I photograph people and in my more recent career conservation photography involving lots of elephants! * Elephants are so much like people emotionally that I sometimes feel I’m shooting humans anyway. So when I was asked to visually re-capture a (very successful family run business)  – Phoenix Aviation– air charter / air ambulance / engineering company from start to finish – this felt like a challenge. I was excited to think and shoot differently. 

Even small aircraft are big, often stationary lumps of glistening metal. There aint much emotion. The question was, I could I move people with this imagery. I put a commercial hat on and pulled in lighting, giant reflectors, back drops & stop motion imagery plus a team of great assistants.

Aircraft set ups & scenes had to be the night before or hours in advance of the shoot. Shifting and artistically aligning a bunch of large jets.  We awoke for numerous 4 AM starts to get the morning sky, the glow of the hangar with a collection of aircraft inside, the tarmac, cockpits etc. 

I had to wear a few hats. To shift away from the sexy charter side of the imagery and show a dependable, strong medical department. The company has a team of Doctors and nurses on call 24hrs a day.

They have most up to date life saving equipment – including ebola/covid isolation bubble units.The aircraft transform into sturdy clinics for Doctors and nurses to rescue people in locations all over the world. Yemen, Afghanistan, Australia and Litchensten were a few recent trips.