Hacking Photography - one Picture at a time
Low lying fog can be fantastic for those creepy photo shoots, especially out on location. Or, perhaps you’re trying to recreate the look of a particular 80s pop music TV show. Whatever your reason, low lying fog often works much better than a more elevated smoke-filled atmosphere choking your subject.
In this video from Jay P Morgan for The Slanted Lens, we see how to make a smoke machine produce low lying fog. And all you need is a cooler and a big block of ice.
There are several ways of creating smoke for your photos and videos. Caleb Pike from DSLR Video Shooter will show you how to make an awesome smoke effect for your photos and videos. It’s not always easy to control the smoke, no matter the way you make it. But Caleb’s method makes the smoke easy to distribute and control. What’s more, it’s cheap and requires only two props: baby nose sucker and hand-held vaporizer. Sounds bizarre, but it works like a charm.
While a lot of our recent articles lately have gone into manipulating photos in Photoshop, some are still doing it the old fashion way, in camera.
The photo above, as well as the photos below, were taken in camera, using knowledge and ingenuity. We reached out to Felix Alejandro Hernández Rodríguez to ask him how he made those:
I am very happy to announce that we are releasing 4 more Image Manipulation packages today. Some by popular demand and some we decided to make on our own, but basically you said jump and we said how high.
Alienbees are known to be solid and reasonably priced studio flashes, offering great value for your money.
Perhaps in attempt to give photographer Rebecca Britt more than she paid for, her one month-old Alienbees B400 decided it will double as a smoke machine.[Read More…]
Here is a technique I did not think I will ever be covering on the blog, using smoke bombs. In fact I did not even know that there is such a thing as smoke bombs until I stumbled on the photography of Jovana Rikalo.
Serbian photographer Jovana Rikalo uses smoke bombs to create some unexpected effects in her portraits. You see, some photographers like control in their photos, but Jovana prefers the random effect she gets from the way the smoke moves in the air.
I Asked Jovana about the hazards of using this technique and she says that she only shoots outside where the smoke quickly disperses.
There is an old song that says that no good story ever started with the words “No Good Story Ever Starts With Drinking Tea [Watch this link, it has some pretty explicit music]. Anyhow, I am not really sure if this is 100% accurate, but it definitely applies for my story today. I once drank a nice shot of Whiskey. Drinking Whiskey and smoking cigar. I kinda threw my head back and relaxed while enjoying the smoke swirling upwards. Ahhh…. What a nice swirl…… It was actually dancing its way up. I know that this is what incepted this ballerina photograph:[Read More…]
Controlling smoke always seems like a hard task to me. Between the wind, air temperate and evaporating nature of smoke it can get quite tricky. It also gets harder to control the bigger the setup is. And going outside does not make it any easier.
While we’ve featured some other ways to control smoke, like cooling it to make it heavy and stick to the ground or replacing it with flour altogether, there is always room for one more smoky trick.[Read More…]
Photographer Anick Morel takes a new twist on the old burning lightbulb photograph. Instead of photographing the bulb in profile, she places a glass above the broken bulb and photographs the smoke formations caused from hitting the glass.
To illustrate the process, here is a diagram that explains the setup:[Read More…]
One of the nice and less common effect we see in light painting is smoke effect. Despite of its relative rareness it is requite easy to make as light painter Wen-Jié Yang demonstrates in the video below.
You can find out more about John on his website or follow him on Facebook and YouTube.
can change a lens mid-rappel, swap a memory card while treading water, or use a camel as a light stand.
To see more of his work please visit his studio website blurMEDIAphotography, or follow him on Twitter, 500px, Google Plus or YouTube.
JP’s photography is available for licensing at Stocksy United.
Find my work on My website or follow me on Facebook or My page
