99 luftballons...

I am still cleaning the mess. Comments welcomed.

Man you have got some patience! It paid off nicely though. Kudos.

It was me, my girfriend and a lot of wet fun. This is how it was done :) It was actually a bit tricky, because the flash allowed me to go only as far as 1/500 sec, which was far less than I needed. That's why a couple of 1000W constraction lights were used [with a minor thread of electrical shock] and no flash. What you see here is 1/6400 sec. and a lead with a needle attached to it sinking into the top of the baloon filled up with a lot of water. Of course, there was nothing letf from the baloon-it just exploded :)

Thanks for sharing the details. I guess this is the second most dangerous genre in photography right after the paparazzi. Keep it up and try not to get electrocuted!

just one word, incredible, incredible. Got to say that this is one of the best pics ihave seen. The best teaching here is that those who persevere will in the end get excellent results.

Thank you guys for your opinion :)

Its all in the timing...and you got this one right on time. Well done.

 

7/7 and if there was a catagory for effort, I'd have put a seven there as well.

Thank you James :) Makes me happy that people like the picture.

Very cool stuff!

Thank you Palmi. You have very strong images in your portfolio and a good model :)

BROKE A CAMERA ONCE DOING WHAT U DID HERE --- I GOTTA TELL YA - THIS IMAGE ROCKS! LOVE IT ! ! ! HAPPY NEW YEAR TO YOU AND EVERYONE ELSE !

I was lucky-I ended up only with drops on my lens few times :) Thank you for the New Year wishes, same to you, everything best, especially a lot of health.

Cool photo Peter, you have some serious patience, my wife would have been watching the TV by balloon number 2. Pass on our respect to your girlfriend.

Thank you Ben. We spend about 2 hours just taking these pictures. The worst thing was cleaning up the water all the time. These things explode like crazy when you puncture them, the water goes everywhere lol. I think this was just a pure luck, because all the baloons exploded in a different way. This one probably felt sorry for us and did a nice job :) Happy New Year buddy.

Thank you Emilia :) I am happy you like it.

Wow, that is NOT what I thought it was from the thumbnail. I commend your patience and talent my friend! Cheers, James

Thanks James. I know the thumbs are a bit small. I have the same experience that sometimes I open a thumbnail and the photo I see is a whole different story. Anyway, thanks for the compliment and looking :)

Peter this is my kind of picture. Thanks for the setup picture. The halogen (?) lights are a good idea. Very, very well done! All the best.

Thank you Jamie.

Yes those are just regular halogens used on construction sites. I had to go this way, because of the shutter speed I had to use. Even though I used these kind of lights, I had to push the ISO to 1600 and compensate the exposure to 3.0. The camera was pushed to the extreme for this shot, but it was just because of the speed required-the black thing what you see on the top of the baloon is a electrical tape holding the needle to a piece of lead used for soldering gun and it is only 1/2 inch long. By this information you can judge pretty much how fast this was-the 1/2 inch did not have a chance to even enter the baloon and look where the water is already :)

Peter, did the water on the floodlights not lead to a short? I'm no electrician but I know you shouldn't mix water with electricity ...

That's a good question. I was the one holding the camera and my girlfriend was popping the baloons. After the first serie using the SB-800 flash I have realized that 1/500 sec was not enough, so I pulled the construction lights out of the closet. They are water proof, but I threw the cords which are really short on the bathroom floor. Right away my girl started to scream at me asking if I am retarded-the water was splashing everywhere on the floor and she was standing in it-I kept a safe distance lol. After that we threw the wires on the top of the toilet bowl-she felt much safer and was willing to co-operate again :) But the lights are water-proof-they are ment for work outside.

Peter, - Fantastic picture ! I will need to set up some experiments myself. The way in which the water is leaving the split in the balloon probably begins to answer a question that has remained unanswered for over 150 years ! And may help enormously in a study I am currently undertaking into 'phobia initiators'. I would like to correspond briefly if you would like to - by all means email me at BrianD@Briandenmee.com Thanks very much for this picture - very much appreciated.

Hi Brian and thank you for your comment. I don't mind a brief e-mailing at all :) Have a nice day.

Great image. I understand the creation, it was hard. For the composition I would try to put this baloon off center and maybe slant to achieve a more abstract and enigmatic feel to it. cheers Jana

Hi Jana,

thank you for looking :) I tried to not to do anything with this photo. To me it has a personality on it's own. Most of the photos I put frame and digitally enhance them, but here I did not see the reason to do it. I just like it the way it is :)