Best Photo Ships


Message posted by Tom on September 27, 2003 at 18:45:55 PST:

Actually, the best low-cost choice for an aircraft photo ship is a Cessna 152 through 182. The reason is the way the hinged side windows work. They are hinged along the top, and the only thing preventing them opening up all the way to the bottom of the wing above is a small retaining arm on the side of the window. This allows the window to only open about a foot at the bottom. While it is possible to shoot photos out of this narrow opening, it sort of sucks. It is only outranked in suckiness by shooting directly through the plexiglass.

So....all you have to do is remove the one screw that holds the end of the retaining arm to the window, and voila, the window opens fully to the bottom of the wing. When first told of this, I was pretty leery of doing something that wacked, but the technique had been used many times by a pilot and photographer who knew what he was doing.

It turns out that forces on the window are pretty gentle, at least at normal photo flying speeds. Pressures created under the wing cause the window to float just below the bottom of the wing, without requiring any holding. You still have to shoot around the strut, but that's not hard with a whole window to lean out of. When finished, just pull the window back down and latch. Of course you still have to be able to convince the pilot to let you do something like this.....

If I recall right, 210's are pressurized, and likely have a far different window arrangement. You'd have to shoot through the plex.

Tom


In Reply to: Re: Staying in Vegas next Year... posted by lone wolf on September 27, 2003 at 15:49:41 PST:

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