Gabriel Scanu can’t fly through the air to achieve his aerial views of Australia — a drone does the heavy lifting. Last year, Gabriel and his father, a cinematographer, began capturing breathtaking images of his native country from hundreds of feet in the air, opening eyes all over the world to its diversity. “Being Australian, foreigners always think of you as a farmer, riding to work on a kangaroo through the bush everyday,” he says. “Growing up in the booming city of Sydney, my experiences of Australia are far from this assumption.”

Drone photography is relatively easy, Scanu promises, even in bad weather. “I think the most appealing aspect is the adrenaline and excitement of operating such an amazing piece of technology,” he says. “It’s almost like a sport, going into it and not knowing what the outcome will be, or if you’ll even get the drone back at the end of it.”