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360° Aerial Photos of Barcelona Transform the City Into Small Planets

By Jessica Stewart on January 25, 2018

Currently living in Barcelona, Brazilian photographer Bruno Alencastro wanted to capture his experience in Europe by photographing the city from a different perspective. The task wouldn't be easy, considering millions of travelers flock to the city each year to photograph some of the city's most well-loved monuments. Thus, Alencastro took to the sky, creating a set of 360-degree aerial photographs that transform areas of Barcelona into small globes.

Alencastro began with Gaudí's iconic Sagrada Familia, which he just so happened to live next to, giving him a first-hand view of the tourists that poured through the monument daily, all snapping photographs. “I had been looking for a different angle, not to repeat the thousands of almost equal photos that are posted every day on social networks,” Alencastro tells My Modern Met.

Taking to the sky, he captured 46 aerial photographs, which he then composited together and transformed into a stereographic projection. A stereographic projection allows a sphere to be projected onto a plane—just imagine how flat maps are placed onto spherical globes. In this manner, different neighborhoods and monuments in Barcelona become “small planets” unto themselves.

After tackling the Sagrada Familia, Alencastro was so inspired that he made his way across 9 other sections of the city, from beachy Barceloneta to the Montjuïc hilltop. By going up high with these 360 photos, the Brazilian photographer manages to gain a unique perspective of the streets of Barcelona.

Follow along with Alencastro as he documents his time in Barcelona via #168daysinbcn.