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Jun, 2018Views
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Behind The Lens
Location
This photo was taken at a local YMCA beach on Lake Hartwell in Clemson, South Carolina. Every few months, me and a group of friends get together and shoot at night. Usually we do some steel wool photos like this one.Time
Earlier that night we had tried to do some photos under a bridge, but there were too many spiders everywhere so we gave up on that idea and decided to go over to the beach. By the time we got there and set up our tripods, it was already about 11:00pm.Lighting
Nothing too special about the lighting in this photo. I knew that the light from the steel wool would create a cool shadow on the characters, but I also wanted to still have some details on them and the flag. My solution was a cheap Ozark Trail flashlight from Walmart. Because I was using a long exposure (6.0 seconds), I didn’t want to shine the light on them for too long, or else it would tak away that shadow. So I just flashed it on them for about a second. That’s all it needed.Equipment
I used a Canon T5i with a 18-55mm f/4.0 lens. I also used a standard tripod, a flashlight, steel wool (Grade 0000#), a lighter, a wisk, and thin metal wire to spin the wisk.Inspiration
I’ve been wanting to do some steel wool photos with an American flag for more than a year. Because the Fourth of July was coming up, I finally decided to buy one and to try it. We spent about 30 minutes shooting some photos and were pretty happy with the results. I didn’t even have the idea for this specific photo till we were about to wrap up. My friend happened to bring his girlfried on this shoot so I asked them if they would like to get be in one together. They were a little hesitant at first but I’m glad they decided to be in it.Editing
It’s usually important to edit steel wool photos because a lot of times it can be a little too bright in some areas. It also makes the individual spark trails stand out a little. And obviously I made it black and white. I use Lightroom Classic cc as my editing software.In my camera bag
All I usually carry in my bag is my Canon T5i, 18-55mm lens, and my 55-150mm lens.Feedback
For anyone trying to get a similar photo, the best advice I can give is to practice with steel wool and make sure you know how to operate your camera’s settings. If you don’t know anything about steel wool photography, look it up and do some research. There are articles that can explain it way better than I can. Get a few friends to come out with you one night, play some music and just have fun. Even if you friends aren’t that into photography, they might still have fun spinning sparks. I have friends that aren’t photographers asking me when the next time we’re gonna go out and do some steel wool photos. I would also advise to use manual focus. To get focus, shine your light at the point of focus and use punch zoom to get a closer look at the point of interest. Also, use a lower iso so it’s not very grainy. Make sure your subjects are still so that they are not blurry in the picture. To help them out, use a shorter exposure like 6-8 seconds. If you’d like to see some of my other work, find me on Instagram @caleb_dempsey3
