As a child I lived under the approach path of an international airport. Every time a plane flew over the neighbourhood, people would cover their ears to avoid the thunderous scream of the jet engines, until the plane gradually flew out of sight. Eventually I developed an unshakable habit of looking up at every airplane in the sky.

Mike Kelley’s “Airportraits” series clearly resonates with people like me. At first glance, this series may remind the audience of zombie or doomsday movie scenes, as airborne mass evacuations dramatically take up more than half of each photo. In fact, these images are photoshopped by compositing selections from thousands of airplane photos taken in different cities.

Kelley has been working on the photo project for two years. His plan is very simple: go to a city and spend a couple of days shooting different planes flying under the same sky. On a sunny day, this is an easy task. On some occasions, though, the weather was so hostile that he had to give up midway and revisit the city later to get the right shots.

A dozen images have been composed for the “Airportraits” series so far, with locations from all over the world,  including Tokyo, London and Sydney. Take a look at Kelley’s Instagram and see whether cities you are familiar with have been included in the series.