Water Figure Tutorial

Due to the overwhelming response I got on Flickr and several e-mail requests, I’m going to divulge how the above shot was taken.

Quick Summary:  A few drops of paint on a balloon covered speaker, while the speaker played a 120Hz tone.  The photo was taken using speed photography techniques, which includes a dark room, long shutter time, shot flash duration, and a sound trigger set at about 70 milliseconds.

Full Details:
First, you need a speaker.  It doesn’t need to be a big speaker.  In fact, for this shot, I just used the small hole (about 2-3 inches wide) that was in the side of my speaker.

Second, you’ll need to cover the speaker, with some rubber.  I couldn’t thing of anything else, so I ended up snipping of the end of a balloon and stretching that over the speaker.  Make sure it’s flat and stretch tight.  Alternately, I think a garbage bag might work too, but don’t quote me on that.

Next, you’ll need a sound generator.  If your stereo has auxilary inputs, you can hook up your computer or laptop to it (headphone out to aux in).  Download a program called Multisine…this will be your sound generator.  Multisine is a small, easy to use program that will create a sound wave at any frequency.  To create a sine wave, just click Generator, Sine, enter a frequency (120 worked for me), and voltage (1 is fine), and then press “Ok” (not add sine…this will only lead to headaches).  Then press Play to hear the tone.

Ok, we’ve got the speaker ready, a sound to play through the speaker…now we just need to set up the photography equipment :)

I used two flashes, my trusty 580exII and 430exII for this shoot.  I wanted plenty of light, and very few shadows.  They were placed at the 4 and 7 o’clock position, both set at about 1/16 power.  The power rating is important!  This determines how long the flash duration will be, and you want a short flash duration (lower power, shorter duration) to capture the motion.  In truth, I wanted to drop the power to 1/32, but then I’d have to lower the f-stop on the camera and I’d lose some DOF.  Macro speed photography is always a balance of DOF and amount of light.

Attached to the flashes is my sound trigger.  I’ve talked about this a few times in my blog before, but I’ll mention it again.  A sound trigger is basically a device that triggers the flash whenever a loud sound is heard.  Hiviz sells a basic sound trigger that works okay, but the Stop Shot is a much nicer unit.  Built into both of these units is a delay circuit, so that the flash fires shortly after the sound is heard, instead of immediately.  For this shot, I set the delay to approximately 70 milliseconds.

This shot could probably be done without the sound trigger, but it’d be hard.  You’re basically trying to time the moment shortly after the sound occurs.  Too soon an you won’t see anything.  Too late and you won’t see anything either.  The entire event lasts less than .1 seconds.

Okay, so now you’ve got your flashes set up, you camera on a tripod (oh yeah, I skipped that step), and you’re ready to shoot.  Drop a few drops of paint near the center of the speaker.  For the above shot I used about 18-24 drops of paint, 3-4 drops of each color.  Set your camera to 1”, f14 (for a large DOF), ISO100.  Turn the lights down (to prevent motion blur), open the shutter, play the sound.

Here’s the tricky part (and about now you’re saying, “Are you kidding?”)…your volume, frequency, and density (how much water is in your paint) will play a big role in how your photo will look.  To low of volume, and your paint won’t move.  To high, and it flies right off the speaker (that looks pretty cool too).  Density matters too.  Too watery and it’ll separate too easily.  Too dense, and it won’t move.  Finding a balance between all these factors is tough, and takes a little trial and error.

Bored yet?  Did I scare you all with details?  Sorry if this was too much, but I wanted you guys to have as much information as possible if you wanted to create something similar.  In truth, this photo was the result of about 4 hours of playing around.  Preparing the speaker, setting up the camera, getting the paint ready, and shooting about 20-30 shots.

If you have any questions, please ask them in comments.  I’ll try to answer any and all questions within a day or two.  And for those that wondered, no, it was not Britney Spears that was playing in the speaker, though that would explain why the paint was trying to get away.

And as a final note, have fun with this!  It’s a little work to get set up, but every shot is different.  Try different liquids.  Try oil.  Try water.  Or try a little food coloring mixed with cream:

Alphabet Speed Photography, D through F

Here’s a quick update on my speed photography project.

D for Daisy Drop was something I’ve attempted before and failed miserably. I didn’t have a macro lens, and just couldn’t get close enough to the drop. This time, armed with a set of Macro extension tubes and my new Sigma 70-200 f2.8 (I love that lens), I was able to get much closer to the drop.

Two things about this photo I don’t like. First, I couldn’t find a good place to put the flash to eliminate a large bright spot on the drop. Second, you might notice a slight brownish edge to the drop…that’s my wooden stand that holds my eye-dropper. Gonna have to get that thing painted black :)

Next is my favorite of the three. Originally, I was just going to shoot a plain old chicken egg. As luck would have it, my journalistic wife needed to take some photos of caviar (fish eggs) for a story, which she bought at a local sushi bar.

What can I say. I love this shot. The eggs were incredibly tough, and very sticky (I think there are a couple still left on the ceiling). I performed this shoot six times with only two sets of eggs.

I struggled with F. After great thought, I ended up on Fudgesicle, only to have a fellow speed photographer (Alan Sailer) beat me to it. So to be original, I decided to do fungus. Again, Alan beat me to it (I shouldn’t have told him what I was going to shoot). However, he did give me the idea that I finally landed on:

French Fries on their own would have been a little dull, so I added some ketchup. If it’s one thing I’ve learned about speed photography, it’s that composition is still very important. There needs to be color, contrast, and proper lighting. Without that, speed photography isn’t art…it’s a physics lesson.

I hope you enjoyed these shots as much as I enjoyed taking them. And if you have any suggestions for H or I, please leave a comment below.

Alphabet Speed Photography, A through C

And so it begins. I'm loving my new project. Twenty-six speed photography photos, each with a subject starting with a different letter in the alphabet. And we begin with:



Apple is such an obvious choice to start with, but I did it anyway. So I added a twist...shaped bokeh! For those that haven't heard of shaped bokeh, it's a fun little project. You cut out a small shape in black construction paper, put the paper over the lens, and crank your f-stop down as low as it will go. Any out-of-focus highlights will become the shape of your cut-out (you can even see it in the viewfinder).

For example, the above photo has a leaf cut-out (bought a leaf-shaped paper punch) and a bunch of Christmas lights in the background. I'm a little disappointed in the size of the splash, but it was the best of the series.

And so we move on to the next obvious choice, balloons:



I almost deleted this photo, but kind of like it. There's a lot of contrast in this photo. My original idea was to cover the balloon with multicolored water and pop it (which I did...see the previous post). It worked, but there was no balloon in the photo, so I rejected it for my project.

Last of all is a photo that was actually suggested by my wife (jokingly I'm sure...but I ran with it), C is for Condom:



I swear I'm 12. I giggled during the entire shoot.

These things are tough! Hats off to the guys at Trojan, they make a helluva product. The above photo is a pellet going through a condom filled with milk (lol...I'm still giggling). I expected the tip to burst (heehee) and milk to spray everywhere. But instead, the pellet went right through and condom remained pretty well intact.

Stay tuned! D through F is coming soon!

Bustin the Burnout

It was bound to happen. I got burned out. Too many photos. Too much pressure.

Two thousand photos...in 10 days. Two weddings, vacation photos, and a newborn shoot. Plus a 365 project that was ending up as a "Crap, it's 11 p.m. and I haven't taken a photo yet today". Too much for a hobby photographer to handle (I didn't take a cent for any of it).

So I dropped my 365, deciding I didn't like the quality of the work (you can only take so many photos of the cats before they get even by waking you up at 4 a.m. with a look that says "do you think I look cute now?").

For a couple weeks I barely touched the camera, picking it up occasionally for the random freelance gig. I had no inspiration. Not even for the DPS assignments, which I swore I'd do every week.

And a break was just what I needed. It gave me time to reflect, relax, and remember what I enjoy about the camera. I love the feel of it...the solid weight of a good lens, heavy to feel the but easy to maneuver. Picturing the shot, imagining every detail as you set focal points, appeture, and flash position. Feeling satisfaction every time you click that shutter. The anticipation as the picutre loads. That feeling you get when you've shot something incredible. It was remembering all this that made me realize I missed it.

Suddenly, inspiration hit me once again. A new project! Alphabet Speed Photography! I'll shoot 26 photos, with subjects starting with the letters A through Z, and every shot must be a form of speed photography.

This weekend I shot the first three letters, A through C (more on this to come shortly). Those three shots turned out well, but one of my expirements literally had me saying "Holy Sh!%!" when the photo came up on the screen:



This is a photo of about 60 or so colored water drops on a balloon 3 milliseconds after it popped. A photo of the before (testing the light levels...I really need a light meter):



This is what I missed. Creating something incredible and unique, and sharing it with others.

So I guess what I've figured out is too much of a good thing is never good. Sometimes we need to give up the things we love to remember why we loved them in the first place (this doesn't include cats or people). If you're feeling uninspired by your photography lately, don't freak...it's just temporary.

Happy shooting :)

Where the Magic Happens

Pretty sweet, right? This is my studio. It’s dark. It’s damp. It smells like kitty litter…used kitty litter.

But a space like this seriously has it’s advantages…like when you want to shoot crayons with a pellet gun without your wife getting mad.

A “studio” doesn’t have to be anything fancy. In fact, a studio only has to suit the needs of your photographic style. For instance, I like doing balistics photography (bullets blowing stuff up) and milk drop photography, and my studio fits my needs perfectly. Other people like shooting portraits, and wouldn’t dream of showing clients a mess like mine (yes, I’ve done portraits, but not in my basement).

Most photographers don’t even have a studio, and quite frankly, don’t need one. Sure you can do the “traditional” studio shot (two flashes in the 4 and 8 o'clock position, black backdrop)…

…but the entire world can be your studio, with infinite backdrops and a multitude of lighting conditions (on camera fill-flash next to big metal sculpture).

So what’s your “studio”?

It’s A Small World…

…and it’s about to get smaller.

During a photography meeting last month, some guy (someday I’ll actually learn all their names) taught us a little bit about macro photography. For those that don’t know, macro photography is making little things look big. There are three ways to do this:

1. Buy a macro lens. Expensive. My wife does not approve. But the best of the three options.
2. Get a reversal ring for the 50mm (NiftyFifty). Kinda goofy, but the cheapest option if you have a 50mm. Read more about that here.
3. Extension Tubes. About $100. Good image quality, but you’ll need more light.

So a few days ago, I officially took the dive into macro photography. I received my brand new set of extension tubes, the Kenko C/AFs to be exact. Here's a couple photos to show what they look like:

Extension tubes are exactly how they sound…tubes that extend the length of the lens, and fit between your camera and the lens. There is no glass. THEY DO NOT MAGNIFY…a common misconception. Rather, they allow you to get closer to your subject than normal. For example, the closest I can normally get to a subject with my 50mm lens is about 15 inches, which is fine if you want to take a picture of a keyboard:

Now I slap on the 12mm extension tube, and focus on my initials. Now I can get the lens a few inches closer:

Again with the 20mm (I can get even closer to the keyboard):

And one more time with 36mm (about an inch from the keyboard):

Wow, huh. In the 20mm example, you can totally see all the cat hair that has built up in my keyboard (honey, I need a USB vacuum for Christmas).

Check out the depth of field in the last shot…the whole “R” isn’t even in focus! With the 36mm tube and the 50mm lens, the focus distance was pretty small…I could probably only focus on something 1-2 inches from the lens, which brings up another good point.

With an extension tube on, you can no longer focus to infinity. Even with the 12mm tube, I could probably only focus on something a few feet away.

One last thing to note is that extension tubes come with all the nifty connections to allow your lens to autofocus and function as normal, so don't worry about having to do anything complicated. Just put the tube on the camera and the lens on the tube, and you're good to go :)

Okay, so technically I didn’t dive right in to macro photography….more like waded in a few feet. But I hope to do more with this in the upcoming weeks, and maybe I’ll have more information soon. And yes, maybe I’ll even break my rule and go shoot some flowers :p

Shooting from the Hip

I’m an introvert. For those of you that don’t know, that means I’d rather stay home and play Grand Theft Auto than go out to the bars with a bunch of people I barely know. And we don’t like extroverts…they make us tired.

So when it comes to photography, I find that shooting in public is a bit stressful (which is why you see A LOT of studio shots from me). In our era of paparazzis, stalkers, and just plain weirdos, photographers are having trouble taking innocent photos just for fun. Not everyone wants their picture taken, and some get pretty grumpy when you do. And yes, I have had a stranger ask me to delete a photo (a wide angle with about 10 people in it) because they didn’t feel they looked attractive at the time (she was sneezing).

So when walking around the Cedar Rapid’s Farmers Market today (they don’t just sell farmers anymore), I found a lot of great photo ops, but was worried about the ramifications of clicking that button. So I shot from the hip. No viewfinder. One-handed. Shot from waist level.

Does it work? Not really. In fact, a good photographer told me once that about 90% of all shots taken without aiming are throw-aways.

So how did I do today?

The hardest part is getting the focus right, as seen in this photo (a little soft):

I have no idea what I was shooting here, but kind of like it:

And this shot was not technically fired “from the hip”, though I didn’t aim through the viewfinder. And I’m pretty sure he knew I was taking photos.

So get out there and take some shots “from the hip”. In fact, post a link in the comments…I’d love to see some other people’s work when not aiming from a viewfinder.