Snap Light Sticks can be used to create interesting photographs. This can be fun and also a great leaning experiences about the subtleties of light and color with a camera.

What was used to take the above photograph:

• A Mikasa crystal bowl.
  • Cleaned and wiped of any fingerprints
• White Glass Floral beans
  • A variety are available and variations in color and reflectivity can have a big impact on the resultant image. These can be bought at most floral and hobby shops.
• 1 Coghlan's blue snapstick (Chemical light stick)
• 2 yards of black velvet
  • This provides for the backdrop
• A Sony Alpha Camera
  • Any digital camera with extended exposure capability that can be tripod mounted will work. Long exposures can result in noise in the image so variations from camera vendor to camera vendor may be seen.
• Sony 18-70 Macro Lens (3.5-5.6)
  • This is not the fastest lens in the world but since we are tripod mounted it will work fine.
• Sony Remote release
  • For any long exposure photography, it is strongly recommended that a remote shutter release is used. The slight vibration of releasing the shutter may cause some blur in the image.
• Smith-Victor Blue Color Gel (12" X12")
  
  • Part GPC12
  • Deep-dyed polyester gels
• Bogen 3001 Tripod
  • Any sturdy adjustable tripod will work.
• Bogen 3285 Tripod Head
  • Any head will work. This particular head allows for easy tilting and adjustment
• A room that can be made completely dark
  • a large closet will work or you can wait until after dark

Image Details:

• Original (3872 X 2592)
• DSLR-A100
• Image Type: JPEG
• Size: 1.9MB
• Aperture: f5.6
• shutter speed: 13 sec
• ISO Speed: 400
• White Balance: auto
• Focal length 40mm

Procedure:

There are a million variations of the photograph you can try. What you will find is tremendous variations in the image depending on the light, the angle of the camera, the image with and without colored gels etc.

1. Set up the clean crystal bowl on a firm shelf or table in a room that can be darkened.
2. Use the black velvet as a backdrop. Remember that the further it is away from the bowl the better to prevent any reflections.
3. Fill the bowl with the white floral beans.
4. Snap the light stick to activate it.
5. Place the light stick in the bowl at an interesting angle.
6. Set up the camera on a tripod an attach the remote release.
7. Visually play with angle of the camera to the subject.
8. Lights Out
9. Release the shutter
10. A dozen seconds later you have your first image.
11. Make variations with the exposure including manually setting aperture and speed or allow for automatic exposure and manually force the camera to over and underexposed the images.
12. During the expose, move a color gel in front of the lens from none to during the complete exposure. The result will be a much deeper blue image as can be seen in the top photograph.
13. After you have taken several dozen images, you may wish to download them to a computer and view the images on a large screen.
14. Make adjustments and keep playing with various options. You should be able to create a lot of interesting images.

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Large Image of Crystal Bowl with Blue Light Stick (1296 X 926) (1.23MB)