Speed Gambling…

Somebody, anybody, just tells Winter to come over, please? PLEASE!? It's officially the fall season, so they say, and it is actually worth than summer itself even. Stinking humidity, allergies everywhere, and the worse of all, malfunctioning ACs and cars. Aaand let's not forget the boiler's problem at home where everyone still thinks that the water is "hot" while my body shivers violently when I take a shower and they refuse to turn it on because they think the weather, or the water, is still hot.
Anyway, I was going to post a bit about some photos I've shot from the Geology department, in my workplace, and I've edited these photos later on my PC. However, I think I'll skip that. It's just one photo which I've uploaded to the stocks already (you can click the stream at the end of this post to check my stock), and another one which I've turned into a 3D anaglyph. Not sure if I'm going to upload or do anything with the latter though. Anyway, Let's jump right into the experiment I talked about in my previous post.

Speed Gamble

In my previous post I've talked about some idea, using all my speedlites in a high speed photography set, like in the sketch on the left. Well, things weren't easy at first because, as usual and typical, I ran into a battery crisis and I had to give up on most of my rechargeable batteries that I've stocked for such work and got myself a new set of alkaline batteries, which are not rechargeable but hopefully more reliable. Another trouble was to set the table and stack the speedlites side by side and pointing at a specific point. It's a minor problem but it was quite vexing specially with connecting 3 out 7 speedlites with external power-pack (I have three 430EXII and one 420EX and these models do not accept external power sources unfortunately). All along the work process, I've changed the height of the tripod, the angle and few other settings; Most importantly from all these settings, maybe, would be the shutter speed, the ISO, flash zoom, and the flash power.
Now, flash power (for all speedlites of course) was set to manual and was controlled via the main speedlite which acts as a trigger as well (the one on the camera). I have to do this, since this is the only way to work with HSS mode AND control the rest of the speedlites wirelessly. I don't have a special trigger for that purpose. I lowered the power down, in hope that I can shoot in burst mode continuously (as this would reduce the recharging time). However, I was wrong. It didn't work that way and technically, I was limited to one shot. Anyway, I was also limited in raising the power too high up for the speedlites, because it might make my work with post-processing harder than it should be (by eliminating unnecessary parts from the metallic black tray I was using for my set).

Slow motion during a session.
For some reason I'm not sure of, the image turns black
when the flashes burst out.

As you can see from the video above, I had to work manually as usual. I've tried to set up my laser gate later on in fact but till this moment, it didn't work quite well. I'll explain the reasons below but first let's see some of the results that I've got in this way (and remember, all was manual, nothing was automated). The following images were, of course, edited and adjusted like a regular photos and they are not right out of the camera. So, there are adjustments and cropping involved; This is beside changing the lens from 100mm macro to 50mm:

The Falling One
Canon EF 100mm Macro, f/3.2, 5000^-1s, ISO200

Fallen Luck
Canon EF 100mm Macro, f/2.8, 4000^-1s, ISO160

Левитация
(Levitation)
Canon EF 50mm, f/6.3, 8000^-1s, ISO200

 

 

Let It Go
Canon EF 50mm, f/6.3, 8000^-1s, ISO200

This is a sample for some shots. Some of them had reflections on the water surface clearly and some (well, most) did not. I've used my polarizer to enhance such reflections (and also to protect the lens front). If I remember correctly, there were around 347 taken (the majority were dark frames) and been sorted down to 91 or so, and the process out is still ongoing. At the moment of typing this, the editing is still ongoing and I didn't check all images. Out of the camera, many of the images were dark in fact and did need a push in exposure while editing in RAW; Sometimes +1 and sometimes +2. Not much editing was done in RAW beside setting the exposure and controlling the highlights and shadows in various manners, including Fill, Black Point, and Contrast. As can be seen also, the shutter speed was fluctuating between 4000^-1 and down to 8000^-1 of a second, trying to freeze the water motion as much as possible. I've also changed the flash head zooming for most of the speedlites here, and in the final stages of shooting, I've settled down with 14mm (by pulling down the diffusing panel over the speedlite head) in order to spread light as much as possible on the tray, as it was hard to point the heads down at the water surface.

Not Enough Speed

Now composition-wise, I was not very happy, and probably using the 100mm Macro lens was the perfect solution, but still then I do think using 50mm was a good choice to add some elements around the action and fill the space with something; But my arrangement was a bird absurd! I did indeed try to fix that in some shots but recomposing, cloning, and cropping. At this moment, I think using 1/8000s is the perfect speed (and it is the maximum allowed by the camera).
After finishing a session or two with the manual work, I've decided to try and use the laser gate (from Ubertronix), which I got long time ago and I've seldom used it sucessfuly; In fact, never used it successfully! And this time, was no exception. I've tried at this point though, and according to some old advice from a professional, to connect the trigger to the speedlites instead of the camera because this will reduce the lag time significantly and would yield better results. This method, though, requires opening the shutter for second and allowing the speedlites to be triggered and then close the shutter (either by using timed shutter or using Bulb mode and a remote, which I kind of prefer in fact). That means, working in a dark environment. The location I was in gets considerably dark actually, but I'd have to wait till evening to have a darker atmosphere. Anyway, a quick glimpse at it (after hard work trying to align the laser beam to the receiver to form the laser gate) - told me that it's not going to work; Not the way I like it at least, for a number of reasons:

• The distance between the laser and the gate is wide across the tray (even after changing the orientation of the tray), making it almost impossible to precisely drop the dice across the beam. Thus, the gap must be narrower to drop precisely.
• The height to which I was able to set up the laser gate was relatively higher than required, as I guess. We are talking about microseconds here if not nanoseconds, thus things should be properly close to the water surface as much as possible without showing in the lens's field of view.
• Without finding a mechanism to adjust the level of the gate, it might be a quite troublesome way to use such a gate to capture the moment. If for instance the dice is captured in motion before touching the water surface, then adjusting the height of the gate is required to capture the perfect moment; Otherwise, all shots will be similar. 
• Part of fore mentioned points, I think this keeps us at the level of macro shooting.

Personally, now, after checking the situation and how things work, I think I do indeed prefer using the manual method despite its drawbacks. I think it also gives various results and unexpected results that makes the work amusing to some level. All that hassle with the laser gate is really not required unless I need to work with something quite delicate (like droplets) in the future. Otherwise, I think I will stick to this manual method for the time being. Now, there are a number of things that I think I want to try (planning to but didn't have the time before typing this blog post in fact):

• Try to merge my workflow with stereoscopic flashing, if possible.
• Use variety of lenses if possible other than 100mm Macro and 50mm.
• Try different angles as much as possible.
• Increase the power of the speedlites and use single shot method since the burst mode doesn't work here.
• Maybe change the container or the set to something smaller to give out a better composition and background, and have better control.

Finale

Now, this is it for now. Let's if I can post more about the new trials that I'm going to do with this experiment of high speed photography. Let's hope I get the time and the mood to work! This week has its toll on me already and I'm trying to hard to slow down and simplify my life.

Lately, and after closing down some settings on Duolingo website which makes me theoretically out of the "leaderboard" or whatever they call it, which is about contesting and doing more exercises for more points - after closing that down, I think I'm having more time to myself to do more useful things, specially in the Arabic section of that website. Beside that, I'm thinking of typing a blog post for my Arabic blog about this high speed photography experiment. So, my next week will definitely be busy, but I'll try to manage my time here and there - Let's hope!

Is it weird that I'm fascinated about astrology these days? Well, I had my interest in that but it's been a bit more than before nowadays. It's all just some trials to re-discover and understand myself further. Maybe forgive myself for some things as well? Well, absolutely not wasting much of time with this though (otherwise, I wouldn't be typing this blog post right?). I think all of this condensed work and thought is part of my efforts to forget about my pains and disappointments. Nevertheless, it leaves me just exhausted… Now, if only I can jot down these words that roam my heart into some poem hmm…

Touch Down
Canon EF 50mm, f/6.3, 8000^-1s, ISO200

Freeze!

It has been a busy week. So busy that I've totally forgot about doing my vocalization chores for the time being, in hope that I will continue by next week. On the other hand, Google Sites service is still not working and I can't upload files to it anymore.

There is a slight work here and there but it sure kept me busy during the week, and I had to stop fasting for few days just to cope with the sleepless schedule. I can't resist the afternoon's nap while fasting.
I've been in a workshop to train a bit on the usage of Canon's Speedlites. The work is still on, and I've got some results (I will show later).
I've been working as well on finalizing my Job Request paper with my teacher and I think it is final now and ready to be used. Maybe it is time now to move on with marketing or chasing customers as my teacher put it. But I think I need some work to be done with my portfolio and need to make it ready somehow. My teacher suggested to print it out like a magazine. My teacher is the main inspiration and the source of encouragement for me for the time being - as he is in the professional field already and does the guiding with encouraging words. He says not many photographers here that do what I do, if any. Made me feel unique.

Also, I'm trying to work more with 3D images for the time being, just for fun and to put something in a new email collection. I can't think of many good subjects, but I'm doing some experiments with my Rokinon 8mm fisheye lens, which proved to be hard to adjust for 3D (anaglyph) imaging; even harder than Canon's 15mm fisheye lens which worked at some scenes. This is mainly because of the divergence and the distortion at the edges which makes a slight movement to the center of the lens being magnified and exaggerated on the edges and causing a large distance to overlap - hence resulting in a ghosting effect.

3D Sculpture
Rokinon 8mm fisheye.
Notice the difference between the Red and Cyan in the center of the image and the edges of the image.

Adding to the hardships using Rokinon's lens, there is also the fact that I'm not sure yet how to make a small different angle (holding the camera by hand) to make a slight difference in the view. For this reason, I decided to move or strife my whole body without moving the camera away from my eye and shoot several shots at different stops of the body. Later at home I would check and decide which best fits.
Another lens that proved be working fine and good with this trend of 3D imaging is my relatively-new Canon 100mm macro lens (which can be used as a telephoto lens as well). I've used it here with a subject that I've taken before with my Tamron 70-300mm, but this time, of course, with  a lesser zoom. I've attached my Vivitar 2x teleconverter to expand the focal length beyond the original 100mm.

3D Gazebo
Canon 100mm macro.

Concentrating on the gazebo itself will reveal the effect. However, the buildings at the back had some strange "block" structure with this 3D processing, which I've failed to understand, but I guess it doesn't effect the beauty of the 3D in the gazebo itself. The main key, as I believe, to have a good anaglyph is to have a nice background and a foreground, and the 3D process is naturally aimed for the foreground like the image above.

Now, I'm dragging my tools here and there whenever possible just to capture something, specially for this 3D trend. Ironically though, I've been bringing my camera to my work place and I've ended up doing more abstract work with no 3D processing in mind. Even though I did take a lot of shots around the place but I think I'm satisfied about two of them only.

Verschlossen (Locked)

Banded

Verschlossen; despite the simplicity of this image, but the work on it was not that easy. The lockers, which lie in some storage room in my work place, were so close to the camera in a narrow space, and that sparked in me the desire to use Rokinon 8mm fisheye lens once again. After setting up the camera and the tripod I've spent a significant time trying to make the vertical lines in the center of the lens as straight as possible without any inclination, but seems my tripod is deficit somehow. However, with DxO optics it was possible to flatten and correct the deficiency to a reasonable degree. While capturing the image itself, I had to put on the timer to 10 seconds, and move away from the camera to the other end of the room, to avoid my own reflection on the metallic doors.

Banded is another story of hardships. In case you're wondering, the shot is for the lower part the wall in my office. My eyes caught the weird splash (or patch) on the lower portion of the wall. That inspired me to make a simple abstract shot combining this patch, with three different colors in general composed in layers (grey which is a wire; brown and white). To take such a shot is not easy; I have to lower the camera down as much as possible to the ground level, and this is to make the look as straight to the eye as possible. To do this, I had to take out the central column in my tripod and flip it upside down (just like I did once with a bathroom panorama); it was quite an exhaustive work with adjusting the legs and expanding them accordingly, and to work carefully with the weight of the camera and lens. Even though the previous shots were taken in brackets, but after all, only one RAW shot was adjusted and processed.

Depicting the view of a cockroach

Back to my workshop with the flashes. On Monday we've conducted the first practical work with high speed photography. However, the work was not as stable as it would have been done with a sound trigger, and also because of the lack of tripods from my part and the shaky hands, all of that contributed to the hardships of taking such images. Timing the shot was another issue. As we helped each other in shooting the scene, timing was a big issue.

Dipping

Pouring

Liquid Metal

The critical issue in all of these images is that, unlike my usual situation, there were more than one flash unit in the scene to be used, thus lighting the scene was not an issue (of course they had to be fixed in proper locations and at a certain power). My flash was set as a master and another two were fixed on special flash tripods as slaves, and their positions were changed frequently and accordingly. The main aim was to develop some sort of sense of a workflow, I presume.
The background provided, however, was not completely black, and with flash pulses it tended to turn bright and sometimes grey somehow. Thus, after getting back home and uploading the images, I had to work with the Curves adjustment layers to set the black point (by the black dropper/picker) and that made the foreground more pronounced. I have to say though that this technique doesn't work in all conditions.
I've found myself, again, using Noise Ninja more than NeatImage in cleaning and sharpening the images here. I think the power lies in the fact that Noise Ninja profiles different areas of the image instead of one block from the image, as it is in NeatImage. However, NeatImage still has its virtues with a ready-made profiles for sharpening at different levels, and those are quite useful for not messing up the sharpness too much. Also, NeatImage as a stand-alone software which can be used to do a batch cleaning when needed. Noise Ninja, with me, is only a plugin in Photoshop (I didn't check if there is a stand-alone version). Most of the images above were taken at 1/1000 of a second. The hardest part was to focus and remain stable pointing the camera to the bowl. With a tripod (and a remote) it would have been a single man's job!

Now, it is time to think more about the upcoming days and business trends, if any. I'm not sure where to start, but I still do think that I need more leisure time with myself to free my mind of many things. This said, I'm missing the joy of doing some panorama, somewhere...