I had earmarked this morning to create more pictures for my Foreboding project.
The project is about the effects of Climate Change and the portfolio I submitted at the end of the last module, was largely concerned with the effects of rising sea levels. I had conducted several shoots at the coast and decided on refreshing my approach.
I decided to examine the sources of CO2 emissions. In terms of sources that could be photographed, these are:
Aircraft
Livestock, especially cows
Electricity generation
Consumerism
Deforestation
As I live close to Gatwick airport, aircraft seemed a good place to start.
The air traffic to and from Gatwick flows East / West, with the planes taking off into the prevailing wind. I used the FlightRadar app to check live air traffic. This showed that aircraft were approaching the airport from the east and also precisely how they were crossing the terrain. I was able to identify two points where I could get a good view of the aircraft on their final descent.
My first vantage point was just south of Lingfield. Aircraft flew directly overhead but were still quite high. I moved onto my second vantage point on the Balcombe Road, East of the airport. This is only about 1 mile from the runway, so the aircraft were very low.
I used a zoom lens and took multiple pictures of each aircraft as it passed overhead.
The weather was very changeable with heavy clouds. This is exactly what I wanted as I wanted to create a heavy, foreboding feel to the pictures.
My favourite picture from the shoot can be seen below. The nose-down attitude of the aircraft suggests falling and the sky looks stormy and volatile. The image conveys the feeling that all is not right. This is what I set out to achieve.
The image is un-cropped from the original. In Lightroom post production, Dehaze has been applied to add contrast to the sky. Highlights were brought down and Shadows pushed up to balance the exposure. Clarity and Grain were increased to give a “gritty” feel to the image.
