A D40, Air Rifle and a Homemade Microsecond Flash

Slaphead · Mar 27, 2009

I don't know if this has been already posted, but this is quite incredible.

High-speed photographs by Alan Sailer capture the moment a pellet fired from an air rifle hits an object - Telegraph

puyjapin · Mar 27, 2009

and how on earth does he time the shutter to release at the correct moment he must have taken lots of shots to get that and wasted a lot of nice tomatoes!! or have i missed the point?

Slaphead · Mar 27, 2009

According to the article he uses a laser trigger - I assume to fire the flash, it doesn't say.

I would imagine its a long exposure (funnily enough) with the flash freezing the motion.

puyjapin · Mar 27, 2009

dont think i will bother trying that then lol

MikeBcos · Mar 27, 2009

I took a series of photos like that many years ago, I also took several of a hammer breaking a lightbulb. I used a mechanical trigger to fire the flash - I couldn't afford a photoelectric one at the time.

I would set the shot up then shut off the lights, open the camera shutter and fire the gun. The pellet would pass through what I was shooting then hit the trigger which fired the flash, after which I closed the shutter and switched the lights back on.

It takes a lot of tries to get something that looks really good, and I was shooting film so I never knew what I got until I had processed it.

Chris of Arabia · Mar 27, 2009

Hope you all checked out the full series - the one where he used a razor blade is very impressive.

SrBiscuit · Mar 27, 2009

VERY cool.

tsaraleksi · Mar 27, 2009

A lot of these are shot with an aural trigger-- the ones of gunshots are generally always going to be done that way. The photographer opens the shutter, the gun fires, light goes off.

djacobox372 · Mar 27, 2009

puyjapin said:
and how on earth does he time the shutter to release at the correct moment he must have taken lots of shots to get that and wasted a lot of nice tomatoes!! or have i missed the point?

shutter speed isn't an issue if the micro-second flash is the only light in the studio... he can be using a 1 second shutter speed, and it will still only expose for 1 micro second because that is the full duration of the light.

tkaat · Mar 27, 2009

Iin short his photography ways are Wiked-mad. lol

EhJsNe · Mar 28, 2009

that is awesome

I never would have thought about the long(ish) exposure and the flash.

I assumed he was just used the burst and wastedlotsa tomatoes.

I couldnt beleive the razor blade one! Thats ridicules! The sheet of glass is probaly my favorite.

Special mentions to the ornament filled with orange jelly and the ornament filled with water.