ALA: Aerials of Los Angeles Open Edition by Jacob Riglin

Here’s some alpha for you… next time you take a photo trying shooting from above or below the eye-line. Reason being? Well, we spend most of our lives looking at everything from the rough height of our eye-line, so any adjustment to that makes a world of difference to engage the viewer and create something instantly more unique. Trust me, give it a try.

For the last 8 years my photography has been defined by the search for unseen perspectives, it’s given me the opportunity to work with some of the most respected brands in the world from Lamborghini to Amazon, along with helping me build an audience on social media of nearly 2 million people. This search has led me to look at the world through a whole new lens (Yes, pun intended). ALA: Aerials of Los Angeles is a series of images that challenges the way that we view this iconic city, weeks of research went into how I could combine the use of telephoto lenses and aerial photography from an open-door helicopter to capture Los Angeles like never before.

Countless hours of planning later and then two 1.5hr helicopter rides at sunrise and sunset, I captured a series of images that I believe show Los Angeles in a whole new light. The use of telephoto lenses allowed me to compress miles of densely populated areas into one frame, with the goal to combine iconic parts of LA into single images, like views from Topanga to Beverly Hills to DTLA, or from the Hollywood sign to Angeles National Forest. These perspectives were only going to be possible from a helicopter, so with some precise coordination with the pilot, some huge camera gear and a broken trigger finger, I took to the skies and brought my vision to life.

For those of you interested I shot these on the Canon 200-400mm f/4 w/ 1.4x converter and a 800mm f/5.6, both on Canon R5 bodies.