High speed photography

[minister]

Hi,,
I am loooking to buy promaster sound trigger (ebay), to do high speed photos,
like balloon burst or water splash or bottle,egg smashing ,
I have d5000/sb600/wireless trigger

i wanted to know is it enough equip to do high speed or I need anything more or more upgraded equipments .

Thank you

 

[Stryker]

Would suggest a 500watts strobe set to raise your shutter speed to 1/1000 in an indoor studio setting

 

[Stradawhovious]

The stuff you have will work fine.

Contrary to the post above mine, the best shutter speed you can use for high speed is "Bulb". Take the photos in a dark room, and the only thing controlling the exposure is the flash. You will get a 1/10,000 exposure instead of 1/100

That's how I got these..... and I didn't even have a sound trigger. Just a D7000 and a SB-600. (click thumb for full sied)

 

[minister]

but to start, how long to open the shutter if I am in dark room ?

 

[Stradawhovious]

but to start, how long to open the shutter if I am in dark room ?

If the only source of light is the flash, it doesn't matter. I think the two pictures I posted were about a 10 second shutter speed.

Here is how it will work for you when you get your sound trigger. Set everything up, open shutter, do whatever it is you're doing to do.... whether its smash an egg, break a balloon etc..... then close the shutter.

Your sound trigger will be hooked up to the flash, not the camera.

Let me know if this doesn't make sense, I will elaborate.

 

[Bram]

I'm kind of confused about it. Like would you set the flash to rear curtain sync? or what. Like I would love to try the water balloon idea, I got a D40x and an SB600 as well so.

 

[Stradawhovious]

OK, I'm sorry if this constitutes me derailing the thread, its not my intent.

Take a look at the following picture.



That was my setup for both of the pictures in the previous post. Basically the concept behind high speed photography is pretty simple... you want to isolate the shortest period of time possible. Even the fastest shutter speeds on normal DSLR cameras is much too slow.

That's where the flash and audio trigger comes into play.

Here is the total process from start to finish for me to set up one of these shots.

1. Set up my materials... Camera, flash, box, subject and shutter remote... all near the ambient light source so I can shut it of completely.
2. Get me exposure. Since this is a completely dark room, and my shutter speed will be several seconds, the only things contributing to the exposure are the aperture, flash power, and ISO. I try to always keep my ISO at 100, which normally isn't a problem with these shots. The flash is the shortest at it's weakest setting, so my exposure usually ends up beint ISO 100, somewhere in the f/3 range and the SB-600 at 1/64 power. The exposure is easy to get. get the subject in focus, turn the lights off, open the shutter (bulb setting so you need to physicall open and close the shutter) flash the strobe, close the shutter, check your results and adjust as necessary.
3. once the exposure is set, then comes the fun part. For you, you would attach the audio trigger to your flash. Keep in mind that the SB-600 doesn't have a PC sync, so you will need a hotshoe adapter. The Flash is NOT attached to the camera. Now clap your hands. Notice how the flash goes off? Groovie.
4. get ready, and take a deep breath.
5. now, with your shutter remote in hand, and your subject in focus (lets use a balloon as an example), do these things in the following order.......

1. shut off the ambient light. All of it.
2. open the shutter with the remote on bulb setting (remember, that you could sit here for an hour with the shutter open, and unless the flash goes off, no image will be recorded....)
3. pop the balloon (at this time, when the balloon pops, the audio trigger will hear it, and activate the flash, the flash...about 1/10,000 sec in duration... your only light source.... will produce the image of the balloon in mid pop)
4. close the shutter
5. turn the lights back on
6. downoad the image to your computer, and marvel at just how damn cool it is.



Please let me know if I can clarify further.

 

[minister]

thnak's a lot for a clear explanation , suppose is i am not using sound trigger what changes I have to make in the setup , ?

 

[Stradawhovious]

thnak's a lot for a clear explanation , suppose is i am not using sound trigger what changes I have to make in the setup , ?

Well for starters, you don't have to hook the sound trigger up to the flash.....

The only thing that changes is that you will have to manually activate the flash. I do it by pressing the "test" button. On the SB-600, when its set to manual, the test button fires the flash at the power indicated on the LDC. The trick then, is to anticipate the action, and try to press the flash test button at the exact moment the balloon pops, or the mousetrap goes, or the gun fires or..... you get the picture. Not very precise, and you're more lucky than anything to get the shot just at the right time..... especially considering this is all happening in the dark.

If you are going to want to do this on a regualr basis, get the audio trigger. They are cheap, and the "hit and miss" approach to this style of photography is really irritating. Sometimes you get lucky and get the shot, but if you don't time it just right, you're cleaning up a dozen eggs with nothing to show for it.

Its just not worth the frustration without some sort of trigger for the flash...... That being said, I still don't have one.

 

[minister]

thnak's a lot for a clear explanation , suppose is i am not using sound trigger what changes I have to make in the setup , ?

Well for starters, you don't have to hook the sound trigger up to the flash.....

The only thing that changes is that you will have to manually activate the flash. I do it by pressing the "test" button. On the SB-600, when its set to manual, the test button fires the flash at the power indicated on the LDC. The trick then, is to anticipate the action, and try to press the flash test button at the exact moment the balloon pops, or the mousetrap goes, or the gun fires or..... you get the picture. Not very precise, and you're more lucky than anything to get the shot just at the right time..... especially considering this is all happening in the dark.

If you are going to want to do this on a regualr basis, get the audio trigger. They are cheap, and the "hit and miss" approach to this style of photography is really irritating. Sometimes you get lucky and get the shot, but if you don't time it just right, you're cleaning up a dozen eggs with nothing to show for it.

Its just not worth the frustration without some sort of trigger for the flash...... That being said, I still don't have one.

This was my only concirn actually I like to do speed photography ,like water splash, water drop, like this I have done from this only by hit and try
and was very time consuming , I am looking to buy sound trigger just to save time and do more creative work than rather than clicking 50 shots to get one

which all happened with all of them

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[chris]

Take two lengths of light gauge wire and strip the insulation from the ends. Make a small loop in the end of one wire, pass the bare end of the other wire through the loop and make this into a loop. You should now have two intersecting loops of bare wire. Tape the wires onto the back of a balloon making sure that the loops are not touching. Connect the other ends of the wires to the flash trigger socket or pins. Set up the camera, turn out the lights, fire the shutter at a 4 second exposure and puncture the balloon. As the balloon collapses the loops will be brought into contact with each other and the flash will fire.

You can use a shorter exposure time if you are quick enough or the 'B' setting. You don't have to use a balloon, anything that will move and bring the loops into contact with each other will work.

 

[Davor]

This is really cool stuff, thanks for the explanation Strad! Now i just gotta go out and buy one of these sound triggers, the setup looks real promising.