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Hello,

I've been experimenting with water once again. Could I have some feedback on these. Please be brutally honest.






Many thanks

stunning technically brilliant work
2nd and3rd are a wipeout!
are these drops flicked across or are they drops heading downwards and you just tilted them

Cream want drops as a themed concept in one of their fashion shoots, i suggest you contact them now

Technically I am very impressed, but as stand alone images they do not do a lot for me.

Matt I assume this was taken with the D70. Can you expand on the strategies you used to get these shots and whether the 18-70 was used with an SB800 etc. They are great images and might even be cropped more heavily to isolate aspects of them for an abstract presentation.

Perhaps I should expand on my earlier comment. They do not grab me because I think that the addition of colour to the images would really make the technical brilliance stand out.

Matt, well ahh let me say i think these look cool with the lighting and well different, i am not a technical person but these are fine.

Thanks for the comments guys.
I was worried that the images might be a tad hot in places and that perhaps the focus would detract from some.

I think that technically these images are excellent. Good lighting and colour. What they lack is a context. I guess you can hone your technique on the water but need to think about what it is doing , show something of where it is going/coming to/from to have a truely excellent shot. Having seen some of your other work I'm sure this won't be long in coming!!
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Cheers,
Paul.

I like them Matt, like them alot. To be really honest the super hot section to the far left is a little irritating and I'd find some a way to reduce it, crop it whatever before I consider submitting them (but hey its on par with your smoke work, so if Cream is interested, go for it).

The first pic is damn sharp and the rest are a bit soft, but I'm not sure if it's due to the jpg conversion.

Can you please give us some details about the setup, etc?

Alpha_7 wrote:To be really honest the super hot section to the far left is a little irritating and I'd find some a way to reduce it,

It irritates me too Craig, and the more I look the more I don't like which detracts from the whole image.

I agree that the image lacks a "reason d'etre" so to speak and will revist this with another eye perhaps.

The set up was relatively simple - two flash heads directed at a background from bottom and top right (the image have been rotated) and the water poured/thrown/swirled onto the floor. The D70 triggered the flashes remotely.

I think they are all good images, agree about the hot spots also..

But you have inspired me to have a go at something like this.

Thanks



MATT

Personally I think the 3rd shot works well as a stand alone image. I can imagine it a large poster print by itself on a large wall. The others, although technically great lose a bit as the water loses form.

Love it. Ideas forming. More playtime ahead

Matt
You are on to something pretty interesting here. I think you have pinned them down to about 80% of brilliant....but need to keep refining the technique. A tad more DOF....you can get that by moving back just a little, up the ISO just a little, and get another f-stop maybe.
Keep pushing this subject and you will end up with fine art.
Ansel Adams reputedly shot 1000 pics of a white cup and saucer to see what combination of SP and F-stop, film and lighting gave the best result.
And he had to pay for his film!

Great shots! Just to echo the others, they do perhaps lack a figurative sense of direction. But just like anything else.. If you can refine and perfect the technique, it becomes another tool in your arsenal when you're shooting in general

Reason Raisin Raison Rokkstar I agree with pushing this a bit further.

Very cool - looks like I might be involved in re-shooting these in the near future commercially. Not overly sure yet but initial reactions seem positive.

Thanks for the technical tips Matt, I'll definately try them next time .

Many thanks for the feedback people.