High Speed Flash Tests
Experimenting with High Speed Flash Photography and a Mumford Time Machine, other experiments can be seen here
“Catch a Falling Star”, an image I’m very pleased with:
a. 2″ @ f16 iso 200 cable release. 50mm on a 40D, full frame image.
b. Front 580Ex 1/32 power with diffuser
c. Rear 580Ex 1/64 power zoomed in to 105mm as a spotlight. Reduced to 1/64 because it was much closer than the main flashgun.
d. Flashes triggered from microphone (200mm away), 0.009 seconds delay.
e. Balloon smaller than previous attempts and under more pressure.
A water droplet animation consisting of 480 images taken at 0.5 millisecond intervals. Click here to see the full animation.
A biscuit being shot by an air gun pellet from a Beeman 0.177 air pistol.
The muzzle velocity of this gun is 130 metres/second and the muzzle was approx 250mm from the biscuit.
a. 2″ @ f11 iso 200 cable release. 100mm on a 40D, full frame image.
b. Front 580Ex 1/128 power zoomed into 105mm to maximise the lighting.
c. Rear 580Ex 1/128 power zoomed into 105mm as a rim light.
d. Flashes triggered from microphone attached to the gun barrel, 0.002 seconds delay.
The flash duration is approximately 1/35,000 second and the pellet has traveled about 4mm during this exposure and it can be seen in the debris trail.
A party popper captured 0.003 milliseconds after the popper was popped.
A single 580EX flashgun on 1/64 power was used to capture this image. The flashgun was triggered using a microphone sensor picking up the bang from the party popper.
A journey through failed experiments with notes on each experiment which might help anyone else taking this path.
Falling Apart at the Seams
A failure in my book because I didn’t get the shot I was after ie I wanted to capture the pellet after it broken the internal filament but before it exited the bulb.
Interesting to see what appears to be a double exposure around the edge of the bulb but no evidence of it if you look at the cracking in the middle of the bulb. I can’t figure out what would cause this.
It was a 1 second exposure BUT in a completely darkened room and lit by two flashguns wirelessly triggered. One aimed at the background and one aimed from in front of the bulb. Both guns on 1/128 of full power so flash duration would be about 1/35,000 of a second.
This was another attempt using the same setup but the double exposure effect isn’t apparent.
f16 @ iso200 using a Canon 40D and 100mm macro len
update: a possible solution to the double exposure is an electronic delay between the firing of the two flashguns which I haven’t observed before.
A recent stop motion animation test on a clockwork mechanism.
Click here to see the full animation.
500 photographs triggered by a photodiode across one of the moving arms. Each frame was incremented by 0.002 second delay. So this represents 1 second of movement but took a couple of hours to shoot. 9 trigger events were ignored to allow the flashes to recycle. A 580Ex and 550Ex flashgun on 1/128 full power were used to stop the movement.
Fail: Using a poor quality alarm clock mechanism has resulted in an irregular movement of the main lever
Water Balloons Trials
a. 2″ @ f11 iso 200 cable release. 50mm on a 40D
b. Front 580Ex 1/32 power with diffuser
c. Rear 580Ex 1/32 power zoomed in to 105mm
d. Flashes triggered from microphone set 200mm from the balloon, 0.003 seconds delay.
Fail: Delay slightly too short for the balloon to clear the balloon.
a. 2″ @ f11 iso 200 cable release. 50mm on a 40D, full frame image.
b. Front 580Ex 1/32 power with diffuser
c. Rear 580Ex 1/64 power zoomed in to 105mm as a spotlight. Reduced to 1/64 because it was much closer than the main flashgun.
d. Flashes triggered from microphone (200mm away), 0.006 seconds delay.
Fail: Pressure in the balloon wasn’t high enough to rip the balloon apart quickly enough.
Pushing the laws of physics too hard
a. 2″ @ f16 iso 200 cable release. 50mm on a 40D, full frame image.
b. Front 580Ex 1/32 power with diffuser
c. Rear 580Ex 1/64 power zoomed in to 105mm as a spotlight. Reduced to 1/64 because it was much closer than the main flashgun.
d. Flashes triggered from microphone (200mm away), 0.012 seconds delay.
Fail: at 12 milliseconds after the balloon was popped the water sphere has collapsed into chaos
more to follow
Tags: Acoustic Camera Trigger, Air gun, Ballistic, Beeman air pistol, Break Beam Trigger, Bursting Balloon, Camera Trigger, Canon 580Ex Flashgun, clockwork, High Speed Flash, High Speed Photography, Laser Camera Trigger, Light Bulb, Mumford Time Machine, Pistol
August 4th, 2008 at 1:46 pm
[...] More experiments can be seen here. [...]
August 5th, 2008 at 9:14 pm
hello,
absolut incredible work you are doing here. Thats just perfect.
greets
simon, from austria
August 17th, 2008 at 8:01 am
Two flashes = two exposures… they will not be exactly simultaneous… maybe if you were using the same flashes at the same power and the same triggering system… but when you’re timing things to 30ns (1/30,000th of a sec) you’ve got to expect a bit of jitter from your flashes. At least that would be my expectation, and I do have degree in electrical engineer with some emphasis in control theory… and zero relevent experience
August 17th, 2008 at 8:02 am
(sorry, 30us (microsecnds), not 30 ns.
August 17th, 2008 at 9:39 am
Thank you for the input Tom
The second gun is being fired via the master/slave wireless link which will put some delay into the triggering. I’ll be modding the system so both guns are triggered via a wire to see if the timing improves.
October 29th, 2008 at 11:15 pm
Could you tell me how you connect the Time Machine to the 40D? Which cable is required? Thanks.