Jer Loc: Mesa, Arizona

Your shutter speed is too high.

jimmya Loc: Phoenix

For the average shooter, which I am, I don't plan to spend the kind of money it takes to have full frame because I get exactly what I want from my 18mp crop sensor. Frankly I don't know if it would have made a difference. That's a beautiful shot of a beautiful war bird... well done.

LaoXiang

Because it is so light, the Tamron is perfect for long-range panning ... the only real advantage it offers over the other 150-600s which hit the market around the same time. Long-range panning takes some folks a Lot of practice though ... you need to be both completely steady and still moving perfectly in sync with the subject. When you hit it, it is worth the 100 times (or more in some shooters' cases) you don't. ;)

Jackdoor Loc: Huddersfield, Yorkshire.

No difference with sensor size, but if you wanted the props to be more blurred, select a slower shutter speed. But too slow and you'd struggle to avoid motion blur on the rest of it!

Bill_de Loc: US

I agree with this guy ... the guy who disagreed with most of the posts! Depending of the speed of the aircraft panning will get it sharp.

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jimbrown3 Loc: Naples, FL

First, forget the tripod. You should pan along with the direction of flight. Keep panning after you have taken the shot/shots, just like a golf follow through (but, don't keep your head down or you will not see your subject, ha) or shooting a shotgun at a clay pigeon. If you want to blur the props, pan at a slower shutter speed and hope the pan of your camera is equal to the motion of the plane. Not so easy to do as say, especially if you have only one chance on a fly by. Takes LUCK and a lot of PRACTICE. Good luck.

harathedog

I also agree. Will zoom back a bit and practice panning.
Trouble is, this opportunity is only once a year or so depending on the weather,air traffic and flight plan.
Did you see what the Photo Shop guy did? Very nice, but I like mine better. A little space to fly into.

jimbrown3 Loc: Naples, FL

Also, if shooting upward with a lot of sky showing, your meter will be fooled by the amount of light in the sky and under expose the bottom of the airplane. If shooting in any auto mode open up + 2/3, more or less EV depending on brightness of sky. In this shot, the sky is a beautiful color but the shadowed underbody is dull. (I'll bet if you were to look at that scene again in real life, the sky would be lighter) Try it, you will like it. Just like shooting in snow or at the beach. Do you want the sky/snow look like 18% grey ? I didn't see what photo shop guy did, but I always like to see more space ahead than behind or equal. You want to have space to fly into, not out of. Have fun, shoot lots. Cheers.

Bill_de Loc: US

Cars are a good way to practice panning. And, they are everywhere.

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jimbrown3 Loc: Naples, FL

Great solution from Bill de for practice. Go for it !

riskot Loc: Texas

The angle of the camera's sensor plane to the plane of the propellers is partly responsible for the freezing effect of the props. Since the props are spinning at a high rate of speed compared to the plane's forward movement, a correct exposure at a slower shutter speed could still have rendered the plane tack sharp while blurring the props.

Jackdoor Loc: Huddersfield, Yorkshire.

This is misleading. After Googling propeller RPM and diameter, the maths says that the tip speed of the propellers at cruise will only be somewhere between 2 and 3 times the speed of the aircraft, so to get significant prop. blur but a sharp airframe, you've got to be good at panning.

amfoto1 Loc: San Jose, Calif. USA

The prop blur is a factor of shutter speed, with no relationship to sensor format what-so-ever. You could set and use slower shutter speeds to produce more prop blur effect (motion blur) on your 70D, with the same results.

If, in fact, you'd have used a full frame Canon or Nikon to take that shot, you would also have needed a longer telephoto lens to frame the subject the same way. Instead of 500mm on Nikon you would need 750mm... or 800mm on a Canon camera. Figure about $13,000 for the Canon 800mm lens ( the Nikon costs $16,300).... and probably another $1500 for a good solid tripod to put it on (because it's too big and heavy to handhold for anything more than a few minutes).

Another way of looking at it, your 70D gives you a "free" 1.6X teleconverter effect. By "free" I mean it's built into the APS-C crop and here's no loss of light to an actual teleconverter. Your f6.3 lens remains f6.3... instead of dropping to f9 as it would with an actual 1.4X or 1.5X teleconverter attached (or more like f10 with a 1.7X... or f13 with a 2X.)

Previous responses are correct... using a slower shutter speed to increase prop blur will also make other movement of the airplane more likely to blur. All you can do about that is use as fast shutter speed possible... that will blur the props enough, but maximize chance of keeping the rest of the airplane sharp... practice panning techniques, and take extra shots (assuming some will be blurred an unusable). It also might help to use a tripod with a gimbal head or gimbal adapter... or a monopod. I recommend you do some experimentation, take some notes, learn what works.... and what doesn't.

Here's an example of a pan-blurred shot I took....



In this case I wanted to try to capture the speed of the car with motion blur (including the faster moving blur of the car's wheels) as well as blur down an unattractive, busy background, and reduce other distracting elements by blurring them. The shutter speed I used for the above was 1/50 (and 200mm lens at f16)... however the effect varies and faster or slower shutter speeds can be necessary depending upon speed of the subject, direction of travel, distance between you and the subject and the focal length you're using. You might need to try a few different speeds to find what works. This is much, much easier with a DSLR than it ever was with film... with DSLRs you can immediately check your images to see if you're getting satisfactory results. Back in the days of film, we had to wait a few hours or days for the film to be processed, to find out if our settings were successful or not! I also can assure you that some of the shots won't be successful. That happens to anyone trying pan-blurred shots. You are walking a thin line between getting part of the image sharp while blurring other parts. Some shots work. Others fail. So plan on trashing some... and take extra shots!

Compare the above to another shot taken moments later using a different camera and lens, but using a higher shutter speed (1/800) as well as the car coming toward me instead. Both these factors helped to freeze the action (also used a longer focal length, although that would usually make for more motion blur, not less)...



I was still looking for the same things in my image... speed and action. But this time utilized the longer focal length and a larger lens aperture to blur down the background (300mm lens, f5.6 aperture), hoping to capture the speed aspect with the strong lean of the car negotiating a tight turn as well as dirt and rubber flying off the pavement around the tires (probably not visible at Internet sizes and resolutions).

harathedog

Great idea, Bill de! I'll go practice on fast cars. Thanks!

speters Loc: Grangeville/Idaho

If you shoot a FF to full potentioal, then yes, but is really does not matter, First you need to need to improve your technique, trying to get the most out of a full frame, I'll bet you can do a lot better than this shot, even with the same set-up!!!