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This afternoon, Air Force One will be landing in Louisville, KY, and I would love to get a couple of good shots of it. However, how risky is it to get close enough to get some good shots of it? I have an EF 600mm f/4L IS II USM lens and a EOS 5Ds Would love any advice on the topic. Thanks in advance.

That's easy enough with a 600mm in the kit bag. Just position yourself near the end of the appropriate runway (probably 500 yards away with that focal length!), and voila. Hope that helps. In the meantime, I'm off to build a wall this afternoon...

I've never had a problem when photographing Air Force 1 from an area open to the public.



I've had police roll by to take a look, and have been checked out from the air, but I was never bothered.

Thanks for the info. I just wanted to make sure I wouldn't end up in a black site somewhere never to be heard from again. Now onto figuring out which Runway they will use at SDF. Also, @Moose135 How did you estimate when to be in position to take the shot? the TFR for Lousiville take effect at 17:30 EST how much later than that does AF1 usually arrive?

I usually look to be in place by the time the TFR starts. Many times, there will be several time blocks for the TFR, one for arrival, one (with different/limited area) for his visit, and one for departure. I will look to be there for the entire block of the arrival or departure TFR, usually about an hour block for each.

Just an update, I survived and am not secreted away in some black site. here is a copy of one of the images I was able to capture, would love some feedback.

Nice catch, but it needs a tighter crop, is noisy and underexposed. I would also recommend 1200px wide to start with.

As a photo, I quite like it, especially the blues of AF1 against the pale blue sky. For anet, it would require tweaking but nevertheless, well done.

Glad it worked out for you!

Was this taken from the Cell Phone lot at SDF?

Jehan

jelpee wrote:

Was this taken from the Cell Phone lot at SDF?

Jehan

Yes, that is correct.

Well , a good question . I think it depends on the where you take it. If you take this kind of plane in China you should be careful because some places is not allow to take the plane which like Air force 1. When the US Air Force 1 come to China last year the military has closed some placed which near by the airport so ... it is hard to take good shot at that time but you still can get some photos. If you go and have a look the Beijing Airport page on A.net and check some VIP Plane u will find that most of their Background are Sky because when VIP plane comes there will be many polices or military there. And some contries and some places is ok to do it so i think the risky should depend on the place you spot.

Glad you got it. I heard from another SDF spotter that he was able to catch AF1 from the cell phone lot as well ona prior visit. I spot at SDF a couple of times a year (e.g. during arrivals for Derby and the Christmas package rush by UPS). I'll most likely be heading that way on April 24th for the Thunder over Louisville rehearsal. My home base is CVG--about an 1hr and 10 minutes north east of SDF.

Jehan

One of the best places to find Air Force One these days is near the Winter White House at PBI. It visits almost weekly and there are plenty of safe places to photograph it - including the one I used to take the photo below.