First smoke shots

[Josh66]

Can you believe it? All this time, and no smoke shots?

Well here you go:

A few more in my flickr - see sig.

 

[NateWagner]

fun stuff.

How did you go about coloring the smoke? gelling the flash? or in post?

 

[Josh66]

Post. The bottom half is as shot. Added a green gradient from the top down. (Diagonally from top-left to bottom-right.)

 

[NateWagner]

gotcha, looks pretty sweet.

 

[Josh66]

Thanks. It was actually kinda fun. A little hit or miss though ... it's not like you can really control it or anything. Probably took about 50 pictures and got 5 good ones, lol.

 

[LahPhotographer]

Amazing shot! You did a nice job making something like smoke look cool...

 

[Josh66]

Thanks! I can't really take credit though. I just copied what I've seen done here, lol!

 

[LahPhotographer]

true, the concept itself is not new (much like water drop shots) But every one is different cause you cannot do that same shot twice, if you know what I mean. SO again congrats on capturing a good smoke shot.

 

[TheSolicitor]

I really like the coloring effect, it adds a certain intrigue and it makes you take a second look at it. As far as doing something different, one thing I enjoy is to take mine and change them from gray smoke on the black background to a negative so the smoke comes in at a really sweet blue color (usually between sky blue and deep navy) and the background is white.

 

[Josh66]

That's a cool idea - I'll have to try that. Thanks.

 

[TheSolicitor]

That's a cool idea - I'll have to try that. Thanks.

No problem. Switching things to a negative is always interesting when you're dealing with something as abstract as smoke, or even other items such as flowers, or other still life.

If you're on a Mac and don't care to go the entire route of making a photograph a negative, you can press, in order Control + Option + Apple + 8 and it will turn your entire screen negative so you can see it. To undo it, you can press the same sequence again.

 

[Mesoam]

interesting, what does the original look like?

 

[mwcfarms]

Very cool shot.

 

[Josh66]

interesting, what does the original look like?

Almost just like this, but all blue. I added the little bit of green.

Not sure why it came out blue, but I liked it.