Jeffrey Milstein has trained his eye so he can see the big silver birds from miles away, coming in for their landings. "It's a little like hunting," says the compact 62-year-old photographer, whose Zeiss lenses stalk screeching Boeing 747s and mammoth Airbus 340s on approach to Los Angeles International Airport. "They're big and slow, dark and ominous."

After decades as an architect and then a stationery entrepreneur (he cashed out in 2000), snapping airplanes became Milstein's calling. It might seem simpler for him to drive two hours from his upstate New York studio to one of Gotham's hubs, but the light is better in L.A., where Milstein was born. "And in New York I always get asked to move," he says. "The authorities are just too skittish."

Though he has other laudable photo series (views of decay in Havana and in junk heaps), "the planes really took off," he says, not realizing his pun. This month, Milstein's images are showcased at Paul Kopeikin Gallery in Los Angeles, just as they emerge in AirCraft (Abrams, $29.95). With white backgrounds replacing the blue sky, his photographs isolate the engineering variations of each vessel; the winged beauties are halted in midair and the viewer gets full focus on their aluminum underbellies.—NED MARTEL

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