[Photo] When the sparks fly!

Rikki · 21 Mar 2011 at 13:51

Wanted to try something different at the weekend when I was working for an exhaust manufacturers website and was taking some photos of his products.

Threw the willing g/f into a scene, gave her a grinder then cranked a few shots using 2 light sources. SB900 at 1/8 diffused dome on left and my SB800 at 1/4 non diffused and zoomed out to 50mm(ish) with a blue gel.

Ran a slow shutter speed and fast aperture at ISO200 with a cir pol filter to capture the glow of the sparks, use the left flash for giving the light kick to her face and the blue gell'd flash on the right giving a coloured rim.

Quick strobist pic is the result

Oh, camera is a Nikon D700, 24-70mm f2.8 lens and eBay remote triggers to fire everything. Only post is to darken/burn out the corners, nothing done on the missus or any colour work.

Throttle · 21 Mar 2011 at 14:14

great image, the sparks add impact. Would advise though that grinding and welding sparks will melt glass on impact so would recommend using a cheap filter in the lens

Rikki · 21 Mar 2011 at 14:24

Already there matey

"with a cir pol filter to capture the glow"

Its more the coating on the lens I was worried about getting burned, a £70 filter Im not so concerned about.

Good post though to reiterate to others

Raikiri · 21 Mar 2011 at 14:45

Good shot but is she actually oompa loompa orange?

An Exception · 21 Mar 2011 at 14:45

Nice picture, good idea to protect your lens with a filter, I'm guessing she was protected by a contact lens filter?

Rikki · 21 Mar 2011 at 14:47

She was spraying me with the sparks, her hairspray'd barnet was protected LOL

Shes not that orange, well compared to the orange glow of the sparks at least

Rikki · 21 Mar 2011 at 14:52

PS: Probably due to the polariser thinking about it and the way it saturates / removes shine/reflections.

Here she is in another pic of her which is less orange LOL

Raikiri · 21 Mar 2011 at 14:56

I don't know, she's pretty orange, it's still a technically very good shot and I'm sure the colours are accurate, I just think the whole fake tan thing is a bit silly

Rikki · 21 Mar 2011 at 15:06

Feel free to throw up some photos of your wife or girlfriend and I'll pass some judgements myself

The colour cast suits the orange sparks:

Or have these guys got their fake tans all wrong too

Rikki · 21 Mar 2011 at 17:07

Nice stealth edit.

Comparing a saturated, well contrasted shot to a faded out, desaturated and pixelated Google images pic.

Here's a more balanced comparison, since you like that sorta thing

Raymond Lin · 21 Mar 2011 at 17:31

I think it's a lovely image but she looks bored, and not concentrating what she is doing.

Technically is really nice though.

Phate · 21 Mar 2011 at 19:57

I like the image, except the model.

I just don't think she suits what shes doing, get her in some overals, a bikini top, greased up all over, give it some charactor

- right now she looks bored.

Raikiri · 21 Mar 2011 at 20:02

Rikki said:
Comparing a saturated, well contrasted shot to a faded out, desaturated and pixelated Google images pic.

It was the higest res one I could find.

Rikki said:
Here's a more balanced comparison, since you like that sorta thing

Except you've picked the darkest part of the oompa loompa and compared to a highlight on her face.

She's been tangoed, didn't say there was anything wrong with the photo though.

TheBigCheese · 21 Mar 2011 at 20:24

I like the picture but there are a couple of things I would change, I won't comment on the colour as I'm on my laptop and it's not calibrated.

But what I would do is crop off a little from the top, it seems a bit of dead space to me.

In terms of the model, she looks a little worried and is pouting which I think looks ridiculous at the best of times, in that setting looking a little devilish or doing a wicked grin would look more in keeping with the shot.

Oh btw, that copyright at the bottom of the picture is advertising your business and is technically breaking OCUKF rules.

Adrianr · 21 Mar 2011 at 20:26

Skin tone aside (doesn't look like I wan't to be getting into that debate!

), I'm very distracted by the highlight/shadow just above her lips. Or is it a spark that's just over her face? Either way, I would remove it.

In the second shot she looks almost startled?

Rikki · 21 Mar 2011 at 23:24

Phate: I didnt have time for the cliche'd baby oil'd shot in ovvies - its Scotland we live in, Ill save that for the dead of summer! (and funnily enough I just watched Jason Cole's DVD on workshop shoots).

Raikiri: I didnt pick any highlight on her face, I used the darker part. Working in clubs at weekends I can safely say on the Tangoscale she features on the low end compared to most of the Snog Marry Avoid candidates around at the weekend! Though I suppose the downsides of stained pillowcases is made up for by the lack of skin cancer cases from actual sun bed abuse

TheBigCheese: Her first time holding an angle grinder (we were shooting a DJ who was off his rocker so just dropped her into the scene so she could get a few shots with sparks flying). It doesnt say copyright on it LOL

Adrianr: Its light cast not a spark from what I can see. I didnt spend any time on post so not removed anything like that (or messed with skin, sizing etc). The second shot? The car one? That was at -2 in late January - thats not startled, thats the onset of hyperthermia

Phate · 21 Mar 2011 at 23:30

Rikki said:
Phate: I didnt have time for the cliche'd baby oil'd shot in ovvies - its Scotland we live in, Ill save that for the dead of summer! (and funnily enough I just watched Jason Cole's DVD on workshop shoots).

I just feel this shot could have been 10x better if you had put more thought and effort into how the model looked and was presented. It's the main thing letting this shot down tbh.

Rikki · 22 Mar 2011 at 09:18

As I've repeated above, it was a shoot with a DJ, I just offered the missus the chance to get a few pics done and the result is above. If it was a planned shoot I'd have spent more than 5 minutes on it.