Making a mess, havingfun

I finally had some time to try some high speed stuff. These are all captured in a dark room, an open shutter, and a fast flash burst.

1.

That is awesome! What do you mean open shutter? Is that so you don't have to try to get the right timing?

let me get this straight, you are in complete darkness, shutter open, and you are throwing a dart at a balloon you can't see, then popping the flash at the precise moment?...?...?

Very Well Done!

wow, amazing pictures. please do explain how you did this a little bit more!

amazing photos

OK. Set up and process of capturing this. First off the capturing part is not luck, I use an audible trigger system that keys off the pop. I can dial in the delay to capture the popping at different progressions... but only one shot per balloon so the flashes have time to cycle.

So, scenario is a very dim or nearly dark room. Camera settings are like f/16 and ISO 100 - 200 -ish. Key thing to note here is that with those settings and the dark-ish room that it's going to take a very long shutter opening to expose any ambient at all, which is good because you do not want to expose any ambient.

So next thing is I have three flashes all off camera all with PW (Pocket Wizards) All set at 1/128 to 1/32 power. Key thing to note here is that the low power on speedlights makes the flash duration shorter. I know you can't tell just by looking but the difference between full power and 1/128 is very significant when you are talking about capturing something that has this much motion (the popping). So depending on the stats you read my Canon 580EX flashes at 1/128 has a total 'on' duration of about 1/20,000 to 1/30,000 which is much faster than my 1/8000 max shutter speed.

So I use Stopshot which is my triggering device. Microphone is plugged into it and the mic is mounted on one of my flashes (all of which have to be very close to the subject at 1/128 power. Then in one of the trigger outputs of the device I have a PW (Pocket Wizard) which the device sends a signal to after 'hearing' the pop. I control the delay by entering it into the device. The delay I use for balloon pops is anywhere from 500 microseconds to 3 milliseconds... depending on how far I want the balloon to be popped in the shot.

I use a black bed sheet for a backdrop. On the other side of the backdrop I have a VERY dim light. So once all set up I have the camera in bulb mode with a cable release. I turn out all lights except the very dim one on the other side of the backdrop. This makes it so I can barely make out the silhouette of the balloon. I push and hold the shutter button on the cable release, throw the dart, and as soon as I see the flashes trigger I close the shutter. Shutter is open 1 or 2 seconds. The flashes capture the shot as per the delay. Exposure is all manual set, flashes all manual. You adjust by ISO, or Aperture, or flash distance to subject. I always adjust before I throw darts. When it's right, I fire away! It's easy to get a test shot off, instead of popping the balloon I can simply stomp my foot on the ground to give the mic a sound to trigger off.

Hope this helps!

Very nice. Thanks for sharing your setup.

Great explanation, thanks for sharing

FlyingPhotog wrote in post #11946810
Very Well Done!

Thanks neighbor. If you ever want to play with this high speed gear let me know.

Dermit wrote in post #11947274
So next thing is I have three flashes all off camera all with PW (Pocket Wizards) All set at 1/128 to 1/32 power. Key thing to note here is that the low power on speedlights makes the flash duration shorter. I know you can't tell just by looking but the difference between full power and 1/128 is very significant when you are talking about capturing something that has this much motion (the popping). So depending on the stats you read my Canon 580EX flashes at 1/128 has a total 'on' duration of about 1/20,000 to 1/30,000 which is much faster than my 1/8000 max shutter speed.

nice shots i like the last one. i've just started playing with this myself. bought a trigger kit. though i have only 1 420ex light which unfortunately has no manual settings so always triggers at max. which for the moment is way too long a duration. :-/

Great shots. Thanks for the detailed explanation.

Yeah, that's how I thought you did it... LOL (not)! Very cool!

where did you find a trigger that is set off by audio?

Wow, they really are quite amazing. Well done on your success.