Weekly challenge 4/11 - 4/17 the Bored Photographer Challenge

SquarePeg · Apr 11, 2020

Taking a page from tirediron’s book - let’s pass the time doing some photo experiments. Your options are...

water drop collisions
water drop refractions
oil and water
smoke trails

All of these can be done without special equipment although for some of these there are a lot of things you can buy that can make it easier. There are literally thousands of video tutorials on YouTube and all of the usual photography learning sites so I’m just going to list a few that I found helpful. If anyone else has a link to a tutorial that YOU YOURSELF HAVE USED SUCCESSFULLY, please feel free to add it here.

As always new photos only for the challenges please. Since we can’t get out there and shoot, I’ll just say Get UP and shoot!

water drop refractions: donkom.ca or

Oil and water:

smoke trails :

photoflyer · Apr 11, 2020

That was hard and I'm not even sure if it meets the spirit of the challenge. But I learned something.

SquarePeg · Apr 11, 2020

photoflyer said:
That was hard and I'm not even sure if it meets the spirit of the challenge. But I learned something.

View attachment 189904

That’s pretty cool. My experiment this afternoon went totally sideways. I ended up with nada so switched it up. It doesn’t fit in this thread so will have to post it separately.

johngpt · Apr 11, 2020

photoflyer said:
That was hard and I'm not even sure if it meets the spirit of the challenge. But I learned something.

View attachment 189904

Mike, this is pretty cool!

Original katomi · Apr 12, 2020

Just had fun playing with this chalange

fishing4sanity · Apr 12, 2020

I decided to give water drop refraction photography a try. It was much more difficult than I anticipated, I'm not sure I even made it to 'beginner' level yet.

SquarePeg · Apr 12, 2020

fishing4sanity said:
decided to give water drop refraction photography a try. It was much more difficult than I anticipated, I'm not sure I even made it to 'beginner' level yet.

Love the concept! It can be very frustrating but is super rewarding when you figure it out.

Some tips I found helpful - use a 50/50 glycerine and water mixture and refrigerate it before hand for firmer drops, make sure the surface you’re putting the drops on is very dry or they will just roll off, use a syringe to control the drop placement and prefocus as much as possible as you’ll only have a short time to place the drops before they start to wander. Also try aiming the flash only at the object being captured not at the drop itself. Shield the drop a bit from the flash if you can without getting in your shot. Close the windows so the neighbors done hear you swearing.

photoflyer · Apr 12, 2020

fishing4sanity said:
I decided to give water drop refraction photography a try. It was much more difficult than I anticipated, I'm not sure I even made it to 'beginner' level yet.

Very good. Different.