Glowing Cities Under a Nighttime Sky

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On my night time flight back to SF from Amsterdam, I noticed that the lights from cities were making the clouds glow. Really spectacular and ethereal - it was really seeing the impact of urban environments from a different perspective. Each glow or squiggle represents one town or city!

Luckily the flight was half empty, so I was able to set up an improvised stabilizer mound made up of my bags, pillows, and blankets for my camera to sit on.

We were around the midwest at the beginning of the clip, and there were fewer cities once we hit the rockies. the bridge at the end is the san mateo bridge.

Technique: 1600iso; beginning - 1 (30sec) exposure / 45secs; end - 1 (4sec) exposure / 10 secs; total elapsed time: around 3 hours?

Equipment used: Nikon D300 (interval shooting mode), Tokina 12-24mm.

Music: Bloc Party - Signs

*Update 2-2-09, 12am: just made it over 50k views! thanks guys for all the kind comments and support!!

*Update 4-15-09: over 100,000 views!!! Yaaay!

*Flickr Explore Highest Position: #3

Rubén Pinella, shashashasha, johnkershner, Nikhil Khade, and 1980 other people added this video to their favorites.

View 20 more comments

  1. dancingpoppy 30 months ago | reply

    that's one of the most beautiful things i have ever seen! keep up the good work!

  2. lydiargh 29 months ago | reply

    I love this song, it fits it beautifully :) very peaceful and calming.

  3. Juan Camilo+Ortiz 25 months ago | reply

    M a g n i f i c video.......................Fantastic work!!!!!!!!

  4. Toygun Çetin 25 months ago | reply

    really awesome!

  5. Toygun Çetin 25 months ago | reply

    really nice idea!! :)

  6. GσℓdεŋCяσt∂ℓσ 14 months ago | reply

    I invite your wonderful video to my new group.
    Thank you.

  7. [ jeremy ] 14 months ago | reply

    wow...great vid! Music goes very well!

  8. chouchiri 13 months ago | reply

    Excellent...

  9. frutor83 11 months ago | reply

    es de los mejores videos que e visto por aqui y excelente fondo musical.

  10. Grouchy Filipina 7 months ago | reply

    nice video. and yay! for bloc party!!!

  11. nuriapase 5 months ago | reply

    wow , genial

  12. orich 4 months ago | reply

    Video and music score are totally creative, well done!

  13. amarcord108 3 weeks ago | reply

    Very beautifully done!

  14. amarcord108 2 weeks ago | reply

    One of the things that makes this video so wonderful is your skill in keeping the wing in the same part of the frame for the entire segment. Makes a nice stable reference against the brilliant movement below.

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