Gary Winogrand once remarked that he photographed things to see what they looked like as photographs. I felt a strong affinity for this philosophy recently while reviewing images I had made of a new steel roller coaster under construction near my home. I found that when captured between the frames of a photograph, the twisting, arcing, steel tubes and boxes seemed magically transformed from a thrill ride into intriguing pieces of steel sculpture. They suddenly became Sculptures of Thrill.

Over the next several months, I returned many times to the park to photograph the steel coasters, looking for the best perspectives to showcase the wonderful beauty of these structures. In the beginning I looked for small elements that could be isolated from their surroundings, much like a piece of sculpture viewed in a museum. But as the project grew, the elements also grew until finally I was photographing the coasters in their environment; or sculptures in the garden.

In researching the history of steel coasters, I was struck by the number of similarities between steel versus wooden coasters and digital versus film photography. Just as digital cameras opened up a huge new design space for camera manufactures, steel gave the coaster designers an enormous new set of capabilities to explore. But, just as with film, there will probably always be wooden coasters. And it won’t be only for nostalgic reasons. Like film cameras, wooden coasters offer an entirely different sensation and feel than their steel counterparts. However, just as the fantastic capabilities of modern digital cameras are pushing film into niche market status, steel now commands more than a 10 to 1 dominance over wood in the world coaster market.

So, the next time you visit a theme park with a steel coaster, look at it not as a thrill ride, but as a sculpture of thrill. Enjoy the view.