Photos of flight

[Photo provided to Shanghai Star]

Few people realize the pictures of a plane taking of can be so impressive. Wu Ni catches up with a photographer who doesn't mind hanging out at airports.

hen a plane taxies down the runway, lifts of and soars high to the sky, few people know that from the ground the scene can be quite spectacular. The long trail left by the plane's lights can look like illuminated highways reaching to the heavens.

Xie Jianming, a photographer in Meizhou, Guangdong province, first saw photos of a plane's trail taken by a foreign photographer. He was impressed by the images and decided he also wanted to try his hand at taking them. At first, he tried a small

airport with only two flights arriving and departing at night. To get more dramatic photos, he chose an international airport in a neighboring city where there was a flight taking of every 20 minutes.

Capturing the right moment involves a lot of hard work, which challenges the photographer physically and mentally.