The haze in Dubai really changes the landscape at sunrise, turning the traditional skyline photo into a soft, dreamlike silhouette. Emerging from the haze, Dubai looks as if it has just awakened and is taking a moment to sharpen its focus. The dust obscures the view at the bottom, but the highest towers reach up […]

Camels have walked the desert outside Dubai long before the city’s towers ever existed, and to capture that ancient presence at sunset is still deeply gratifying. Behind Dubai’s skyline of glass and steel, the camel remains one of the most enduring symbols of Dubai and the Arabian Peninsula in general. The Bedouin, traditionally desert-dwelling herders, […]

Every year during the PhotoPills expedition, the highlight shot is to align the full moon with the Burj Khalifa. This year we were lucky with clear skies. As the moon began to intersect with the spire of the Burj Khalifa, the rising sun was already softly illuminating the skyline and the lower parts of the […]

Dubai is a city of superlatives. World’s tallest this, largest indoor that. It’s the kind of place that seems designed to produce a particular kind of photograph, the kind that leaves viewers incredulous. “It can’t be real,” they say, convinced that such a place can only be the product of filters and photographic trickery. But […]

In a city known for its remarkable, laws of physics-defying architecture, there is no shortage of buildings that ask you to look at them. The Museum of the Future, however, is different; it asks you to look through it, a distinction that is the building’s entire point. A Striking Design of the terrace of the […]

You know immediately when you enter the Museum of the Future in Dubai that that it will not be a conventional museum visit. The lobby alone, which, in many museums, is a bland, functional space, is sixteen meters high and features a curving double-helix staircase with robotic creatures watching from overhead, is a solid indication […]

When you think of Downtown Dubai at night, the image that comes to mind is usually clear skies, endless skyscrapers, and the Burj Khalifa towering above it all. But sometimes, the magic lies in the unexpected. On this particular morning, our small group had just returned from Abu Dhabi. A fog forecast had us on […]

When you think of Dubai’s skyline at night, your eyes instantly go to the Burj Khalifa. Towering above every other building, it seems almost untouchable. But sometimes, the magic isn’t in what’s obvious — it’s in what you nearly miss. This photograph was taken at 3:34 a.m. with my Sony ILCE-7RM5 and a 175mm focal length […]

Three years ago, my first trip to Dubai, I was in question of the futuristic architecture of the recently opened museum. Nothing quite like that has ever come across me. Tickets were almost impossible to obtain back then—booked out almost a month ahead. I barely spent a week in Dubai, so I regretfully never had […]

The day we finally went to experience Dubai Creek we simply had split our workshop group by boarding two different boats. As we sailed across the creek, I noticed sailing boat that I had never seen anywhere else before. It drew my eye, and at that point I just gave it little thought. Just moments […]

After we wrapped up the first moon shot, we rushed back to the hotel. The clouds promised an interesting opportunity for shot of Downtown at sunrise, and staying at Shangri-la Hotel in Dubai, we had the perfect terrace all to ourselves. That morning was a time limit race. We had just finished a moonshot exercise […]

The first PhotoPills trip to Dubai and Abu Dhabi ends, and what a journey it has been! Leading this team alongside Andy Marty on an amazing United Arab Emirates journey was just amazing. Still, the real high point is unquestionably, alignment of the supermoon with one of the most famous buildings in the world—the Burj […]