Water Drops

I recently have been trying out a new toy – a stopshot trigger from Cognysis.  This enables various types of things to be frozen with either laser triggers or in this case a gate trigger.  The setup I had is similar to what is shown on their water drop kit page, in that I have a dropper that automatically drops the droplets through a trigger.   The stopshot then fires my camera flashes on a set time.  The bowl and water are in a dark room and the camera shutter, I control in bulb mode with a remote shutter cable.  All the image is then caught, just when the flashes are fired. I am using two Canon speedlights, (a 580ex and 430ex, both set to 1/64 power).  This is the fastest shutter the 430ex has, so this is what I have used to get the quickest burst of flash light out to try and freeze the action.

The images are the first good results I have had, in four sessions with the kit.   Having gradually been learning about the trigger, water, bowls and lighting.  I still have much to improve.

However, after reading through Corrie Whites excellent water drop photography e-book, this tin foil background ( an idea in it ) has given me some first beginners keepers.

The colours are from a red gel on one flash, and blue on the other.  The water was bluish.

Here they are.

My next step will be to build a better dropping station, get a better reservoir tray, and some additives for the water.  So far I have tried rinse aid in the bowl, colouring and glycerine.