Smoke Photography

[ishamy]

Had a wee shot at burning stuff tonight, very addictive! Pretty cool what you can do with a match, flash and a black box.


Dancing Angel by M+M Morrison, on Flickr


Purple Wisps by M+M Morrison, on Flickr


Flames! by M+M Morrison, on Flickr


Green Smoke by M+M Morrison, on Flickr


Violet Snake by M+M Morrison, on Flickr


Pink Overload by M+M Morrison, on Flickr

 

[ElDude]

I was amused by the person telling you off for smoking on Facebook earlier as they clearly didn't see this coming

 

[Nexus]

Watermarks kind of ruin them.

 

[2StepSteve]

Nice captures

but...

Watermarks kind of ruin them.

This!

The watermarks are ridiculously intrusive in the centre of the image as they are.

 

[Jase]

Agree, I've seen these on all of your photo's, the Watermark in the middle ruins every single one. The eye is drawn straight to it and I barely see the rest of the photo.

 

[Steves1982]

It could be a bit more discreet. Great photos though

 

[ishamy]

Ahh Balls Thanks for the comments and yes I do understand about the watermark, reasoning being I had an issue with a few people printing off my images a few months ago. In fact one person admitted she had one on her mantle piece :O anyway I think I will have to rethink the water mark... Thanks for all the comments should give it a try, so much fun burning stuff!

 

[King Damager]

Did you filter the flashbox colour? Or do the colour change in PP?

kd

 

[ishamy]

I did the colour in PP, tried in shot but wasn't really getting anything I liked. I was burning matches which gave off some nice blues mixed with white/grey smoke which really helped give a two tone in PP. I just changed the white balance in Lightroom.

Will look at moving/changing my watermark tonight, I had slightly changed it from my 2012 one and you are all right, it is far to prominent.

 

[ElDude]

To be honest, if people are actively stealing your images leave the watermark there. Yes it detracts from the image but if it stops people pinching them then so be it.

You already have positive comments so you know the photos are decent

 

[ishamy]

You already have positive comments so you know the photos are decent

Decent?! I think you mean 'Awesome' (Joking of course) Yes you are right, but I think I shall try something else with it maybe tonight, make it a bit easier on the eyes haha.

 

[Ksanti]

Take the watermark off, protect your work under various creative commons licenses and when you find out that people have used the image, then you threaten legal action. In the mean time keep high resolution images off of the internet so people can't print them for proper commercial use.

Note I'm not saying bait people into thinking your work is free to use and then hit them with a "my normal charge is £500 per 6x4" email like some photographers do, just recognise that a watermark is largely useless for protective purposes.

Ultimately, any watermark that's going to do a half decent job of protecting an image is going to have a bigger effect in ruining the image. Watermarks in photography come down to increasing awareness in the way that Jaime Ibarra does it - yes they're easily removed, but that's not the point. What'll protect your images is just not having 12mp copies of every image available online.

Finally:
Watermarks - useful for advertising/getting the word out, less useful for protection
Resolution - in real terms, this is your protective tool along with a decent legal backup as a last resort. Nobody using a 960*640 image off of the internet is going to be paying significant money for an actual print.

Very nice images as well, under the watermark. Tbh, until you're at Lara Jade/Chase Jarvis levels of success, I don't think people stealing your images should be of huge concern - and they don't even use watermarks... I use them as examples as they're internet photographers as opposed to long-since established photographers who've got agencies to deal with all the copyright issues.

 

[pingu666]

nice pics

 

[ishamy]

Thanks for that post Kasanti, very good point's in that. I have changed the watermark to being at the bottom of the shot and more opaque, anyway will have a good read again and see what's what (ahh the watermark only updated in Flickr)

Thanks guys!

 

[ishamy]

Shots updated

 

[Ferrise]

Hi ishamy,
Awesome smoke photography and like to know the technique. Any tip will be appreciated. All are great but like green smoke most.

 

[ishamy]

Hi thanks for the comment and glad you like. Well setup was pretty simple, black background, matches, lighter, flash and remote trigger for the flash.

basically light the match with the lighter, blow it out and take the shot with the flash firing from camera right behind the smoke pointing slightly towards camera. Keep shooting until you get what you want, in PP you can change white balance to anything you would like to suite the colours you want

If you check out Digital Revs youtube channels there's a 'how to' on there, as well as loads of other (that's if you can put up with the style of their videos )