Big Island by Air

[pzarquon]

The Star-Bulletin reports on HawaiianImages.net, a website that started as "a simple online advertising gimmick" but ended up a resource that could be of use and interest to people ranging from realtors to geologists to curious residents. Brian Powers, with an airplane control stick in one hand and a camera in the other, has photographed the entire coastline of the Big Island. And now he plans on doing the same on the other islands.

Powers said he heard of an environmentalist who shot the California coast and hoped to repeat the project in Hawaii to promote his photography business. "It's grown to be more of a resource than the advertising tool I envisioned," Powers said. "And preserving a snapshot of this island as it is right now was fascinating." Powers flew his single-engine Piper Cherokee 160 at 500 feet, holding his Nikon D100 camera out the window and firing off pictures of the nearly 300 miles of coastline.

Google Earth is great, but their coverage is not complete (only Hilo is relatively well covered), and sometimes very out of date. This guy's focusing on the local neighborhood, and is getting a view that in many ways is more compelling than the one from a space satellite. Here's where my mother's family is from.

[timkona]

Re: Big Island by Air

Photographing coastlines in an age of rising ocean levels is a great idea.

I've seen old photos of the Outer Banks of NC taken 100 years ago. Most of what was in the photos is 10 feet underwater now.

It's a good time to sell ocean front property. You need to rope in the next sucker before you are left holding the bag on your oceanfront land in Hawaii.

I have seen houses out in Ewa, and all along Alii Dr in Kona, where the ocean is winning the battle.