Tag Archives: long exposure

04/3/14

Making of "Drowning"

To create this photo, I used my computer screen again as a softbox. I wanted to get the silhouette of the glass so I didn’t need a flash, and using a tripod I could choose the dof I wanted and then the necessary exposure time to get a white background.
I placed the razor blade very carefully before filling the glass until it held in the position I wanted, and then I started to fill the glass with water using a dropper, and also doing some photos of the composition while I was filling it, just in case the razor blade changed its position, in which case I could loose the shot.

Also, in the first attempts I noticed that the edges of the glass weren’t as defined as I wanted due to unwanted light coming from the screen, so I placed a couple of books as flags to reduce the amount of light on the sides of the glass to get a more defined silhouette.

Finally, I used photoshop to create the silhouette of a face and then its symmetry with a copy of the layer.

Before:

 20140216_190456

After:

03/27/12

DIY LED torch for light painting

Light painting is an interesting photography technique in which we use long exposure in low light conditions and then draw using a flashlight or other objects that emit light, so that the resulting photo will contain all the movements and shapes we did with flashlight.

My purpose was to build a high power LED torch with the possibility to hang it from a chain or string so I could spin it or rotate it fast enough to draw an orb or other objects and still getting a bright result in the photo, because a typical LED torch or flashlight works well when trying to draw letters or lines in the light painting, because we move slowly, but when we move the flashlight much faster, the lines and spirals look much weaker, that’s why is useful to use high power LEDs, to see the light painting clearly. In addition, the batteries would add more weight at the end of the string, facilitating the spinning of the torch.

 

Component list:
– 1x 4 AA battery holder
– 3x high power SMD LEDs
– 1x PCB (1cm x 13cm approx.)
– 1x switch

 

The electrical circuit is very simple, basically there’s a 5ohms resistor and 3 SMD LEDs in parallel. The LEDs work at 3.8V with a power consumption of 350mA, but in this case I used a little higher resistor so the LEDs could still make more light, but I prefered a longer battery duration.

The circuit is divided in three small PCBs with one LED in each one, to illuminate in three different directions during the light painting.

To attach a string to the LED torch, I’ve added a M3 screw in the top part, but I still have to find an appropiate string or chain to use.

To make an orb with light painting you have to spin the LED torch with your wrist while you rotate slowly around yourself. This will create the effect of some sort of sphere, you can find a lot of examples of this technique.

I still haven’t tried it properly, I hope to post a new photo using this tool soon in my photography section, thanks for reading.