Pekka Luukkola's "Rowing" series: how does he do it?

Last week I saw Pekka Luukkola's photo exhibit at Retretti, Finland, and was completely taken by the beauty of his work. Several of his nordic dusk landscapes featuring fire, such as the two shown here below from the "Rowing" series, are truly amazing (IMHO). The human presence in nature made evident with such elegance and subtlety.

"Rowing I":
http://zephyr.cmb.ki.s​e/POTN/Rowing_I.png

"Rowing II":
http://zephyr.cmb.ki.s​e/POTN/Rowing_II.png

How does he do it? Pekka Luukkola's website (HERE) is not very informative. A piece of text in the exhibit explained that he makes all images from one single shot, without any image processing, but after a lot of planning. The fire patterns seen on the "Rowing" images come from torches attached to the end of the oars of a rowing boat. A single shot is taken at very slow shutter speed. No trace of the boat or any disturbance of the water surface can be seen. Remarkably, however, perfect relexions of the fire on the water surface are preserved. It'd be very nice to hear from anyone familiar with the work of this photographer or else other POTN members with educated guesses as to how this amazing effect is being achieved.

Mod edit: If you want to show images that you haven't personally shot, or other material, just post a link to it as there are © issues?

I have no knowledge of this artist, but I would assume it's a super long exposure with perhaps a polarizing filter for the water.

btw, as I understand it, posting images that are not your own is prohibited, perhaps just leave the link in?

Light painting

Or, if it's the same Pekka who owns this BBS..you could just PM him.

They're both from the same area...and I've never met anyone with such a unique name. Unless "pekka" in finland is what "fred" is to north america, that is.

Karl Johnston wrote in post #10596710
Or, if it's the same Pekka who owns this BBS..you could just PM him.

They're both from the same area...and I've never met anyone with such a unique name. Unless "pekka" in finland is what "fred" is to north america, that is.

Nope, not the same Pekka, and I'm pretty sure you're correct about Pekka:Finland::Fred:No​rth America. I remember reading about that a while ago, though I'm not sure if the reasoning I read is entirely correct. It is a very common name though, to the point that some foreigners use it as a racial slur.

These look like simple time exposures. They will not show the boat & the water movement will be smoothed out over time.

I saw a similar beautiful, black and white boat trail picture on flickr (http://bighugelabs.com …?id=4305808399&​size=large). It was taken with 200 seconds exposure. Worth to see.

Simple long exposure.

The ripples from the boat smooth out over time - giving the glass like appearance however the light trails from the oars are captured continually by the sensor.

Imagine the sensor as a series of pots. Each pot starts empty and when filled (exposed) they contain the amount of light captured. The ones from the water receive very limited amounts of light during the exposure hence any change will be small. The ones showing the light trail receive a larger amount of light therefore show larger changes.

It is the exact same thing that allows capturing of light trails from cars, extremely flat lakes in landscapes etc.

It helps if you wrap everything in black gaffers tape, or spray paint everything flat black and wear black clothing. This way anything that you don't want showing up as trails will record as so severely underexposed as to leave a clear view of the parts of the scene which you want to show through.

Photo by itself is easy one to do. Just long exposure (considering path length and rowing speed I would say something around 5+ minutes). What is more interesting is how he managed fire on boat and paddles. Doing this with lights (batteries, led lights etc.) is easy, but flame is different thing. And I guess flame is main thing which makes these photos so special.

primoz wrote in post #10706056
Photo by itself is easy one to do. Just long exposure (considering path length and rowing speed I would say something around 5+ minutes). What is more interesting is how he managed fire on boat and paddles. Doing this with lights (batteries, led lights etc.) is easy, but flame is different thing. And I guess flame is main thing which makes these photos so special.

I believe a flashlight is called a torch in places other than the US.

If you read the OP's post he clearly states fire, so Primoz's comment still stands.

An electrical torch (or flashlight) would be nothing out of the ordinary (and would make for smoother trails) however the fire makes the trails uneven and unusual.

Or for no water ripples he could just take pictures before, and after the race from the same spot and PS the smoothness in. Although, yes, over time the smoothness will naturally come back.

For a long exposure in dusk / dark conditions, would it be expected to have some hot pixels that would need to be touched up, or is top end equipment generally free of this? I have a 50D and I get a few hot pixels on long exposures at night (e.g., astro or fireworks)

Second, for the two examples given in the original post, I would guess the ambient light is close to the darker end of twilight (perhaps someone more experienced could confirm; when I have done ~30s exposures at early twilight, the resulting image looks like daylight.) If these were indeed taken at late twilight, you'd have to make sure there are no bright stars or planets in the sky that will appear as streaks in the image, or you'd need to edit them out as well. The conditions for the second link, however, are cloudy so this problem is avoided...

Neat stuff.

Judging by the quality of light I am assuming the ends of the oars have lit torches on them. The quality of light is flame like.