Candle Smoke C&C

5uspect · 06-01-2008 8:02pm #1

I had a go at that, I guess now cliched inverted smoke plume visualisation technique. Here's the two I think came out best. A few more in my sig...

Comments appreciated!:)

trishw78 · 06-01-2008 8:23pm

I like the way that smoke dances on air currents I'm always facinated at watching incense burn

Borderfox · 06-01-2008 8:24pm

great technique

m_stan · 06-01-2008 8:42pm

First one is really nice. Love this effect. What did your setup look like ?

5uspect · 06-01-2008 9:34pm

m_stan wrote: »

First one is really nice. Love this effect. What did your setup look like ?

Thanks! Basically I set up a candle in an old wine bottle on the kitchen table and my 350D and 580ex flash on a tripod about 0.5m from the flame. I stuck some sheets of black paper on the wall opposite the camera to get contrast with the smoke.

I used a mixture of mixed and bounced flash at ~1/600 to 1/1000s with high speed sync. I used the 18-55 kit lens at ISO 100. I also tried on board flash and it did quite well apart from some strong shadows on the black paper. I'll probably get a large sheet of black fabric next time.

To extinguish the candle I used one of those extinguisher cup thingies you hold over the flame. I usually left it over the candle for a second of too to let the smoke built up before pulling it away and snapping the wake. Here is a shot of it:

and here is no.1 before I let rip at it in PS:

The background was far from perfect so I'd imagine a nice sheet of black fabric will work wonders!

Sebzy · 06-01-2008 11:06pm

Very nice shots and thanks for the little guide.

RCNPhotos · 07-01-2008 1:16am

Another of those things i just would never have thought of doing on my own, awesome. First one is my favorite, looks amazing.

Mellor · 07-01-2008 2:00am

What post pro did you do? Was it just crop and invert

mikeanywhere · 07-01-2008 7:48am

nicely done!!

m_stan · 07-01-2008 7:53am

thanks for the info. would have had no idea how to do this ! deffo gonna try this at some stage after I get over my little lightbox craze I'm having at the moment !

5uspect · 07-01-2008 10:26am

Mellor wrote: »

What post pro did you do? Was it just crop and invert

The workflow generally involved adding a curves adjustment layer set to the invert or colour invert preset depending on which ever worked best, invert normally. Then I added a black and white adjustment layer and gave it some tint. If needed I added a selective colour layer to get some nice colours.

Since my background wasn't perfect I had to get rid of some unevenness in the background. Generally I selected the colour from the background.
(PS will select the colour as you see it thru all the adjustment layers)
I filled a new layer on top of the stack with this colour and used a layer mask to bring only the smoke through.