My first attempt at water drop

usayit · Mar 3, 2012

I've been meaning to try this out for several years but just now getting to it. Sure filled an otherwise boring Sunday evening with some fun behind the camera.

Frequency · Mar 3, 2012

Excellent...with exquisite colors and forms....

JSER · Mar 3, 2012

Stop showing off and go away...................

Great shot, hate you

Kazzy · Mar 3, 2012

Those are great.

I have to try this when I get my tripod and new lens.

photo_joe · Mar 3, 2012

Yeah my first attempt at water drops didn't turn out this well. Looking forward to getting some more time in the near future to try again. Great shots. How many shots did you take to get these two?

mishele · Mar 3, 2012

Fun stuff!! Keep shootin!

photojunky · Mar 3, 2012

Great shot!

usayit · Mar 3, 2012

Thanks ALL!!

photo_joe said:
How many shots did you take to get these two?

The camera I selected has a very slow FPS and small buffer, so it took a lot of shots to get it right. I have a modified Sunpak TR-PAK II + 444D powered by those large Ni-MH batteries that were originally used for electric RC cars so the flash has no problems keeping up. (Its from my "strobist" kit). The flash was bounced off a white foam board at 45 degree angle and 90 degrees from the off camera flash. Of course, everything supported by either tripods or umbrella stands. The final setup was a clear Pyrex glass baking dish, on shiny metal grill (you can see it in the 1st), and raised an inch off the table with some books. This setup allowed me to side various things underneath for different effects. The 1st photo taken with one of my kid's coloring books slid underneath. The 2nd was just a darker brown butcher paper but with some food dye dropped in.

I believe I took about 400+ shots to get it right. It took about another 100 or so shots to experiment with various configurations to see which gave me the best results. I also noticed you can experiment with multiple light sources as well....

A couple from my early attempts at getting everything all figure out. You can see I had most of the lights in the basement on and I hadn't put anything underneath the glass yet. Oh.. and in one I made a mistake and started to take photos with the word "Pyrex" clearly underneath the drop.

Definitely have a few ideas running through my head... a great project for one of those weekends that the weather outside keeps you indoors.

LaFoto · Mar 4, 2012

Oh - how these make me want to try this again. Four years since I last did these. But as I'm on the brink of exchanging cameras, I might wait for the new one to arrive and see what I can do with that one and the new lenses. Too bad I can no longer rely on my "viewfinder eye" as much these days as I still could 4 years ago with regards to manually focussing...

What (and where) was your light source, or did you have more than one? Flash and window light with the sun shining outside, maybe?

TerryDemczuk · Mar 4, 2012

Nice work!!!

Joel_W · Mar 4, 2012

Love both pictures in set #1. Picture#1 just blew me away. The colors in combination of the drops is just amazing. And after reading how many shots, time, and experimentation it took, it's even more amazing.

usayit · Mar 4, 2012

LaFoto said:
What (and where) was your light source, or did you have more than one? Flash and window light with the sun shining outside, maybe?

Corinna, I am glad you liked them. I have attached a schematic of what I recall was the final setup I ended up with. I was in the basement with some of the lights (and TV) on but it was pretty dark. You can consider the majority of the light was from a single flash with no diffuser. I hope the drawing helps.

The last couple posted, I had a work light on so I can see what I was doing while I was experimenting... but its essentially the same.

PS> As for focus, I was shooting at smaller apertures to get a bit more DOF for error. I had a lead toy soldier (old one..) that I would sink and position in such the drops were falling on his head. I then manually focused on the toy soldier's head just above the water line.

Frequency · Mar 4, 2012

usayit said:
LaFoto said:

What (and where) was your light source, or did you have more than one? Flash and window light with the sun shining outside, maybe?

Click to expand...

Corinna, I am glad you liked them. I have attached a schematic of what I recall was the final setup I ended up with. I was in the basement with some of the lights (and TV) on but it was pretty dark. You can consider the majority of the light was from a single flash with no diffuser. I hope the drawing helps.

The last couple posted, I had a work light on so I can see what I was doing while I was experimenting... but its essentially the same.

PS> As for focus, I was shooting at smaller apertures to get a bit more DOF for error. I had a lead toy soldier (old one..) that I would sink and position in such the drops were falling on his head. I then manually focused on the toy soldier's head just above the water line.