Listicle: 10 drone photographers who are out of this world
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Simeon Pratt (@SimeonPratt): Pratt is a Chicago-based photographer and cinematographer. His drone shots: Container ships breaking ice as they glide through frigid seas, lone towers piercing clouds, cliffs at sunrise, roofs of European towns, focus on a stillness that only comes from being distant from your subject. His photographs, despite their grand scale, are meditative, playing with light and a hint of surrealism.
Priyansh M Jain (@ShotByPriyansh): The 21-year-old content creator, shuffling between Bhopal, Delhi and Mumbai, loves cityscapes. The images capture both landmarks and lesser-known corners of towns, but from the air. The symmetry of worshippers praying at a mosque, being eye-level with a bird in flight. It’s all here.
Mike Bishop (@MikeBishop.TV): Bishop is a Los Angeles-based cinematographer whose optical illusions of the natural world make you question reality. Under one particularly striking photograph, taken in Iceland, giant grey arches of glacial meltwater flow into the ocean. He asks if the image is of a tree of life – it could well be. In another, a dead tree stands in the middle of the desolate clay pan of Deadvlei in Namibia, resembling a withering, rickety old hand pointing to the sky. It’s photography meets sorcery.
Bean Singh (@IAmBeanSingh): Delhi-based Singh’s Instagram feed is a burst of colour. Every tiny square on the screen features a city, a lane, or a neighbourhood with its own story to tell. Ignore the filters for a bit and focus on the aerial views. Singh’s posts also talk in detail about the different lenses and gear he uses to create each montage, which can be educational for drone enthusiasts.
Ashwin KC (@Droneholic_): In the age of Midjourney and deep fakes, Ashwin’s precise shots risk being mistaken for being machine-generated. What sets this Kerala-based photographer apart from his peers, is how he depicts human movement from a distance. Whether it’s fishermen spreading their nets, a boat racing through blue waters, or cars driving across snow-clad, treacherous roads, Ashwin has an eye for detail, zooming in to trace footsteps—an equal but oft-missed part of mighty landscapes.
Gunj Guglani (@GunjGuglani): Guglani started his YouTube channel over a decade ago in 2013 as a travel vlogger and photography enthusiast. In 2024, the Delhi-based photographer moved to aerial photography. He is often seen operating his device in his cinematic videos. Kolkata looks sepia-tinted and decadent from above, the yellow heat of the sun melts into the Jama Masjid on Eid. You can still smell the food from that height.
Ozzo (@OzzoPhotography): Ozzo is an Iceland-based photographer who runs his own production company specialising in drone photography. His Instagram page makes the most of his location. The feed is a robust archive of Iceland’s natural grandeur: Fjords, formidable volcanoes, majestic waterfalls, and of course, the Northern Lights from a different angle.
Erez Marom (@ErezMarom): Marom is an Israeli photographer who specialises in nature photography. He started with macro photography, or capturing tiny subjects in extreme close-ups, especially insects, to make them look bigger than they are in real life. Soon enough, he stumbled upon landscapes and now documents places from up above. Marom allegedly melted one of his drones while flying it over an erupting volcano in Iceland. Talk about dedication!
Tobias Hägg (@AirPixels): Based in Stockholm, Sweden, Hägg was profiled in the book Masters of Drone Photography (2018) by marine biologist and filmmaker Fergus Kennedy. His images lay sharp focus on natural colours and depth, so they resemble abstract art, or watercolours. He gets symmetry well, in natural landscapes and man-made townships. Pictures look larger than life, even on a tiny phone screen.
Alexandra Taylor (@AllieMTaylor): Taylor is an American photographer based in Zurich, Switzerland. Her photos aren’t just picture postcards—they’re stuff desktop wallpapers are made of, the kind that you would stare at on your screen while taking a breather from work. She often features herself in her compositions, adding a human touch that sometimes goes missing while capturing a larger than life natural phenomena.
