【tasteful eroticism】

When you hear the phrase "air traffic photos,tasteful eroticism" what comes to mind? Most likely some dull graphics documenting airplane patterns. (Is that actually what they are? I really don't know.)

Either way, Mike Kelley, an LA-based architectural photographer, is revolutionizing the process of capturing air traffic with his series "Airportraits," which features gorgeous shots he's taken of airplanes from all over the world.

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The photos are puzzling at first. Obviously that many airplanes cannot fly right next to each other – so how did he perfectly layer so many shots together?

"As an architectural photographer, I'm doing a lot of compositing: blending lighting, time of day and people, as I photograph buildings," Kelley told Mashable."Believe it or not, architectural photography requires a lot of photoshop in many instances, so I've been working with photo composites for years now in order to give my photos a special look to them."

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He explained how architectural photography prepared him for this new style of photography.

"To do this, I used some of the same techniques that I use to photograph architecture," he told Mashable, explaining his process of layering photos on top of each other to create the dazzling images. "The crazy thing is that the first image was originally supposed to just be a proof-of-concept to see if the idea had any legs. I put it on the internet as kind of a 'hey, check this little thing out that I did, it's kind of cool' and it just went crazy viral."

Kelley's love of air travel and the boost of that initial internet virality accelerated his new hobby.

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"I've always been fascinated by aviation and one day while out at LAX plane spotting, decided that I wanted to try capturing multiple takeoffs and putting them together into a single image to show their flight paths and the sheer volume of traffic departing LAX," Kelley wrote to Mashable.

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He wrote more about his inspiration for the project on Reddit.

"So I originally posted my first LAX image here - called 'Wake Turbulence' back in 2014," he wrote on Reddit. "The response was so overwhelmingly positive and it really, as cheesy as it sounds, sort of changed my life. I knew I had to do more of these pictures and luckily having this picture in my portfolio really opened the door for me to do so."

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"The project sort of became an obsession for me - using google maps, learning to read METARs, listening to ATC, working out schedules of planes coming and going to get the most interesting aircraft and liveries in each shot," he wrote on Reddit.

Kelley also shared a behind-the-scenes video that gives some more insight into his travels and his process:

Kelley spent so much time working on the Airportraits that he is happy to take a break for a while.

"I don't have anything solid in the pipeline right now but I've kicked around a few ideas," he told Mashable. "I'm hoping that I'll be able to discover something I'm as passionate about as the Airportraits project soon. For the time being though, I'm looking forward to not having to stay up until 3am to edit these every weekend."

"It's been super tough balancing the work on this project and the work from my architectural photography, so I'm looking forward to a few months of a more relaxed work schedule."

Here are some more of Kelley's gorgeous photos, which are available for purchase by clicking here.

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