be good. A decent wide with a little bit of push for focal length. I don't need any super close ups of any buildings or anything...

Thoughts? Suggestions?

 

[paulherrin]

i think that 18-50 might be a good choice

additionally, you might like to look at some kind of wide prime, like a zeiss or a cooke, if you can.

really depends on what kind of shot (or shots) you're going for.

EDIT: just noticed you're not doing any lens changes... 18-50

 

[Michael McVicar]

Hi All,

I'm going to be shooting aerial footage of Philadelphia from a helicopter soon and wanted to know what experiences people have had with different lenses... It's a two-seater heli so I won't have an AC with me; whatever lens we lift off with is the lens I'll have on the camera for 60 minutes.

I was thinking the 18-50 Red Zoom would be good. A decent wide with a little bit of push for focal length. I don't need any super close ups of any buildings or anything...

Thoughts? Suggestions?

Think in terms of angle of view. 35mm includes a good mix of ground and horizon as a touchstone. 18-50 would give some great feeling of space but if something grabs your eye you are going to want more length. It's going to be hard to hold it steady though. Good luck and good pilot.

 

[Shane Kelly]

I've used my nikon 17-35mm with good results so the red lens would be a good choice. Also be sure and use cards or an element technica iso mount.
A vari-nd can be very useful too as you really don't want to have a mattebox on the lens.

 

[Mitch Martinez]

Cool. Thanks guys!

I'll let everyone knows how it goes. It's a 60 minute flight, so I'm bound to get something worthwhile from it.

 

[Evin Grant]

We always use a 25-250HR for Wescam shooting.

 

[Mitch Martinez]

a 25-250 would be great but I don't have one yet. I probably should have listed the lenses in my kit initially.

I have an 18-50 Red Zoom, 80-200 zoom, a set of primes from 8mm to 300mm