I often get requests for information about techniques. Here is the “stock reply” that I have been using to save me some time. Now I can just point people to this post!
Equipment
I don’t use special cameras or lenses, really. I am currently using a Canon 5D and a 180mm macro lens, but other equipment works, [...]
I recently purchased a Canon 5D Mk II. A fine camera it seems, and the added resolution will be helpful. One small issue is that Canon redesigned the battery. Well, times change and things progress, and we can always use better batteries. It uses the LP-E6 battery and the camera is not compatible with the [...]
I realize that I haven’t written about my trip to Boston.
Last August, I was invited out to Boston to help on the set of Discovery Channel’s show, “Time Warp”. It was an opportunity to finally get some high-speed video of the kind of drop-on-a-splash collisions that I have been photographing for years, but have never [...]
Every now and then I get a question about managing depth of field in drop photographs. Indeed, it can be a bit frustrating.
Depth of field is a perennial problem with macro photography. It’s just the physics of it. The depth of field is shallower with higher magnification, so it makes little difference which lens you [...]
Andrew Davidhazy just pointed me to this kit for high-speed photography. It looks like a great way to get started for not a lot of money. The heart of the device is a microcontroller, so it has few parts and is extensible for the experimenter. It has both a sound sensor and a light sensor. [...]
This is a question I frequently get. The short answer is, “Most likely it will.”
Most any camera will do. I use a an electronic circuit to trigger the camera, so I need one that has an electronic shutter release (most do). I use a variety of methods to create my Liquid Sculpture images, but in [...]
I suppose it’s obvious to many that water is a special substance. To recount a few of its properties that make it so:
It has the highest surface tension of any liquid except mercury.
It has one of the highest heat capacities of all materials.
It expands (floats) when it freezes.
It is a nearly universal solvent.
For my work [...]
When people think of high-speed photography, the name that most often comes to mind is Harold “Doc†Edgerton. And rightly so, as he contributed so much to the discipline.
However, in 1876, A. M. Worthington wrote a paper entitled “A Second Paper on The Forms Assumed by Drops of Liquids falling vertically on a Horizontal Plate”; [...]
Once you try to produce a stream of drops at a steady rate, you begin to realize it isn’t as simple to do as it is to say. The temptation is to use a siphon or IV drip of some kind. The problem with these is that the amount of pressure behind the stream is [...]
Continued from previous post…
While it is a bit complicated getting the photographic equipment assembled, tested, and reliable, the true challenge is handling the liquids.
They are willfully non-linear.
It seems that everything in the world affects how they behave: viscosity, surface tension, density, temperature, the shape of the dropper, and what the cat had for dinner. Learning [...]
