Skip to main content

Sometimes an Idea Works, Other Times it Fails

I had a brilliant idea to use dinoflagellates (bioluminescent plankton) for water droplet photography. The dinoflagellates glow when stimulated (i.e. shaken, dropped, impact each other), so I figured they could be used for a unique water drop photo.   However, there was a problem, while I could see the glow of the dinoflagellates; the camera senor even when cranked up to ISO 6400 could not detect the glow at a useful shutter speed to freeze the water drop.   Usually when I do water drop photography, I am somewhere between ISO 100 – 400 with an aperture of F4 - F8 and shutter speed of 1/250 or faster. When using the dinoflagellates I was at ISO 1000 – 3200, with an aperture of F2.8 and a shutter speed of 5 seconds or slower just capture the light the dinoflagellates produced.  Thus, I could not freeze any drops, and the resulting pictures look more like blurry atomic partial traces or abstract art.  Below are a few of the better images after they were edited to get rid of grain and artifacts. 


ISO 6400,  Aperture F2.8, Shutter 2 seconds

ISO 6400,  Aperture F2.8, Shutter 2 seconds

ISO 1000,  Aperture F2.8, Shutter 5 seconds

ISO 1000,  Aperture F5, Shutter 30 seconds

ISO 1600,  Aperture F2.8, Shutter 5 seconds

Comments

  1. lindakwarciany7/03/2016 10:09 PM

    i am sure you will be able to figure out how to take the pictures especially if you can see the electric interaction with the naked eye. i am sure your final result will be interesting to medical research.

    ReplyDelete

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Cobwebs Everywhere

On October 7 th , I did a studio spooky session with Coralinx Cosplay .   The central theme of this shoot was a pretty goth girl who had a fondness for spiders and decorating with cobwebs, making it a perfect Halloween session.   Note: Cobwebs are defined as abandoned or old spiderwebs that have collected dust.   Many cobwebs are the result of comb-footed spider (i.e., black widows) that make irregularly shaped webs.   Spiderwebs are active structures built to catch prey.   (Source: Western Exterminator Company) For these sessions, I used: Photography Equipment Other Equipment Cannon R6 24-105 mm Lens Transmitter/Trigger 2 Westcott FJ400 2 Phottix Strobes 2 strip boxes 2 rectangular soft boxes 2 c-stands 3 light stands Backdrop stand Black seamless 2 Westcott silicon gels Tether cable Laptop Laptop holder Sandbags A-clamps Spyder Color checker Fake cobwebs Table ...
Post a Comment
Read more

Katsucon 2025 Wrap - Up

Katsucon 2025 didn’t seem as crowded as 2024, but I still wasn’t feeling it.  Katsucon will always have a special place in my heart, but I think I’m just bored with it, from a creative perspective.   While I still love working with cosplayers the location itself no longer excites me and I’m tired of fighting the crowds.  If I return to Katsucon 2026 I think I’ll just set up a studio in my room and do studio sessions.  I can be a lot more creative with a studio session, and I get to use all my lights.  So now let's talk about photography.   For Katsucon I was shooting with my Canon R6 with an 24-105 Canon RF lens, and I had a fisheye lens on me as well, but we will discuss that later.  I had two speedlights, one on camera which acted as a trigger 90-percent of the time and one on a light stand which my husband would hold during shoots. This year I booked 11 cosplay sessions and shot 869 frames.  I shot a range of ISOs from ISO 100 to ISO 800...
Post a Comment
Read more

Spooky in the Morning

On October 5 th , I did an on-location spooky session with Rebecca at Claude Moore Park.   The theme was Victorian ghost; however, it is hard to be a ghost at 9:30 in the morning on a bright sunny day.   I did my best to get a spooky look. For these sessions, I used: Photography Equipment Other Equipment Cannon R6 24-105 mm Lens Transmitter/Trigger 2 Cannon Speed lights 1 30-inch umbrella Light stand Assistant Smoke Genie The setup The set up was relatively easy.  I mounted a Canon speed light on a light stand with an umbrella.  My assistant then held the light in the appropriate spots as we made our way around the park to different locations. Camera Settings This session was held outdoors in bright morning sun and was intended to look spooky, so I tried to keep the images dark.  Thus, I used ISO 100, which is great for sunny conditions.  I wanted to maintain a soft background as much a...
Post a Comment
Read more