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Week 14: High-speed photography - Water drop photography

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Today I would like to tell you about phenomena that are too fast to see, if photographed, give very interesting results, admired in arts, and often used in advertising but at the beginning I must say that the whole project was created by Armand Stańczak, Sergio Cosentino and me of course. We spent with this topic 2 years(finally the project is done) or even more so I hope it will be at least “ok” for you J
Water drop photography is one of examples of events that could not be seen at all without a camera. High speed photography allows capturing such fast and amazing phenomena. There exist tools for high speed photography and, in particular, dedicated tools to photograph droplets of water, or milk, or other liquids but I will tell about tools and hardware in the second or third part of this presentation.

History

High-speed photography has now about 127 years and it all started with photography made in 1887. Someone captured shock wave which is generated by a bullet; these were first tests of new technology. Then after 44 years we had the first photo taken using similar technology that we are using today(a flashgun + a camera) and we can see it here:

1931 - Edgerton Eugene
Present
Nowadays we have multiple ready, out of box solutions which give even not an experienced user a chance to take beautiful photos with minimal effort. Tools available on the market include the photography trigger Camera Axe:
CameraAxe – 900 zł at least
and the SplashArt kit:

SplashArt – 750/2000 zł depends on version
However, even such a simple device is not so easy to use, as it's software requires adjustment of various values and settings, which can be difficult for a user. What is more, such tools cost a few hundred dollars and are expensive for amateurs. CameraAxe, which is the least expensive and best solution for amateurs, allows connecting a camera, flash lamps, and sensors.
Therefore, we decided to build a system at a fraction of this cost, to make water drop photography available to anyone interested in capturing water splashes, without investing in a professional studio. This solution can also be used by professional photographers (That was the plan :D )

The SyncBox synchronizer

Ok, so boring stuff is almost over (if you are interested in hardware go to the next part) . Now I will show you what we accomplished with our magical device. Of course, these photos are only a small fraction of the whole collection which contains around 8000 photos taken during the whole experiment:











And finally a video made with the assistance of SyncBox. The video  contains at least 350 photos taken 1ms after 1ms to get more information about the behavior of a drop. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=noAj7rIq4MA

Here are some examples of photos made by Tobias Bräuning, photos which can be done using the equipment similar to ours.

The SyncBox synchronizer – hardware

Our solution is based on Arduino, an open-source electronic prototyping platform, which can be connected to a computer with Windows, Mac OS X or Linux system, and it costs only about 20 Euros. It allows to control electric signals. The device is basically not a really complicated synchronizer which allows you to take a picture when a water drop hits water surface, series of pictures can also be taken. The complete system also includes a water container, a piping, a valve for releasing drops, a water pump, and altogether it costs about 50 Euros.

Arduino Uno R3
How it works and looks

The controller triggers electric impulses of the desired pulse length and frequency at the precisely defined instant.
The Arduino board has analog and digital inputs and outputs, and it is connected to the host computer via the USB connector. Computer  is used for programming integrated circuits. The synchronizer can be connected to any digital camera. The camera is placed on a tripod, and two flashes can be attached to this system.
The drop kit consists of a rectangular 1 liter water container, piping attached to  an aluminum frame, a water pump to maintain pressure in rubber ducts, and a solenoid valve. The position of the camera is important, since it must be close enough to water in order to get a high quality picture, but if it is really close, it should be protected from water drops and there it is J nothing special but still the result  is nice I must say. Here a few photos of the device:



Questions:
1. Have  you ever tried high-speed photography? If yes, what was the result?
2. Have you ever tried any specific type of photography? 
3. Do you have any ideas how to use such a device? Besides taking pictures of drops?

Sources used in this article:
Monk, Simon, 2010. 30 Projektów Arduino dla Geniuszy Zła. Nowy Jork, Stany Zjednoczone: Wydawnictwo McGraw-Hill.
Oxer, Jonathan, 2009. Praktyczne Arduino. Nowy Jork, Stany Zjednoczone: Wydawnictwo Apress.
Kurt, Tod, 2006. Przerażające projekty, wstęp do układów scalonych z Arduino. Publikacja.
Banzi, Massimo, 2009. Zaczynając z Arduino. Kalifornia, Stany Zjednoczone: Wydawnictwo Make-Books. Wydanie drugie.
Jaworski, Przemysław. Arduino i projekty kinetyczne. Nowy Jork, Stany Zjednoczone: Wydawnictwo Apress.
Karvinen, Tero, 2011. Roboty i gadżety Arduino. Sebastopol, Kanada: Wydawnictwo O’Reily. Edycja pierwsza.
Wheat, Dale. Wnętrze Arduino. Nowy Jork, Stany Zjednoczone: Wydawnictwo Apress.
Evans, Brian. Poczatki programowania Arduino. Nowy Jork, Stany Zjednoczone: Wydawnictwo Apress.
Riley, Mike, 2012. Programowanie Twojego domu, automatyzowanie przy użyciu Arduino, systemu Android oraz Twoje komputera. Stany Zjednoczone: Wydawnictwo: The Pragmatic Bookshelf.
McRoberts, Michael, 2010. Podstawy Arduino. Nowy Jork, Stany Zjednoczone: Wydawnictwo Apress.
Timacheff, Serge, 2008. Canon EOS w cyfrowej fotografii, kurs fotograficzny. Indiana, Stany Zjednoczone: Wydawnictwo Wiley Publishing Inc.
Wilcher, Don. Naucz się elektroniki z Arduino. Nowy Jork, Stany Zjednoczone: Wydawnictwo Apress.
Elektronika Praktyczna. Międzynarodowy miesięcznik elektroników konstruktorów. Strona Internetowa: http://ep.com.pl/ .
Platt, Charles, 2009. Zrób: Elektronika. Kalifornia, Stany Zjednoczone: Wydawnictwo Make-Books. Edycja pierwsza.









Comments

Patryk Długaszek said…
Personally, I don't have capability to using professional device for taking this kind of images, but I’ve tried using a simple digital SLR camera to take the shot (I display camera on the shortest exposure time). Unfortunately results wasn’t satisfying, which I could expect but they wasn’t too bad. In near future I would have to experiment with more professional stuff.

I think, that technology could be useful in detailed observations of many kinds of substances and invent to them another application and improvement. Of course we can use this technique to another purpose, for example for fun (on YouTube is the channel which have many films with this kind of technology - http://www.youtube.com/channel/UCUK0HBIBWgM2c4vsPhkYY4w).
18 January 2014 at 03:29
Unknown said…
I like taking shots. It is one of my hobbies. Unfortunately it is quite expensive hobby so i cannot affort best quality lens. On the other hand photography is not all about best equipment. Besides very sepcific topics u can take a picture with almost every camera that gives you an abbility to set properties of light etc. I was never a fan of high speed photography, but most of the results of that shots were amazing. My favouries are the one taken in city, possibly in landscape mode or with great panorama in background. I do have some ideas of usage of this device but mostly because i was in your group at engineer course so i heard from you :P
18 January 2014 at 22:42
Seisyll said…
About the photography part of this article. I tried photography and although I feel I had few good results it didn't kick in for me so I passed.
As to Arduino I remember helping you a little with it when you were creating your engineering project. I must say that this device is quite interesting and creates many posibilities in creating more or less complicated "systems" like with humidity control or turning light.
19 January 2014 at 17:42
armandstanczak said…
1. Have you ever tried high-speed photography? If yes, what was the result?
well as a coinventor of this yes I did try HSS. Well the resuls are posted above soooo xD
2. Have you ever tried any specific type of photography?
Macro, Super Macro, HSS, Wedding, Nature, People (I'm not that good at it), and mamy more.
3. Do you have any ideas how to use such a device? Besides taking pictures of drops?
Maybe it can stop bullets?
19 January 2014 at 20:25
alt_pl said…
1. Have you ever tried high-speed photography? If yes, what was the result?
2. Have you ever tried any specific type of photography?
3. Do you have any ideas how to use such a device? Besides taking pictures of drops?

I can simply answer all question above with one sentence: I am not interested in photography. I only take pictures when I must, because I am not an enthusiast of it. However device You describe looks interesting to me and I would find it intriguing to look at series of pictures of some fast process.
19 January 2014 at 21:08
lukasz-anwajler said…
1. Have you ever tried high-speed photography? If yes, what was the result?

No, I didn't even know the exact name of it until now :)

2. Have you ever tried any specific type of photography?

Unfortunately, no. I'm rather a poor photographer and I only take photos using my smartphone or Google Glass.

3. Do you have any ideas how to use such a device? Besides taking pictures of drops?

TBH: no idea :)
19 January 2014 at 22:00
Sergio Cosentino said…
Well I have some experience with high speed photography, since I also worked on the SyncBox project :D. But apart from that, none. The truth is I am no really into photography, any kind for that matter and in this project I mainly coded the device to work properly :P. I don't really have an idea how to do god photographs and frankly it isn't as fascinating to me, as it is for other people. Working on this project was interesting, but not for the “artistic” reason, not for me anyway. And I learned to appreciate the work it takes to make such photos. And believe me, it takes a lot of work.
20 January 2014 at 07:35
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