Notes on Kite Aerial Photography: Thumbnail Gallery

San Francisco Bay
Images from the Edge

If you have reached this page then you may have gathered by now that I am a Professor of Architecture at UC Berkeley with a penchant for taking photographs from kite-lofted cameras. Kite aerial photography is a delightfully benign, low-cost means for taking intimate aerial photographs. If you are curious about the technique I suggest wandering through the sections noted in the header above.

I write this note from a blissful state of sabbatical leave; recent administrative duties complete, kite photography on the front burner. Of late I have been taking more and more shots of the San Francisco Bay wetlands (30 to 200 feet AGL) and find myself enjoying the subject. I have been thinking lately that it would be interesting to apply KAP to support and/or document efforts directed toward wetland restoration. To support discussion along these lines I have assembled this small collection with 50 or so images  taken in natural and urban settings around the Bay's edge.

As part of this posting I have included a Thumbnail Gallery section with images of the Bay's edge and a Key Map to convey the general location of these photographs. This selection of images is certainly not an example of kite aerial photography in a longitudinal study of wetland reclamation but it does suggest the potential of the technique.

As a quick example, I have been having a great time photographing the South Bay salt evaporation ponds. I have gained permission from Clyde Morris, head of the Don Edwards San Francisco Bay National Wildlife Refuge, to photograph over refuge wildlife (in return for image use). I have also been wandering out into the edges of the salt evaporation ponds near Union City. It is a fascinating landscape out there, all the more so for changes it has endured and changes pending from restoration efforts afoot. Consider the example image below:

This image is actually a montage using Panotools of four separate digital  photographs taken with a 4-megapixel Canon S400 Digital Elph. Each of the contributing images is 1704 x 2272 pixels in size. I have provided links to the full scale montage (1533 x 2671 pixels, 1.1 Mb) and a similarly framed single image taken from a greater height with the Canon S400 (1704 x 2272 pixels, 0.8 Mb). Take a look at these to check source resolution. The majority of my aerial images have been taken with 35-mm film cameras including the Yashica T4 point-and-shoot and the Canon Rebel single lens reflex. Film cameras offer higher resolution than their digital counterparts. Images presented in the accompanying gallery have nomenclature regarding the camera used.

The view above was taken near a long defunct salt work near the current regularized course of Alameda Creek. I gather from old navigation charts in the McCone Hall map library that the site served the Union City Salt Company in the late 1800s. Photographically and while visiting the site one finds interesting juxtapositions between the old order of nature and the more recent overlay of property lines and the enterprises they represent.

The salt pond reclamation project is organizationally complex with a landscape including government agencies at all levels (US Fish & Wildlife, California Resources Agency, California Fish & Game, Coastal Conservancy, various municipalities), political entities (Feinstein, Davis), private foundations (Hewlett, Moore, Packard, Goldman), NGOs (Save the Bay, Audubon Society) and of course private concerns (Cargill). Behind these more public faces lies an array of consulting, academic, and professional entities that are doing the science and underpinning policy development. The mind spins (and with considerable appreciation).

If I am to continue to photograph the salt ponds I need official sanction and with it permission to access the sites. In return I can provide images, perhaps over a long time frame. I welcome your advice, contacts, and questions on the topic, Just drop me a line.

Cris Benton