In his Two Degrees Celsius series, Tom Hegen explores the impact of climate change on Greenland's melting ice sheet.

(Tom Hegen)

Greenland's ice sheet between 2012 and 2014, according to a study in Geophysical Research Letters. Currently, it's losing ice at a rate , and the melt is accelerating, a separatestudy stated.

This is what Tom Hegen, a photographer from Munich, Germany, takes to the skies to document.

Hegen buzzes some 3,000 feet above Greenland's seemingly endless sheetof ice before having the pilot tip the plane on its side so he can snap a photo. If the light or angle isn't to his liking, he asks to circle around to do it again.

(Tom Hegen)

“,” Tom Hegen told Atlas Obscura. Whileaerial photography may appear easy because of the distance between the camera and the Earth's surface, here's some perspective: Taking photos like the ones seen in Hegen's , you have to have the precision comparable to that of taking an image of an object over 1,300 feet away while in a car traveling at 100 mph.

From the seat of a plane, Hegen captures a perspective that many aren't able to see from the ground. His photography shows the drastic but mesmerizing effects of climate change on the Arctic Ice Sheet spanning Greenland.

Hegen describes the issues that arise while photographing such a remote place and trying to locate meltwater rivers and lakes that could disappear overnight.

(Tom Hegen)

There were days he would wait for hoursin his tent among fjords to see if the weather would clear up enough to get the plane into the sky to shoot. Some days, that time never came. When he did get in the air and above the landscape, some parts became so thick, the pilot would have to climb just to keep a safe distance between the plane and the ice.

“I felt numb and overwhelmed at first, before I could even start taking the first photos,” Hegen said of the landscapes changing proportions. “On all sides and up to the horizon – just ice."

Like that of his Two Degrees Celsius series, Hegen'snumerous aerial photography collections attemptto show the relationship between humans and nature by changing the perspective.

(Tom Hegen)

, for example, would appear to be a natural scene if shot from the ground. Take to the sky and it shows you something you might not have noticed.

“Once you change the perspective and get an overview of it, you actually recognize that every single tree is planted on a grid system to make it easier for the cutting machines to go through the aisles,” said Hegen.

More ofHegen's photography can be seen on his and .