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hot coffee, cold milk...
hot coffee, cold milk...
IreneM


Photograph Information Photographer's Comments
Challenge: Heat (Advanced Editing IV)
Camera: Nikon D70
Lens: Tamron SP AF 90mm f/2.8 Di for Nikon
Location: My kitchen.
Date: May 21, 2006
Aperture: f16
ISO: 200
Shutter: 1/500th s
Galleries: Macro, Action
Date Uploaded: May 21, 2006

 Thanks a lot for the kind and constructive comments. I'm absolutely delighted with my top ten finish, especially in the face of such "fiery" competition.
A few mentioned that they would like to know how I did this shot.
Well, here goes…..First of all, if any of you have checked my pbase site you’ll know that high speed photography is a great passion of mine. A perfect synchronization between the moving object and the actual taking of the photograph is required. We talk about highspeed photography when we can’t see the fast movement with our eyes.
In my case, no laser module/sound trigger is used. I stand in my kitchen for hours on end dripping liquids from a syringe (without the needle) into other liquids….that’s it. I started experimenting with high speed photography about six months ago and seem to have developed a very good eye/shutter finger coordination.
For this challenge I started off by using warm coffee and cold milk to get the splashes. It had worked like a charm for me before and did again this time. The shots were great, lighting good, splashes good. Took about 3 hours. After viewing them on my laptop I realized that they did not meet the challenge (convey heat in your photograph)! The dreaded “DNMC”. There was no “heat” to be seen!
Started another series the next day with boiling hot coffee this time. Got some good milk splashes but, with needing a lot of light to capture the splashes, the steam became practically invisible. Aarghhh.
What to do? Luckily I had some incense sticks left over from my “smoke” series. I lay incense sticks around the cup and did some more experimenting. The effect was better but the smoke changed the surface tension of the coffee and I had to place the 2 flashes in different positions to catch the splashes. Because of this, the lighting on the cup just got worse and worse.
My husband eventually took pity on me and held the joss sticks close to the cup for a couple of hours which helped enormously.
After checking the images (hundreds!) I ended up choosing the one which looked the “hottest” and hoped no one would notice the catastrophic lighting on the cup itself too much.
Adjusted the contrast/cropped/resized in ACDSee 6.0. Cloned out some unsightly blotches in the background in Photoshop. Noise Ninja.
I’ll be putting some outtakes onto my pbase site within the next few days if anyone wants to check the “good” ones I managed to get ;-)

Statistics
Place: 8 out of 158
Avg (all users): 6.7814
Avg (commenters): 8.3043
Avg (participants): 6.7424
Avg (non-participants): 6.8034
Views since voting: 23297
Views during voting: 401
Votes: 183
Comments: 38
Favorites: 6 (view)

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AuthorThread
 06/30/2006 04:54:35 PM
What a sensasional photo love it, worth the effort , have to try this out one day.
  Photographer found comment helpful.
 06/02/2006 12:30:17 PM
Hello! from the Critique Club, I'm Jon Rowe and i will be looking at your image today :)

Composition: I believe that you have this one spot on. I love the DOF you have used here, and the fast caught motion, but still being able to get such detail on the steam is amazing. only gripe is i would have cropped a little wider, and allowed the top of the steam to show, but that's just personal preference

Background: i think this really works well, it emphasizes the midtones from the splash.

Overall this is a great image, with a wonderful score. and i've always been fascinated with your work. keep up the great job.

congrats on your top 10!
  Photographer found comment helpful.
 06/01/2006 11:14:36 PM
Irene: great accomplishment. I have you flagged because thus far your work is exceptional. Congratulations on your top 10 finish.
  Photographer found comment helpful.
 05/31/2006 05:11:06 PM
Another Irene special - what a delight! Congrats on the score and position - and thanks for the info: could have sworn you used a laser trip to make the shots work! You have some hand/eye coordination: remind me not to challenge you at tennis or even cricket...
  Photographer found comment helpful.
 05/30/2006 09:00:17 AM
Mindblowing... The lighting is my gripe, but there ain't much you could have done about it without going with a black BG.... That would have changed the early morning feel of the coffee cup with the soft grey setting IMHO...

This is a fantastic shot without the details, but even more so after reading about it... talk about patience! :)
  Photographer found comment helpful.
 05/30/2006 06:02:35 AM
white mashroom in coffee, very nice
  Photographer found comment helpful.
 05/29/2006 01:23:31 PM
Congratulations on your top 10 finish. Great shot!
  Photographer found comment helpful.
 Comments Made During the Challenge
05/28/2006 09:03:18 PM
Excellent capture, especially like the steam in there too! (Of course, without that the whole "heat" theme would not have played out so well.)
Well done! On my short list at the top!
  Photographer found comment helpful.
 05/28/2006 08:18:16 PM
Nice drop shot.
  Photographer found comment helpful.
 05/28/2006 05:30:51 PM
this is really an impressive photo. sound triggered? infrared? the timing on the second drop is perfect.
  Photographer found comment helpful.
 05/28/2006 12:12:28 PM
Excellent timing! Don't think I've seen a crown like this before. Firs the challenge well and a good shot to boot - good luck.
  Photographer found comment helpful.
 05/28/2006 03:33:43 AM
Excellent image.
  Photographer found comment helpful.
 05/27/2006 09:25:31 PM
wowsers ... that's got everything - really different even though it has common elements.
  Photographer found comment helpful.
 05/27/2006 03:23:58 PM
awesome shot! great job!
  Photographer found comment helpful.
 05/26/2006 03:12:18 PM
Irene, I really like your shots of this kind, they are totally great. I am sure you'll be in the top 3. Good luck! 10
  Photographer found comment helpful.
 05/26/2006 06:03:08 AM
Well done.
  Photographer found comment helpful.
 05/26/2006 02:08:00 AM
whoooooa!!! is that for real?! thats so awesome! well done!
  Photographer found comment helpful.
 05/25/2006 04:59:51 PM
beautiful
  Photographer found comment helpful.
 05/25/2006 01:57:35 PM
neat effect, let us know exactly how you did it once the voting is done.
  Photographer found comment helpful.
 05/25/2006 06:56:46 AM
The capture of the milk drop is super and I love the red cup. If I have one gripe about this it's that the crop is rather tight - emphasised by the fact that the steam goes out of the image. Still, one of the better shots in this challenge and I hope it does well for you.
  Photographer found comment helpful.
 05/24/2006 05:05:16 PM
Excellent! Great idea, great shot, and a nice and different crop 9
  Photographer found comment helpful.
 05/23/2006 07:04:25 PM
Wow what a beautiful splash!!! Amazing! This one could be a winner!
  Photographer found comment helpful.
 05/23/2006 05:17:53 PM
very creative..don't think I'll look at milk the same again..it's alive!
  Photographer found comment helpful.
 05/23/2006 01:54:16 PM
Very well done.
  Photographer found comment helpful.
 05/23/2006 10:44:20 AM
What a wonderful Red Hot effect, well done
  Photographer found comment helpful.
 05/23/2006 10:11:51 AM
Great catch....
  Photographer found comment helpful.
 05/22/2006 11:17:37 PM
Fantastic little splashroom. Oft repeated yet this one carries off a unique perspective with the cup edge and steam. Well lit, focused, timed and planned. I would say more, but.. I feel lilke a cup of coffee now.
  Photographer found comment helpful.
 05/22/2006 09:40:00 PM
Very interesting.
  Photographer found comment helpful.
 05/22/2006 09:01:05 PM
I must know how you did that, it's amazing!
  Photographer found comment helpful.
 05/22/2006 05:55:41 PM
AMAZING. I WANT A PRINT. 10 10 10
  Photographer found comment helpful.
 05/22/2006 04:16:19 PM
Another amazing one from IreneM!
I just don't get how you get a perfect splash like that!
Anyways, 10 from me.
  Photographer found comment helpful.
 05/22/2006 04:10:47 PM
Beautiful image - very well done.
  Photographer found comment helpful.
 05/22/2006 02:05:10 PM
nice capture ... well done!
  Photographer found comment helpful.
 05/22/2006 12:57:10 PM
Noway! how did you do that?!? 10 from me!
  Photographer found comment helpful.
 05/22/2006 11:27:26 AM
This is very cool.
I would be interested in the process here and how many tries this took.
  Photographer found comment helpful.
 05/22/2006 10:43:43 AM
Nice capture!
  Photographer found comment helpful.
 05/22/2006 01:13:06 AM
Very cool capture!
  Photographer found comment helpful.
 05/22/2006 12:44:08 AM
wow...great capture
  Photographer found comment helpful.


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