High speed shots

[Lello]

Here are a few shots (not very good yet, still practicing) of some balloons bursting, the 3rd one, I filled with water and burst it over the bath.
If anybody is interested I will post the method and the equipment used.

[Gidders]

Originally Posted by Lello

If anybody is interested I will post the method and the equipment used.

Yes please!

[Canis Vulpes]

Very interesting, Lello.

Please post some more, the water balloon is excellent.

[yelvertoft]

Lello,

That water balloon bursting is brilliant. More information please.

[andy153]

Water burst is great - more info please.

[Lello]

About a month ago I saw a photo of a balloon bursting, I was so impressed by it I decided to give a go, As I had a MB-D10 (Nikon vertical grip) that allows bust mode at at 8fps fitted with ni-mh batteries, I thought how hard can it be I found half a packet of balloons (about 10) in a draw that had been there since I don't know when. So blew up the first balloon set it up on a shelf, D300 set on CH (high speed burst mode) with remote cord attached (so I could reach the balloon with needle) All set to go, hit release on remote while attacking balloon with needle, looked at result and missed with all shots from that burst so blow up another balloon and tried again still no luck, well got through all the ten balloons with nothing to show for it So me thinks, this is harder than I first thought!! Went on the internet and found this site > LINK <
Then realized that I was going about it the wrong way DOH, you need to have the camera on BULB setting in a dark room and it's the flash going off the gives the result, but for that you need a sound trigger to fire flash, as you can see on the site they have all sorts of triggers. I printed off a list of components and went to Maplins to try and buy and make my own sound trigger, Maplins could not supply all the exact parts needed, so I decided to buy the sound trigger with delay kit from HI-VIZ. About 10 days later the kit arrived, and as I thought I was buying the kit already made up you can imagine my shock when it all arrived in a plastic bag for me to build, well 4 hrs later I manged to build the kit, (will post photo after weekend) I managed to find a packet of balloons at work (for some open day we had six month ago) with the first shots taken, the flash seemed to fire to late and all I was getting was the fragments of the balloons flying through the air, and although my kit has a delay part to it, this was not going to help me! so after moving the trigger further away and trying different aperture settings I'm nearly there, so as I have now run out of balloons I will carry on after the weekend, As I am doing my very first wedding shoot (shadowing the wedding photographer) for a Friend on Saturday and maybe Going to Duxford Sunday/Monday, So blowing up balloons will have to wait for now.
P.S
I found that filling the balloons with just water and bursting them, the trigger switch was not picking up the very low sound, So I half filled with water and blew them as as well.
There are a few more shots.

[miketoll]

The water filled ones in particular are fascinating. Would be good to see the result with the string and needle cloned out. Oh, and when you get round to capturing a bullet bursting the balloons do post the shot!

[Lello]

Originally Posted by miketoll

The water filled ones in particular are fascinating. Would be good to see the result with the string and needle cloned out. Oh, and when you get round to capturing a bullet bursting the balloons do post the shot!

I could borrow a shotgun, but I don't think that would work somehow

[miketoll]

We would need a picture of your wife's face as she saw what was left of the bathroom! Then you would have to disappear like a high speed flash!

[Canis Vulpes]

Absolutely brilliant, lello. Thanks for the explaination, I must have a crack myself.