Six Lines of Flight

About this piece

Mike Gedj captures six Blue Angels aircraft in formation, their blue fuselages and yellow markings sharply defined against billowing clouds. Long smoke trails extend across the frame, giving the coordinated flight a sweeping linear rhythm.

The story

I followed the formation across the sky, watching the spaces between the aircraft as closely as the aircraft themselves. Each blue shape held its place against the pale clouds, while the smoke behind it widened and softened. Through the viewfinder, speed became an arrangement of lines and intervals. I wanted to hold that contrast: six precise silhouettes moving together, leaving traces that were already beginning to lose their shape.