Award-winning aerial photographer Brad Walls, also known as Bradscanvas, has just released his highly-anticipated new series Pools From Above - an ode to the beauty found in the shapes, colours and textures of swimming pools.
This unique and never-before-seen perspective uses Walls’ clean, minimal aesthetic to visually showcase interesting pools from around the world.
Inspired by his travels throughout Southeast Asia and within his own home country of Australia, Walls’ journey initially began by capturing the bodies of water simply to document holiday memories. It wasn’t until picking up the bestselling Annie Kelly coffee table book Splash: The Art of the Swimming Pool, however, that Walls would start investing time and passion into curating a series, stating that “As I turned each page of Kelly’s book, a wave of childhood nostalgia washed over me, spending hours in the pool over summer.” Paying powerful homage to Kelly, Walls’ series chooses to keenly focus on pools’ elements of composition from a bird’s eye view. “I fell in love with the lines, curves and negative space of the pools, which - without alternate perspective from a drone - would have been lost.”
A Palm Spring Ting Private pool, Byron Bay
Pools From Above is also an integral part of a much larger project which is aimed at a book release in the not-too-distant future, as Walls says “The response from viewers has been positive, asking for the series to be amongst their coffee table books.” Looking ahead, once the world finally re-opens, Walls has no plans of slowing down. He plans to capture even more world-renowned swimming pools across an array of idyllic locations, including Palm Springs, Mexico and the Mediterranean.
Aquacade Bondi Icebergs, Sydney
Since bursting onto the photography scene in early 2019, Walls has gone on to produce award-winning photographs and garner worldwide media attention, with a primary focus on capturing aerial portraits of sportspeople like synchronized swimmers, gymnasts and ice skaters from unique perspectives and angles that audiences are normally unable to see.
Babylon Private pool, Sydney
Walls is a featured artist for the Inaugural 2020 Aerial Photography Awards in October and already shortlisted for the Drone Photo Awards in Siena, Italy, within the Sport and People categories.
Quarter pi Private Pool, Sydney
Balletic Private Pool Byron Bay
Blu Private property, Bali
Cosmo Bondi Icebergs, Sydney
Daydream Private Pool, Sydney
Grecian sun sleeper Private Pool, Philippines
layers Private property, Bali
Momentum public pool Prince Albert-Park Pool, Sydney
Nostalgia Private property, Bali
On the ledge Byron Bay
Paradise walkway Private property, Bali
Patterns Resort Byron Bay
Pixelated H2O Private property, Philippines
Solo swim Public pool, Sydney
Summer bliss Private property, Sydney
Suns out buns Ωut Private pool, Sydney
Survival Juice public pool, Prince Albert Park Pool, Sydney
Symmetry Private Pool, Malaysia
Time warp Resort Byron Bay
Up & down public pool, Prince Albert Park Pool, Sydney
Series name: Pools from above
Photographer: Brad Walls
Tools used: DJI Mavic 2 pro, Adobe Photoshop, Adobe Lightroom
