How Do I Photo Steam and Smoke

[dwservingHim]

Hey there,
I have tried a couple different times to photograph steam or smoke. What type of lighting, backdrop, etc... do I need to get it just right.
Thank you for your help

[wulf]

Backdrop: probably something plain and a distance from the smoke / steam. If you are lighting the smoke / steam, a dark background will give most contrast.

Lighting: I've mainly used a small flashlight for my experiments although must try again now that I have an SB600 flash unit to play with. To get the length of the smoke illuminated, try sending the beam / flash up or down... ie, along the main path of the smoke.

Have you got any of your results you could share?

Wulf

[Nicole]

I've written up 2 threads about photographing smoke. The first, I used 2 halogen work lights, the second I used my SB600 off camera.
Photographing Smoke
http://digital-photography-school.co...res-smoke.html

[dwservingHim]

I'm sorry, but I don't have any good results yet. But I am going to take your advice and try it out sometime. Thank you

[wulf]

Even bad results are good - they might help somebody suggest a small tweak that would make all the difference.

Wulf

[dwservingHim]

True. I will try and upload some as soon as I can (which may be this weekend). First week of school. But I will try. Thank you.

[kencaleno]

1. have a black piece of board for background

2. Set up a joss/incense stick about 6 inches in front of board

3. Camera on tripod

4. Flashgun off camera 2 feet from incense stick, to the left, with a piece of black board behind to keep flash off background

5. Focus lens manually on top of joss/incence stick-then light incence stick,giving it a wobble for interesting smoke pattern

6. Turn on flash

7, Raise camera so only smoke is in focus

8, Take your shot

[dwservingHim]

Thank you very much. I would assume that the same principles apply for a cup of coffee and it's steam. I will try it out. Thank you.

[karen1961]

thanks for the tut,here's my try


i know they aren't perfect,but it is my first try,
you can see the rest of them here... smoke - a set on Flickr

[ksuflash]

I was inspired by this post, so I gave it a shot. Below are some of the ones I liked.