The Flame

[dragulaz]

Trying to capture a good shot of a flame is not as easy as I thought. Not sure if this is sharp enough or not, was wondering what everyone else thinks. Fire away with C&C.

http://i20.photobucket.com/albums/b222/applegbt/2007FlameMacro-24-Edit.jpg

[ADAPTE]

IMO is not sharp. I´m new at this so i can´t help you much. But i´m guessing you need a faster speed.

[dragulaz]

IMO is not sharp. I´m new at this so i can´t help you much. But i´m guessing you need a faster speed.

That's kind of my thoughts as well. Here is attempt #2, with a bit faster shutter speed.

http://i20.photobucket.com/albums/b222/applegbt/2007FlameMacro-70-Edit.jpg

[JasonRussell]

I like the second one best.

[babyduckmonger]

Wow. That second one is killer. It doesn't even look like a photograph - more like a render or something. Very nice!

[rooeey]

I like them both the first is a little soft but this adds to the shot a little however the second shot which is much sharper is some what surreal......

[Chris71]

That second one is killer!
Something else I need to try.

[Tahaacke]

I agree with everyone else. That second shot is amazing. This is a good concept. Thanks for the idea.

[ADAPTE]

The second one is a very cool shot... maybe you can tell us how you did it?

[dragulaz]

The second one is a very cool shot... maybe you can tell us how you did it?

Thanks for the comments everyone. Here's how I did it in case anyone else wants to give it a try.

As for settings you should be able to see the EXIF, but if not it was shot at 1/1000th at f/8 using a 5D and Canon 100mm f/2.8 macro lens. The subject was a "candle rock", if you don't know what that is this is a link to something similar:

http://www.vermontrockcandles.com/

Basically it's a candle that burns lamp oil instead of wax. I like this because you can make the flame larger (longer) by just pulling the wick out a bit further. And they are completely flat, so you can get the full flame.

Anyway, I probably shot nearly 200 frames using various methods to "agitate" the flame. I tried blowing and fanning from various angles. This particular shot was created by physically shaking the table that the candle was sitting on (just a cheap posing table). I had set up black felt for the background but with these camera settings pretty much any background will go black.

The trick is to get the right balance of ISO, shutter speed, and depth of field to get maximum sharpness without underexposing the flame. I'm not sure if this particular shot is perfect or not, still playing around with it. But I like the results so I thought I'd share. Besides, what else do I have to do...I live in Ohio and it's really cold outside. :)

I did a small amount of post processing. Curve tweak, shifted color balance slightly to increase the "orange", raised saturation and contrast just a touch, and added some unsharp mask.

[Apollo11]

Love the 2nd shot. Artistic, and great color!!