Please tell us in more detail how you set up your winning shot. I know you showed us the position of things. Presumably that is a spotlight on the left. But how did you sync the flash and the water drops? And how did you protect your gear from getting wet?
Setup as above... desk lamp to the left and flash to the right "here i am stuck in the middle with you" lol I used a yongnuo rf-602 flash sync (25ish quid of ebay) which is a must have in anyones kit bag... its too good not to have! Camera and flash in Manual mode... Canon 5DII 24-105mm @ 105 F10 1/200 (limited by the flash sync speed, one minor drawback of the rf602) ISO 100 Flash on 1/8 power IIRC No water protection... i was just careful Then it was just a case of setting the tap to a slow drip and i little bit of luck, I think i took about 150 shots! Only thing I would have liked it to use a macro lens... that would have been a much better lens to use! Heres another on i took during that same session. Thanks Rich
Rich (and remember I'm blonde!) - I have a flash sync thing for when I occasionally use studio flash. Bit plugs into my hotshoe and the radio/thingy/bit plugs into the back of the light, so when I press the shutter, it triggers the flash. Is this the same thing? And if so, can I set up my flashgun (Nikon SB600) and plug the bit into that, and the trigger on my camera? Sorry if I sound a bit stupid, but I don't really understand flash much, so tend to avoid it if possible. Also, how do you know when the drop is going to hit the water, so you can press the shutter? Or is that bit just down to luck?
Yeah that sounds the right bit of kit! So long as the receiver has got a hot shoe mount! And yes.. its just a bit of luck... but if you put your camera in High speed shooting mode youll stand more chance of getting the shot! Rich
i have used a bag suspended from a a-frame ladder with a tiny pinprick of a hole in it using just a flash mounted off camera against a black backdrop to give it some real contrast (same as you would set up a low key shot)
Well, wasted some time playing ..... My SB600 flash doesn't have commander mode and there's nowhere to stick the radio thingy, so I had to make do with the on-camera flash, as I then found out the batteries in the gun had gone flat! Not as good as yours, though Rich, so you're obviously very clever!
Thanks, Sam - it took me most of the afternoon. I also took about 150 pictures, produced about a dozen of the corona, and only about half of those were anywhere near passable (including one that looks a bit rude!)
I thought about it, but not being a cake-making sort of person, I didn't have any. I tried pouring some sunflower oil onto the surface of the water, to see if it would make any difference to the way the drops happened. It didn't, although I did get this
I plan on having another go at the droplet thing, when I have more time to play and when I get another light (I smashed my bright spot light on Friday), as it was a bit dark when I started today. Watch this space!
Bummer.... i wish i hadnt told you now!! Really like the third one and the first one isnt too shabby either... just maybe a shallower angle would have been a little better! Search ebay for those flash triggers... they are so cheap its not worth NOT having them... even as a back up to your studio triggers! Good work Stella! Rich
One of these is what I was planning to enter with; Flickr set - (best viewed large, and on black) Achieved with natural light, and by firing the camera on continuous shooting and dropping stones into the bird bath. Took over 200 shots, since dropping the stones in the exactly the right place proved difficult to do consistantly. Also a load of shots got discarded because the perfectionist in me didn`t want any of the water droplets to have left the shot! Oh, and I didn`t always catch the splash... I wasn`t entirely happy with results, so was looking to use the kitchen sink, like Rich, and either add red food colouring or use a red filter over the light source, but never got round to it. I may well give it a go in the future though.
