Flying shavings photo

[john lucas]

A few months ago they asked for photos of shavings flying. I believe it was for a book cover. does anyone know if that's ever been selected or come out. A friend and I spent an afternoon shooting and playing and we were just wondering what was selected if in fact the choice was made. We had a good time learning to make photos of shavings whatever the outcome.

 

[Bill Boehme]

A few months ago they asked for photos of shavings flying. I believe it was for a book cover. does anyone know if that's ever been selected or come out. A friend and I spent an afternoon shooting and playing and we were just wondering what was selected if in fact the choice was made. We had a good time learning to make photos of shavings whatever the outcome.

It seems like Malcolm Tibbetts was the person asking and I thought that it was for the journal cover. I did not have time to shoot any photos on such short notice, but found an image that I had made about a year earlier and sent it to him. I am fairly certain that my image was not exactly what he was wanting since it was more like dry wood chips rather than curly shavings. I think that if I had time to spend working on this, I would go for about 1/30 second and use second curtain flash or no flash at all. Normal first curtain flash would put the "tail" in front of the shaving which would be all wrong. Using second curtain would remedy that by putting the tail trailing behind.

I think that the shavings need a bit of a "tail" to give a sense of motion. And a slow shutter speed also allows the turning to be blurred. I have found freezing things with a high shutter speed looks like there is no motion. However, there is also the other problem of motion blur of the hand and tool if the exposure is too long especially if there is vibration due to a rough turning.

 

[Malcolm Tibbetts]

John, the request was for the cover of the 25th anniversary book which is being put together for the 2012 symposium. An outside contracted editor, John Kelsey, has yet to make a final choice. We had many great photos submitted so I know the decision is tough.

 

[john lucas]

Thanks Malcolm. My friend who helped with the photos is coming over for a visit today and he's interested to know. I know there were probably a lot of good images. We were just curious. We are probably going to produce more shavings today and some more images but it's for a brochure for a friend.