The media has been dominated by coverage of Asiana Airlines Flight 214's crash landing in San Francisco this past weekend. What's interesting is that some of the most powerful photographs showing the aftermath were not captured by professional photojournalists, but rather those with the most access to the site: US government employees.
NSA whistleblower Edward Snowden has become a person of extreme interest in recent days, but thus far he's managed to avoid photojournalists' cameras fairly well. The same cannot be said of the empty airplane seat which was supposedly going to take him from Russia to Cuba this past weekend.
In an airplane full of disappointed photojournalists, the conspicuously vacant Seat 17A became in short order the most photographed empty airplane seat in the world.
Karim Nafatni has a view of the world that most other photography enthusiasts don't have. When he's not scouring the Dubai landscape for sweeping architectural photographs, Nafatni is often tens of thousands of feet in the air, working in the cockpit of large jetliners as a pilot for a major airline.
"Aerialscapes" is a series of photographs by German photographer Jakob Wagner that was shot from the sky. The images in the project are sweeping landscapes of various locations around the world, showing formations that are both manmade and natural.
There are a few reason why some of us fight over who gets the window seat on airplanes, and the view that Tim Sessler captured in his mesmerizing short film "Drift" tops that list. While on a flight from San Francisco to Philadelphia (with a layover in Salt Lake City) Sessler pulled out his 5D MarK III and shot some of the stunning vistas outside his airplane window.
When people test cameras and lenses for resolution, they commonly use special resolution test charts that are filled with black bars of varying lengths and thicknesses. They're kind of like eye charts, except for cameras instead of eyeballs, and with lines instead of letters.
Well, did you know that in dozens of locations around the United States, there are gigantic resolution test charts on the ground?
Check out this curious 25-second time-lapse/composite video that shows every airplane that landed at San Diego International Airport on Black Friday a week ago between 10:30am and 3pm. The giant planes whiz by overhead as if they're part of a fighter jet squadron heading off to battle -- not something you'd expect to see with commercial planes at an airport. It was created by photography and film professor Cy Kuckenbaker.
Martin of Cargospotter created this mesmerizing time-lapse video showing the constant stream of airplanes that land on a particular runway at London's Heathrow airport, the third busiest airport in the world in terms of passengers (Atlanta Airport tops that list -- did you know that?). The still photographs he captured are played back 17-times faster than real-time, causing the planes to look like RC airplanes floating around and bobbing in the breeze.
You've probably heard people say that you should keep your camera gear with you at all times when flying, as there are multiple points in the travel process at which your valuable equipment could get stolen or damaged. In case you're not convinced, check out the video above showing an investigative report that ABC News recently did.
To test airports that have a history of theft, Brian Ross of ABC's The Blotter left 10 iPads inside the plastic bins at security checkpoints. At 9 out of 10 airports, the screeners followed protocol and immediately contacted the owner using the contact info prominently displayed on the iPad. In the 10th case, an agent was filmed taking the iPad out of the bin before it vanished.
You've probably seen time-lapse videos shot looking out the side of an airplane through a passenger window, but have you ever seen one from the pilot's point of view? If not, check out the beautiful video above. It was created by pilot Jakub Vlk, who brought his Canon 600D to work and captured photographs across seven days. The video shows Vlk taxiing to the runway, taking off, floating up into the clouds, flying around, and landing.
The next time you fly, be sure not to forget your camera on the plane — your camera might …
When photographer Robert Johnson of Business Insider was denied so much as a …
Alex MacLean is a Massachusetts-based photographer and pilot who uses his dual interests to create epic aerial photographs.
Alex MacLean has flown his plane over much of the United States documenting the landscape. Trained as an architect, he has portrayed the history and evolution of the land from vast agricultural patterns to city grids, recording changes brought about by human intervention and natural processes. His powerful and descriptive images provide clues to understanding the relationship between the natural and constructed environments.
Lavatory Self-Portraits in the Flemish Style is a spontaneous portrait project that photographer Nina Katchadourian started while traveling by plane in 2010.
Maho Beach outside of Princess Juliana International Airport in Sint Maarten is famous for the fact that landing airplanes fly overhead at minimal altitude. It's one of the only places in the world where airplanes can be viewed in their flightpath just outside the end of the runway, and therefore is very popular with tourists and plane spotters. Austrian photographer Josef Hoflehner has a project titled "Jet Airliner" that consists of photos of massive jet airliners hovering over the heads of sunbathers on the beach.
Aviation photographer Justin de Reuck has an awesome job: rather than do photo …
Earlier this month we shared some advice from an anonymous airline baggage handler, who revealed that hard-sided …
You probably already know that it’s not a good idea to include your expensive camera gear with check in …
Photographer Edouard Janssens recently sent a weather balloon equipped with a Sony NEX-5 …
Here’s an illuminating (pun intended) video walkthrough by photographer Eric Curry, showing how …
For his project "Cloud Collection", photographer Rüdiger Nehmzow went about four miles off the ground and photographed clouds through the open door of the plane. With no glass between Nehmzow and the sky to muddy up the shots, the resulting photographs are absolutely stunning.
Space Shuttle Atlantis blasted off for the last time today, the final launch ever for NASA’s …
Kodak uploaded a video to YouTube recently thats been causing quite a bit of controversy. It’s a talk by …
Australian PhD student Hamish Innes-Brown lurked around Tullamarine Airport in Melbourne and shot these beautiful photographs of airplanes landing using a Mamiya C330 twin lens reflex camera and Kodak Portra 160NC medium format film.
Reuters photographer Beawiharta was on a short flight from Singapore to Jakarta with his wife and three kids, when …
There's a lot of paranoia when it comes to doing photography in and around airports these days -- much to the dismay of plane spotters -- but wedding photographer and airplane enthusiast Lynn-Kai Chao came up with a neat way to do airplane photography without worrying the TSA: by using airplane models. Believe it or not, the above photograph is actually a Photoshopped photograph of Chao holding a model airplane.
Last week a United Airlines flight out of Denver International Airport was returned to the gate after being ready …
We’re lucky that cameras and camcorders can be used during flights, or we wouldn’t have this amazing view of …
Viral marketing agency The Viral Factory is helping Samsung with an experiment in which they're planning to drop 100 SD cards attached to paper airplanes from 21 miles above the Earth in the stratosphere. Instructions will be printed on the paper airplane informing anyone who finds one of the experiment and what they can do to participate. Finders are encouraged to shoot with the cards and then upload anything taken to the Project Space Planes website.
The claim that the planes will "carry the messages across the world" is a bit farfetched, but supposedly the planes could potentially travel hundreds of miles depending on the wind conditions. The experiment is planned for mid-October.
Photography rights advocate Carlos Miller came across the above poster recently put out …