Night Images Of Mississauga, Ontario

I love night photography because it shares so many aspects with my other photographic love of water blur. The long exposure time that allows you to scope out the next angle. The hidden secrets that the images often reveal.

However, night photography is lonely and rather anti-social. The family doesn’t want to come with you and stand around, especially when it’s cold. In today’s paranoid world, people think you’re setting up some kind of gun holder or bomb instead of just a camera on a tripod. Passersby are more suspicious than curious of what you’re up to.

So… I was down near Toronto Pearson International Airport the other evening for a presentation by Royal Caribbean International on their newest ship Quantum of the Seas. The ship is amazing, by the way. The thing went until 8pm and no one was urgently waiting for me back home so I took advantage of the opportunity. All the images below were simple 30 second exposures.

Mississauga City Centre at Night

My first plan was for the Toronto Waterfront but, as usual, the Weather Network overestimated the forecast temperature and walking at night on the shores of Lake Ontario with below freezing temps was not appealing. My second was the Square One area of Mississauga, Ontario.

Lights, modern skyscrapers, traffic – it’s all there. At the Square One mall, there is a parking garage on the southeast corner that offers up amazing views. The top floor of the garage is hardly ever used and serves as one big observation deck.

Of course, the pinnacle is the Absolute World Towers, the two curvy shaped skyscrapers that are only a few years old. They are nicknamed the Marilyn Monroe Buildings because of these curves.

The area is still close to the airport and not many long exposure night shots will escape streaking by airplane lights. I think this is a cool result – others might not think the same.

I’ve been to this location countless times. I just occurred to me this time that the area is very similar to the strip in Las Vegas, Nevada. This is a very built up and growing ‘downtown core’ with numerous modern skyscrapers with more and more on the way. However, it is not a traditional city.

Square One first opened in 1973 and this core has built up around it out of farm land since. Even at the edges of the the buildings in the west, developments are still being carved out of farmland. Whereas, the downtown of nearby Toronto and most other major centres in the world, the downtown was first developed over a century ago and has undergone renewal several times since.