Arm OTW - Depending on the flying abilites of the pilots in the formation we have had the subject ship in to 2 disks away from us, making for some very dynamic images. A lot of times I find that those who havent done much formation flying will tend to fixate on the photo ship and get drawn closer to it. Thats why on most photo shoots we try to get two pilots onboard, both for that sort of problem and also for working as lookout etc.
A good example was the other day I was in Sydney doing an air to air shoot of Childflight's new SA-365N2. We had two pilots on each aircraft and it worked great, especially over Sydney harbour where there was a lot of other traffic.
One other suggestion for people and that is always have two pilots on photo ship if possible, so the subject ship doesnt have to worry about radios, talking to tower etc, less distractions so he can keep his head out of the cockpit. And having the second pilot in the subejct aircraft also allows it to have one pilot looking at the Ts and Ps while the other is concentrating on keeping formation.
Just some thoughts.
Heli Ops