0:00:01.206,0:00:03.342
I'm driven by pure passion

0:00:03.366,0:00:06.039
to create photographs that tell stories.

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Photography can be described[br]as the recording of a single moment

0:00:11.269,0:00:13.475
frozen within a fraction of time.

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Each moment or photograph[br]represents a tangible piece

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of our memories as time passes.

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But what if you could capture more[br]than one moment in a photograph?

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What if a photograph[br]could actually collapse time,

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compressing the best moments[br]of the day and the night

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seamlessly into one single image?

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I've created a concept[br]called "Day to Night"

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and I believe it's going to change

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the way you look at the world.

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I know it has for me.

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My process begins by photographing[br]iconic locations,

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places that are part of what I call[br]our collective memory.

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I photograph from a fixed vantage point,[br]and I never move.

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I capture the fleeting moments[br]of humanity and light as time passes.

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Photographing for anywhere[br]from 15 to 30 hours

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and shooting over 1,500 images,

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I then choose the best moments[br]of the day and night.

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Using time as a guide,

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I seamlessly blend those best moments[br]into one single photograph,

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visualizing our conscious[br]journey with time.

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I can take you to Paris

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for a view from the Tournelle Bridge.

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And I can show you the[br]early morning rowers

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along the River Seine.

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And simultaneously,

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I can show you Notre Dame aglow at night.

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And in between, I can show you[br]the romance of the City of Light.

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I am essentially a street photographer[br]from 50 feet in the air,

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and every single thing you see[br]in this photograph

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actually happened on this day.

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Day to Night is a global project,

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and my work has always been about history.

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I'm fascinated by the concept[br]of going to a place like Venice

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and actually seeing it during[br]a specific event.

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And I decided I wanted to see[br]the historical Regata,

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an event that's actually been[br]taking place since 1498.

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The boats and the costumes[br]look exactly as they did then.

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And an important element that I really[br]want you guys to understand is:

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this is not a timelapse,

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this is me photographing[br]throughout the day and the night.

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I am a relentless collector[br]of magical moments.

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And the thing that drives me[br]is the fear of just missing one of them.

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The entire concept came about in 1996.

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LIFE Magazine commissioned me[br]to create a panoramic photograph

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of the cast and crew of Baz Luhrmann's[br]film Romeo + Juliet.

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I got to the set and realized:[br]it's a square.

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So the only way I could actually create[br]a panoramic was to shoot a collage

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of 250 single images.

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So I had DiCaprio and Claire Danes[br]embracing.

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And as I pan my camera to the right,

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I noticed there was a mirror on the wall

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and I saw they were[br]actually reflecting in it.

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And for that one moment, that one image

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I asked them, "Would you guys just kiss

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for this one picture?"

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And then I came back[br]to my studio in New York,

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and I hand-glued these 250 images together

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and stood back and went,[br]"Wow, this is so cool!

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I'm changing time in a photograph."

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And that concept actually[br]stayed with me for 13 years

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until technology finally[br]has caught up to my dreams.

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This is an image I created[br]of the Santa Monica Pier, Day to Night.

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And I'm going to show you a little video

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that gives you an idea of what[br]it's like being with me

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when I do these pictures.

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To start with, you have to understand[br]that to get views like this,

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most of my time is spent up high,[br]and I'm usually in a cherry picker

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or a crane.

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So this is a typical day,[br]12-18 hours, non-stop

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capturing the entire day unfold.

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One of the things that's great[br]is I love to people-watch.

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And trust me when I tell you,

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this is the greatest seat[br]in the house to have.

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But this is really how I go about[br]creating these photographs.

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So once I decide on my view[br]and the location,

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I have to decide where day begins[br]and night ends.

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And that's what I call the time vector.

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Einstein described time as a fabric.

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Think of the surface of a trampoline:

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it warps and stretches with gravity.

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I see time as a fabric as well,

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except I take that fabric and flatten it,[br]compress it into single plane.

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One of the unique aspects[br]of this work is also,

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if you look at all my pictures,

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the time vector changes:

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sometimes I'll go left to right,

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sometimes front to back,[br]up or down, even diagonally.

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I am exploring the space-time continuum

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within a two-dimensional still photograph.

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Now when I do these pictures,

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it's literally like a real-time puzzle[br]going on in my mind.

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I build a photograph based on time,

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and this is what I call the master plate.

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This can take us several[br]months to complete.

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The fun thing about this work is

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I have absolutely zero control[br]when I get up there

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on any given day and capture photographs.

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So I never know who's[br]going to be in the picture,

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if it's going to be a great[br]sunrise or sunset -- no control.

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It's at the end of the process,

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if I've had a really great day[br]and everything remained the same,

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that I then decide who's in and who's out,

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and it's all based on time.

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I'll take those best moments that I pick[br]over a month of editing

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and they get seamlessly blended[br]into the master plate.

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I'm compressing the day and night

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as I saw it,

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creating a unique harmony between[br]these two very discordant worlds.

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Painting has always been a really[br]important influence in all my work

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and I've always been a huge fan[br]of Albert Bierstadt,

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the great Hudson River School painter.

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He inspired a recent series[br]that I did on the National Parks.

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This is Bierstadt's Yosemite Valley.

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So this is the photograph[br]I created of Yosemite.

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This is actually the cover story[br]of the 2016 January issue

0:06:17.230,0:06:18.523
of National Geographic.

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I photographed for over[br]30 hours in this picture.

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I was literally on the side of a cliff,

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capturing the stars[br]and the moonlight as it transitions,

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the moonlight lighting El Capitan.

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And I also captured this transition[br]of time throughout the landscape.

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The best part is obviously seeing[br]the magical moments of humanity

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as time changed --

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from day into night.

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And on a personal note,

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I actually had a photocopy[br]of Bierstadt's painting in my pocket.

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And when that sun started[br]to rise in the valley,

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I started to literally shake[br]with excitement

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because I looked at the painting and I go,

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"Oh my god, I'm getting Bierstadt's[br]exact same lighting

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100 years earlier."

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Day to Night is about all the things,

0:07:08.640,0:07:10.887
it's like a compilation of all[br]the things I love

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about the medium of photography.

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It's about landscape,

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it's about street photography,

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it's about color, it's about architecture,

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perspective, scale --[br]and, especially, history.

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This is one of the most historical moments

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I've been able to photograph,

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the 2013 Presidential Inauguration[br]of Barack Obama.

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And if you look closely in this picture,

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you can actually see time changing

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in those large television sets.

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You can see Michelle[br]waiting with the children,

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the president now greets the crowd,

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he takes his oath,

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and now he's speaking to the people.

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There's so many challenging aspects[br]when I create photographs like this.

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For this particular photograph,

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I was in a 50-foot scissor lift[br]up in the air

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and it was not very stable.

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So every time my assistant and I[br]shifted our weight,

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our horizon line shifted.

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So for every picture you see,

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and there were about[br]1,800 in this picture,

0:08:04.860,0:08:07.819
we both had to tape our feet into position

0:08:07.843,0:08:09.986
every time I clicked the shutter.

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(Applause)

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I've learned so many extraordinary[br]things doing this work.

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I think the two most important[br]are patience

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and the power of observation.

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When you photograph a city[br]like New York from above,

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I discovered that those people in cars

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that I sort of live with everyday,

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they don't look like people[br]in cars anymore.

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They feel like a giant school of fish,

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it was a form of emergent behavior.

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And when people describe[br]the energy of New York,

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I think this photograph begins[br]to really capture that.

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When you look closer in my work,

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you can see there's stories going on.

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You realize that Times Square is a canyon,

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it's shadow and it's sunlight.

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So I decided, in this photograph,[br]I would checkerboard time.

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So wherever the shadows are, it's night

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and wherever the sun is,[br]it's actually day.

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Time is this extraordinary thing

0:09:06.727,0:09:09.338
that we never can really[br]wrap our heads around.

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But in a very unique and special way,

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I believe these photographs[br]begin to put a face on time.

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They embody a new[br]metaphysical visual reality.

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When you spend 15 hours[br]looking at a place,

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you're going to see things[br]a little differently

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than if you or I walked up[br]with our camera,

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took a picture, and then walked away.

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This was a perfect example.

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I call it "Sacré-Coeur Selfie."

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I watched over 15 hours

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all these people[br]not even look at Sacré-Coeur.

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They were more interested[br]in using it as a backdrop.

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They would walk up, take a picture,

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and then walk away.

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And I found this to be an absolutely[br]extraordinary example,

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a powerful disconnect between[br]what we think the human experience is

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versus what the human experience[br]is evolving into.

0:10:03.922,0:10:08.764
The act of sharing has suddenly[br]become more important

0:10:08.788,0:10:10.683
than the experience itself.

0:10:11.416,0:10:14.657
(Applause)

0:10:14.681,0:10:17.817
And finally, my most recent image,

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which has such a special meaning[br]for me personally:

0:10:21.135,0:10:24.579
this is the Serengeti National[br]Park in Tanzania.

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And this is photographed[br]in the middle of the Seronera,

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this is not a reserve.

0:10:29.532,0:10:32.440
I went specifically during[br]the peak migration

0:10:32.464,0:10:35.535
to hopefully capture[br]the most diverse range of animals.

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Unfortunately, when we got there,

0:10:38.107,0:10:40.687
there was a drought going on[br]during the peak migration,

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a five-week drought.

0:10:41.886,0:10:44.479
So all the animals[br]were drawn to the water.

0:10:44.503,0:10:46.744
I found this one watering hole,

0:10:46.768,0:10:50.793
and felt if everything remained[br]the same way it was behaving,

0:10:50.817,0:10:54.301
I had a real opportunity[br]to capture something unique.

0:10:54.325,0:10:56.130
We spent three days studying it,

0:10:56.154,0:10:57.821
and nothing could have prepared me

0:10:57.845,0:10:59.845
for what I witnessed during our shoot day.

0:11:00.438,0:11:03.246
I photographed for 26 hours

0:11:03.270,0:11:06.682
in a sealed crocodile blind,[br]18 feet in the air.

0:11:07.340,0:11:09.896
What I witnessed was unimaginable.

0:11:09.920,0:11:11.174
Frankly, it was Biblical.

0:11:11.491,0:11:13.546
We saw, for 26 hours,

0:11:13.570,0:11:18.800
all these competitive species[br]share a single resource called water.

0:11:19.115,0:11:22.975
The same resource that humanity[br]is supposed to have wars over

0:11:22.999,0:11:24.633
during the next 50 years.

0:11:25.301,0:11:28.737
The animals never even[br]grunted at each other.

0:11:29.515,0:11:33.269
They seem to understand something[br]that we humans don't.

0:11:33.650,0:11:36.455
That this precious resource called water

0:11:36.479,0:11:38.586
is something we all have to share.

0:11:39.699,0:11:42.310
When I created this picture,

0:11:43.222,0:11:47.476
I realized that Day to Night[br]is really a new way of seeing,

0:11:48.127,0:11:49.349
compressing time,

0:11:50.349,0:11:53.524
exploring the space-time continuum[br]within a photograph.

0:11:54.809,0:11:58.523
As technology evolves[br]along with photography,

0:11:59.229,0:12:03.253
photographs will not only communicate[br]a deeper meaning of time and memory,

0:12:03.920,0:12:09.705
but they will compose a new narrative[br]of untold stories,

0:12:10.594,0:12:14.554
creating a timeless window into our world.

0:12:15.285,0:12:16.436
Thank you.

0:12:16.460,0:12:23.126
(Applause)