747

Christiaan van Heijst

Long Exposure Photography from the Cockpit of a 747

One of the most frequently asked questions I get is how I shoot long-exposure photos from the cockpit of an airliner and how they end up sharp, despite flying at roughly 950kmh/590mph/500kts through the air. I will try to answer that question in more detail, going through the process and challenges step by step. Hopefully it sheds some light (pun intended) on the techniques I use and for the pilot-photographers among us some valuable and easy-to-use tips for your next night-flight.

Gannon Burgett

NASA Packs 17-Ton Telescope in a Boeing 747 to Solve Catch-22 of Astrophotography

NASA is known for using some impressive optics for its telescopes. But with amazing optics come some logistical limitations.

Ground-based lenses used by NASA can be as massive as needed, but are limited due to atmospheric distortion. Those used in space-based telescopes such as Hubble, on the other hand, must be much smaller, capable of being launched into space and fixed on-the-fly. This leaves NASA with a little Catch–22.

A Catch-22 they’ve managed to find an answer to in the form of SOFIA (Stratospheric Observatory for Infrared Astronomy): a Boeing 747 with a 17-ton telescope packed inside.

DL Cade

Photograph of the Milky Way Taken Out the Window of an Airplane Above the Atlantic

One of the standard cliché Instagram shots that gets ridiculed on occasion is the plane wing photographs, usually accompanied by some clouds or a sunrise or sunset. And while we agree that taking a photo out the window of your commercial airplane is tacky and overdone, the photo above by astrophotographer Alessandro Merga is a big fat beautiful exception.