Future Pilot’s Senior Session at Monroe Executive Airport | Charlotte NC Senior Photographer
Zach is learning to fly at Monroe Executive Airport, so there really couldn’t have been a better place for his senior session. We spent the evening photographing him around the airport—and made sure to document the plane he’s done most of his training in.
There are senior sessions where we spend a lot of time figuring out the right location. This was definitely not one of them. Zach is learning to fly at Monroe Executive Airport, and when his dad first contacted me, they already knew that’s where they wanted to shoot. Of course, my mind immediately went into hyper planning mode and I knew this session had a lot of amazing potential to capture a really personal story about Zach’s plans and dreams.
Even better, we were able to use the plane Zach has done most of his training in. He and his dad specifically asked me to photograph some of the details of the plane while we were there, and I’m really glad they did. The tail number, the instrument panel, the cockpit, the little things he probably doesn’t think twice about right now; all of it is part of this particular time in his life.
And then, of course, there’s the fact that Zach can actually fly the thing.
It’s easy to forget when you’re talking about senior pictures that this is a high school student sitting in the pilot’s seat. I loved being able to photograph him where he actually takes his lessons rather than simply putting him next to a plane and making it look like he does.
We had three hours at the airport, which sounds wonderfully leisurely until I mention that we managed to choose the absolute hottest day of the year. The heat coming off that tarmac was something else.
Thankfully, having the extra time meant we didn’t have to rush. We could wander, get inside the plane, move around the hangars and wait for the light to change instead of trying to cram everything into an hour.
I also didn’t want to make every photograph about flying. Zach is a senior first, and I wanted the final gallery to have plenty of images that felt like senior portraits — just with a much better backdrop than I usually get to work with.
By the end of the session, the sun was finally low enough to give us some relief and the airport looked completely different than it had when we started. We finished out on the tarmac with the planes and that gorgeous late-day summer light.
This is one of those sessions I think will get more interesting with time. Right now, it’s simply where Zach goes to flight school and the plane he’s learning on.
Twenty years from now, I have a feeling he’ll be pretty happy his dad made sure we photographed it.
And for the record, if Zach ends up flying something enormous someday, I fully expect to be able to say I photographed him back when he was just getting started.
