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Fire

This photographer created phoenix wings by light painting with real fire

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Light painting is something many of us try at some point in our photographic journey. Some of us just make a brief visit into this world, but others make it their home. One such photographer is Derek VanAlthuis, an avid light painter who’s produced some outstanding work. One such image is the one above.

When I first saw this image, I could immediately tell that it wasn’t your average light painting photo.  The fire just looked so real. As it turns out, it looks that way because it is real fire. I got in touch with Derek to find out more about his process, and get some insight into how this image was made.

How to add extra details in a photo after the shot using Photoshop

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When creating images its always good to add some extra details just to keep things interesting. I recently shot a cover feature for alternative lifestyle magazine, Proper eye candy, with Madison Phoenix.

The plan was to shoot some moody images using gels. I also wanted smoke, but alas, at the time I didn’t have a smoke machine. So my plan was to fake it afterwards in Photoshop. One of the images also featured Madison smoking a cigar. Now if you have ever been in a small confined room with a lit cigar, you will know it isn’t the best of situations. Slowly you begin to choke in a dark haze of tobacco smoke. Something I didn’t really fancy….or the weeks of lingering smell afterwards. So again I decided I would fake it, by adding the glow of a lit cigar later in Photoshop. I know, I know, I am a big faker, but oh well……I like  my lungs and the scent of fresh air in my studio.

I lit fitness gear on fire while athletes used it, here is how it looks like

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[editor’s note: I was surprised at how casually the athletes treated the fire. I mean, it has to hot, and that size of a flame up close can be quite intimidating. I asked Brandon about it  and he told DIYP that: “The safety and comfortability of the athletes was priority in this shoot, so making them aware of the process and how we would handle everything was taken care of prior to the shoot. Along the way we made sure they were okay with whatever we asked them to do, and once they saw what came from the photos, they were much more excited to keep going!”]

We’ve all seen photographs before of light trails through various forms of light painting; cars passing by, flashlights, pixelsticks, wool spinning, etc.

How often do we usually see fire as a tool to create light trails? Or how about using fire inside a gym to create light trails?

This is how this shoot happened

How to create realistic burning skin in photoshop

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If you are doing a still image and want to add some burning skins effects, this video will show you a quick 10 minutes way to do so. You start with a “blank face”, we chose a model on a white background, but any face will do.

To get the scorched texture we used a tree bark (from here) and to get the fire inside we used a fire effect from here. It’s a 7 minutes video, and by the end of it you will have a new tool in your photoshop arsenal.

Burning wire wool through a macro lens becomes a raging firestorm

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When the whole wire wool thing was pretty cool and new a decade or more ago, many photographers stocked up. Then the idiots discovered it. These days, it’s become a bit of a boring and cliché subject. Some of us, though, still have mountains of the stuff sitting in our garage that we could never possibly use. The good news is, it can still make an excellent photographic subject, especially with a macro lens.

This video from the Macro Room shows what it looks like when you burn wire wool up close. It’s a mesmerising video, and offers all kinds of suggestions for things to try yourself.

Aerial Perspective – The depth your images have been consciously missing.

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Something I’m going to be touching on today is referred to in the painting world as “Aerial Perspective”, a way, if not “the” way to create depth in your images. When you see pictures of mountains, or landscapes you’ll often notice that they are coated with fog, clouds, smoke, steam, etc in order to make the background appear further away.

Monroe Station in Big Cypress reduced to ashes after steel wool spin shot gone wrong

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Now, this is why we cannot have nice things.

While I am not enjoying saying this, it looks like photographers are slowly earning the bad cred that authorities are giving them. After shuttering a 126 old statue for a selfie, it is now revealed that the fire on The Big Cypress Monroe Station last month was probably caused by a photographer trying to spin steel wool for a light paining photo.

In a press release by Bob DeGross Chief of Interpretation and Public Affairs at Big Cypress National Preserve, it is stated that:

Incredible time-lapse shows the ethereal world of California wildfires

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Up close and personal, wildfires are tragic and terrifying. But if you can step away from the chaos and capture things from a wider perspective, they can become a thing of beauty.

No one knows this better than filmmaker Jeff Frost, who has spent the past three years capturing dozens of wildfires across the Golden State and has turned them into a time-lapse.

Local Landmark Shipwreck in California Burnt Out for Instagram Photo

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Perched on a sand bank in Tomales Bay, CA, the ship nicknamed the “S.S. Point Reyes” has sat for a great number of years, left to rot and decay naturally.  The exact number of years it’s been there is something of a local secret, adding to the mystery of the wreck, which has been a significant local tourist attraction.

Sitting in the bay, and not the Pacific Ocean is the reason why the wreck has remained around for so long, and has been of great interest to photographers visiting the area, which has a long history of shipwrecks.

On Sunday night, it became of particular interest to one unnamed Instagram user who thought it’d be a great idea to start spinning red hot wire wool behind the boat for a photo.  As one might expect, this caused a fire which went on to consume about half of the wreck, and was still being battled by local fire fighters into Monday morning.

This is why we can’t have nice things.

Using Color Balance to turn Dust And Particles into Fire, Ice And Magic

Time to dust up on your Color Balance Adjustment Layer. Here’s a quick Photoshop trick that will add some more magic (or magical fire and ice) to your composites.

This technique works wonders using dust particles shot against a back background. You can shoot this yourself or use a pre-made dust resource if you don’t have the energies to vacuum all the mess such a shoot creates.

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