Aerial photos by Joseph Melanson

August 6, 2003 12:34 PM

6000 breathtaking aerial photos of American towns and other sites, with particularly good coverage of towns in New England (MA, VT, CT, NH, RI, ME). All of this by one photographer, Joseph Melanson, whose mission in life is "to show you facets of your environment that you never realized no matter how long you lived there."
posted by dougb (22 comments total)

Astounding, enormous link - thankyou!
posted by Marquis at 12:40 PM on August 6, 2003

Breathtaking, astounding? This falls far short of those terms to me. Naturally, I checked the D.C. photos first (my hometown) and so far I'm not impressed. The photos are average at best, the text over the images is annoying, and the various sizes and quality of the photos is disappointing.
posted by Witty at 12:49 PM on August 6, 2003

That's neat. I can see my house from there...
posted by SweetJesus at 12:57 PM on August 6, 2003

Hey, you can see my house from here! Wicked cool! Although he seems to have only done the coastal Maine regions thus far. Still, lots of fun to see familar towns from the air.
posted by nelleish at 12:57 PM on August 6, 2003

Jinx!
posted by nelleish at 12:58 PM on August 6, 2003

Underwhelmed here too. Doesn't beat the California Coastal Records Project or Scott Haefner's Kite photography
posted by marvin at 12:58 PM on August 6, 2003

As a CT resident, the CT selection is rather disappointing. Besides the quality sucking.
posted by smackfu at 1:03 PM on August 6, 2003

These pictures make my house look 10 pounds heavier.
posted by shmeggy at 1:04 PM on August 6, 2003

but there are so many photographs, from all over! ye doubters!
posted by Marquis at 1:05 PM on August 6, 2003

I'm just a little to the left ('bout four blocks) of this photo.
posted by me3dia at 1:10 PM on August 6, 2003

This is almost as bad as MapQuest's satellite photos, if for no other reason then that the size and resolution of the pictures blows yak. And at least MapQuest has an excuse. Yeah, like someone's really going to download a wallpaper-sized image with such craptacular resolution, print it up and sell it.

Asshat.
posted by Civil_Disobedient at 1:16 PM on August 6, 2003

I'm not too impressed, either. Second smackfu's opinion re the CT selection. Not nearly as nice as it could have been - there are some gorgeous areas here - and sadly out of date - my office building is at least 8 years old and the picture doesn't even show the construction.
posted by widdershins at 1:22 PM on August 6, 2003

A little disappointed in the NH section. They have Manchester (#1 city in the state), but no Nashua (#2 and where I currently live) or Merrimack (#10 or so and my home town). Most of the pictures are from the "north country", but the pictures that are there aren't half bad.
posted by turacma at 1:24 PM on August 6, 2003

Well I find the Massachusetts pictures that I've looked at to be of pretty high quality. But I'm mostly impressed with the guy's sense of mission and the sheer number of pictures he's taken. And I suppose aerial photography is always breathtaking to me; When you look at your neighborhood from above, you suddenly see all these objects in relation to each other that you'd only seen separately before.
posted by dougb at 1:38 PM on August 6, 2003

The Rhode Island pictures are nice, but he seems to only photograph the East Side of Providence. Where's Cranston St, Atwells Ave or Juan Pablo Duarte Bvld? Why no Chad Brown and June shots? Where's Smith Hill and The Foxy Lady?

I guess he only takes shots of the picturesque areas...
posted by SweetJesus at 2:06 PM on August 6, 2003

So? I really can see my house from here.
posted by salmacis at 2:41 PM on August 6, 2003

Salmacis that site is amazing!
posted by CunningLinguist at 3:13 PM on August 6, 2003

Yes, the image quality on the web site leaves something to be desired, but it's only a web site to promote the gallery and let people order (very expensive) photos. I'd say the image quality is good enough for that.
posted by Triplanetary at 3:18 PM on August 6, 2003

or any random house in Portland Oregon
posted by marvin at 4:03 PM on August 6, 2003

Last time I was there, the Foxy Lady was quite picturesque.
posted by PrinceValium at 6:27 PM on August 6, 2003

Yuh, his Rhode Island geography isn't the best. He's got Tiverton beaches showing up in Portsmouth. SweetJesus, the obvious question is: where's the blue bug?
posted by yerfatma at 6:54 PM on August 6, 2003

Somewhere in this picture...
posted by SweetJesus at 9:14 PM on August 6, 2003