Went to the Stonybrook Fine Arts Studio last night to shoot one of their welding classes in action. The staff at that place is pretty much out of their mind, such as Mo, whose beard had beads on it and who taught me how to make a properly proportioned dolphin out of clay. As I approached the studio, there he was, outside, going nuts on some sort of metal cube, sparks flying everywhere and beaded beard twitching maniacally.
I approached with caution.
But he turned out to be more normal than the welding instructor, Mr. Todd. Similar to Sweeney? Kind of.
ISO 100, f/22, 50mm, 1/8 sec. Stonybrook Fine Arts, Jamaica Plain, Massachusetts.
It took a long while for me to figure out the best exposure settings for this assignment. I wanted the sparks to have a stream behind them, but I still wanted to leave the aperture closed down as tight as possible (the light, especially the electric stuff, is apparently horrible for the camera lens) and generally kept the shots underexposed by about two stops. For the shot above, I was physically incapable of looking through the lens at the action. I also had a huge mask on to protect me from the abrasive light. (I stole a glance without the mask on - bad idea. I'm still seeing spots.) So I resorted to positioning the camera on my stomach (human tripod!) and hoped that I was aiming in the right direction. Most of the time, I was off.
That's why you take 250 pictures and hope that you got at least 5 decent shots. Ah, the joys and sorrows of digital.
3 comments:
What a great shot Mimi.
And that light from a welder can make a permanent spot on your eye. I still have one on my left eye from being an kid with a welder friend.
Well this is rediculously cool. Does he flashdance too?
He's a maniac. Maniac. Oh no.
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