Shooting water splash with K10D and...?

Hi everyone.

I've got a K10D and no flash.
I soon realized that that wouldnt be enough to shoot the classic water drop splashing in water... Not in a way that you can freeze the action, at least
Shutter tops out at 1/180th...
Can I get greater speeds with an external flash? What other kit would I need. No fancy triggers (sound activated or whatever) for the splash itself. I'm just playing around...
What are some budject options I can look at?


Thank you.

The cheapest option of all would be to have a go with the built-in flash

Don't forget that the duration of the flash is much, much shorter than any shutter speed you can set on the camera.

So you don't need faster shutter speeds than 1/180 - just not too much ambient light.

As Chris mentioned, water drops are "frozen" because the flash is so much faster than the action and much faster than a shutter (up to 1/20,000s IIRC).

Best bet:
1) Set the camera to manual focus, manual exposure on a tripod
2) Set to something like f/8, 1/125s (aperture is the important one)
3) Turn up the ambient light - get a focus on where the drop will be
4) Turn the ambient light right down
5) Use built in flash

You may need to experiment with reflectors and the like (e.g. bits of white paper or silver kitchen foil) to get some depth to the lighting.

But you should definitely be able to get a half decent shot with that!
...and lots and lots of patience!!

Matt

I did just that down to the silve kitchen foil... just didnt turn down the lights.
I dont get frozen action... I get movement.
Apertures 8-16
Sspeed: 1/180
Using A 50mm F1.7 with extension tubes.
I managed to get a drop or two. Horrible ones.

Picked up a tip in a thread earlier this week and tried the HSS (High Speed Sync??) option on my Metz 58 flashgun, now it seems to quite happily sync right up to 1/4000 sec.

Is there any disadvantage of using the HSS mode, as up until I had read that, I thought the maximum sync I could get was 1/180 sec?

I took this one some time ago using the on board flash with a 50mm macro lens at 1/125sec.
So you can certainly get that frozen effect without any fancy equipment.

[IMG]http://i184.photobucket.com/albums/x261/ClarkyinAus/IMGP3939.jpg[/IMG]

Therein lies the problem. It's not the flash, it's the high ambient light
You need the flash to be a good 3-stops or more brighter than the ambient lighting, otherwise the image formed by the ambient light will become part of the final photo - and that'll include blurry movement.

I reckon if you use HS you'll run into other issues Since the flash in HS mode is firing bursts of light to "pepper" the image with light as the slit in the shutter moves down the frame (which is up, according to the image, IIRC), you'll probably get a shortening of the drops. If you turn the camera upside down and repeat, then the drops will be lengthened (Just surmising... not actually tried this )

Matt

Thanks Mattmatic.
I just realized it myself...
I forgot that if other ligth during those 1/180 are very low, litle will be engraved except for what the flash iluminated...
I gotta hit the books again

Gonna give it another go!

The secret is to use the flash with a minimum of flash power which should get you 1/10000s effective shutter speed.

I believe you can get even higher shutter speeds of 1/30,000 with an autoflash by using a piece of paper to feed back the flash directly to the auto sensor.

Either use a trigger system or a shutter speed of 1/2 a second and fire the flash manually. Here's a shot I'm really pleased with using a trigger.

Rob.

Rob - that's a good point. The more power a flash puts out, the longer the duration of the flash. Thankfully, with selectable ISO and immediate preview on digital you can at least check the results.
Great example!!

(Of course - make sure you don't get the camera wet!! )
Matt

"The secret is to use the flash with a minimum of flash power which should get you 1/10000s effective shutter speed.

I believe you can get even higher shutter speeds of 1/30,000 with an autoflash by using a piece of paper to feed back the flash directly to the auto sensor.

Either use a trigger system or a shutter speed of 1/2 a second and fire the flash manually. Here's a shot I'm really pleased with using a trigger."

I remove the auto sensor an run a jumper wire across the connector plugs on my viv 283's to get the shortest flash duration (and lowest output possible).

love that shot.... did you get the colors in camera or in post? oil and milk in a black pan?

Thanks Don - It was drops of white milk on a black acrylic sheet using a home made dropper system using a milk carton and some tubing. The colours are food colouring although I did push the saturdation on the red a bit.

There's some amazing examples of this kind of stuff by Martin Waugh which puts my attempts to shame!

http://www.liquidsculpture.com/fine_art/index.htm

He has also some great techinical stuff on flash power/duration aswell.
http://www.martin-waugh.com/?p=8

Cheers


Rob.