The following film brings together several night sequences from the collection.
Since the discovery of fire, human beings have waged a constant battle against darkness. From torches and candles to electricity, artificial light allows us to remain active and productive long after sunset — endlessly pushing back the night that conceals real dangers and feeds our fears and fantasies.
Seen from the air, night reveals a different geography : that of artificial light, which traces the outlines of cities, roads and human networks against a backdrop of darkness. It is also, today, one of the most visible signs of our impact on the environment — light pollution, whose effects on nocturnal wildlife, migratory birds and insects are now well documented and a growing concern.
Filming at night from a helicopter demands specific technical conditions : fast lenses, high-performance stabilisation systems and instrument-rated flying. The night sequences in our collection were shot using Cineflex HD cameras fitted with wide-aperture lenses, delivering cinema-grade image quality even in very low light.
Bagan, Myanmar — At sunset, the thousands of temples and pagodas on the Bagan plain are silhouetted against a blazing sky, in one of the most spellbinding twilight panoramas in Asia.
Nantong, China — An industrial port city in the Yangtze Delta, Nantong at night unfolds from the air a spectacle of urban lighting on a Chinese scale : illuminated tower blocks, hotels and port infrastructure reflected on the river in an explosion of neon and floodlights.
Copenhagen — Copenhagen at night offers a striking contrast to the Asian megacities : a human-scale city whose harbour and city centre glow with a warm, soft light, revealing a restrained and elegant Scandinavian architecture.
New York — The Manhattan skyline at night is one of the most filmed images in the world — and yet, seen from the air in the right conditions, it retains its full power to fascinate : skyscrapers lit from within, illuminated bridges spanning the East River and the Hudson, and the luminous grid of the avenues stretching as far as the eye can see.
Los Angeles — At night, Los Angeles reveals from the air what the daytime haze conceals : an infinite ocean of light stretching in every direction, one of the world's largest conurbations with no discernible centre or edge, criss-crossed by rivers of headlights on freeways in perpetual motion.
Paris, "Midnight in Paris" — The City of Light lives up to its name seen from the air at night : the illuminated monuments — the Eiffel Tower, Notre-Dame, the Louvre, the Invalides —, the banks of the Seine and the great Haussmann boulevards form a nocturnal panorama of incomparable elegance, essential for any production featuring the French capital.
Marseille — The Marseille coastline at dusk, bathed in a golden light that warms the calanques and the Old Port : a Mediterranean image of rare beauty and warmth, very different from the urban night shots that dominate the rest of our collection.
Night aerial footage
