Definition of “urbanization”: Glowing Cities Under a Nighttime Sky on Flickr – Photo Sharing

October 2, 2009

Pleasant to watch, this time-lapse composition highlights the light pollution aspect of increasing urbanization across the United States.  The photographer, a Dutch architect, notes that each streak of light represents a city, as he flies across the American Midwest to touchdown in San Francisco (SFO).  It’s a visual definition of urbanization, isn’t it?

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

Stunning, beautiful and troubling at the same time.

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Can you use this in your classroom?

Tip of the old scrub brush to One Man’s Blog.

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