Atlas 5 Launch

**Snapper** · 12-03-2005, 19:31

**ravtino** · 12-03-2005, 19:34

Great picies!

**Lynnes** · 12-03-2005, 19:47

Wow fantastic pictures.

**Ray&Sarah** · 12-03-2005, 20:16

Brilliant pictures once again Steve.[msnsmile2]

**Epic** · 12-03-2005, 20:36

once again fantastic pictures.what a perfect day for the launch and capturing it [clap]

12-03-2005, 21:03

Excellent Steve!!![msnsmile2]

**Nostromo** · 12-03-2005, 21:19

Fantastic! Wish I was there (inside the spacecraft I mean!).

**linda allen** · 12-03-2005, 21:43

Hi steve,
Looks like you had a great spot to view the launch. Was it in Titusville at the Howard Johnsons? or there abouts.

**Snapper** · 12-03-2005, 22:03

Hi Linda,

We were just off the causeway where the 528 crosses the Banana River. It was quite a good find (on the advice of one of the guides at KSC). You get quite a good view across to the whole KSC and Cape Canaveral pads. It would be a wicked place to watch the shuttle launch in May for anyone over here. The other good news is that, at least from what we saw, nobody minds if you pull off the road onto the grass and park up for an hour or two to watch the launch. I imagine you would have to get there really early for a shuttle launch. Yesterday there were only a handful of people there. There were more people there on Thursday when the launch was scrubbed.

You are quite a long way away from the action here so you need a reasonably long lens if you want to get any close(ish)-up up shots. I don't yet have any long lenses for the Nikon, but after yesterday's afternoon out I do have something of a shopping list [msnwink] I figure something around 300mm to 400mm would be ideal, or maybe a fast 200mm lens with a x1.4 or x2 doubler as long as that doesn't prevent the autofocus from focusing like most of them do. That's only going to get the first few seconds of the launch so I think then the best plan would be to switch to a wide angle, say something in the 12mm to 24mm range depending on how much distortion you wanted to play around with. Now the rub is that everything happens so quickly that you don't have time to be swapping lenses, so I think I need a second camera body as well. A D2X with a 300mm lens would be perfect for the initial lift-off and then I could switch to the D70 with a 12-24mm DX lens or maybe even a 10.55mm fisheye.

I would also have to spend a good few weeks in Florida to make sure I caught a few launches to get it all worked out.

Hey! We can all wish!