So I've been popping a MILLION balloons and can NOT get the timing right!!! I didn't put glitter in the balloon, so that would have been lacking, but I just wanted to figure the technique out first and I suck! ;) C'mon experts....help a girl out.
A camera that can shoot at least 5 frames per second. Not just one shot. Timing is everything, and I feel continuous shots would be needed before, during, and after.
yeah.... at least a 5 frame per second camera is needed.. and continous lighting.. ^___^ u can't have a speedlight or a strobe to do this for they have 3-5 seconds time before u can light it up again.. ^__^
I picked on quite some hits on my balloon picture on flickr from this site, so I might as well explain how I did this ;-)
The trick is not in a fancy camera that can shoot realy fast (believe me, it will not be fast enough. The 'exposure time' of this shot was about 1/30.000 seconds. I don't know of any consumer camera that can do that ;-) ). The trick is, like Christine pointed out, to use a sound trigger. The one I use for my shots was bought at www.hiviz.com (cheap thing, have to assemble it yourself).
From a practical point of view you do the following: set up a balloon and camera in a room that can be made totally dark. Connect an external flash to the sound trigger and put it a bit at the side and front of your camera pointing over the balloon (actually, a flash at both sides would be best to eliminate shadows on one side). Put the flash at 1/64 or 1/32 power (the lower the power, the shorter the duration of the flash so the more you freeze the image). Put your camera on manual focus and focus on the ballooon. Set the exposure time to a couple of seconds. Then switch of all lights to make the room dark, trigger your camera (an external trigger is practically a must) and pop the balloon. The sound of this will trigger the flash, which will shortly expose the balloon. Wait till your camera has taken the shot and turn on the light again (or not ;-) ).
Of course this will then need a bit of tinkering to get everything right (power of the flash, angle of the flash, f-value of the camera and most importantly the distance of the sound trigger to the balloon (since basically this distance will dictate the 'delay' of the flash).
So, that's it from a technical point of view. The hardest thing then of course is thinking about a creative shot instead of just shooting another popping balloon ;-)
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Then there is the lighting thing....
http://www.diyphotography.net/universal_sound_and_optical_slave_flash_trigger
The trick is not in a fancy camera that can shoot realy fast (believe me, it will not be fast enough. The 'exposure time' of this shot was about 1/30.000 seconds. I don't know of any consumer camera that can do that ;-) ). The trick is, like Christine pointed out, to use a sound trigger. The one I use for my shots was bought at www.hiviz.com (cheap thing, have to assemble it yourself).
From a practical point of view you do the following: set up a balloon and camera in a room that can be made totally dark. Connect an external flash to the sound trigger and put it a bit at the side and front of your camera pointing over the balloon (actually, a flash at both sides would be best to eliminate shadows on one side). Put the flash at 1/64 or 1/32 power (the lower the power, the shorter the duration of the flash so the more you freeze the image). Put your camera on manual focus and focus on the ballooon. Set the exposure time to a couple of seconds. Then switch of all lights to make the room dark, trigger your camera (an external trigger is practically a must) and pop the balloon. The sound of this will trigger the flash, which will shortly expose the balloon. Wait till your camera has taken the shot and turn on the light again (or not ;-) ).
Of course this will then need a bit of tinkering to get everything right (power of the flash, angle of the flash, f-value of the camera and most importantly the distance of the sound trigger to the balloon (since basically this distance will dictate the 'delay' of the flash).
So, that's it from a technical point of view. The hardest thing then of course is thinking about a creative shot instead of just shooting another popping balloon ;-)
Although they've been out of stock for several months now - I don't know if they've discontinued it.
Here's a shot I did of a popping balloon with the sound trigger and flashes in the shot and labeled. http://www.flickr.com/photos/sudweeks/3222171064/