How-to photograph phosphorescence?

[AutumnJazz]

I know that on older cameras, you can use M sync to fire an electronic flash before so that it glows, but my F100 doesn't offer that.

Does anyone know how I could photograph things that glow in the dark?

 

[walter23]

I know that on older cameras, you can use M sync to fire an electronic flash before so that it glows, but my F100 doesn't offer that.

Does anyone know how I could photograph things that glow in the dark?

I think phosphorescent materials often fluoresce under UV light. You might pick up a fluorescent "blacklight" tube to amplify the phosphorescent glow. Otherwise, couldn't you just manually trigger your flash a moment before the exposure or otherwise "charge" the material up? Presumably you're doing relatively long exposures for such weak light sources as these.

 

[keithwms]

How about front curtain synch, long exposure.

 

[walter23]

How about front curtain synch, long exposure.

I thought he meant firing the flash before the exposure started to energize phosphorescent things without actually having a flash exposure. I have to confess I had no idea what m-synch was until I searched for it just now, and found this little useful tidbit on photo.net: "If the shutter is synched for bulbs (M synch), then it will fire the flash 1/50 second before the shutter opens to give the bulb time to light up"

 

[keithwms]

Ah okay so the idea isn't to have balanced glow + ambient light? Xenu tell us more about your project

If you're tryign to charge the object but don't want any flash in the image then I think I'd set the flash to the max and put the camera in continuous mode and just fire away. The flash won't be able to keep up after the first shot, so subsequent exposure won't be flashed. If you're lucky the phosophorescence will persist long enough for frame 2...

 

[AutumnJazz]

Thanks Keith, I hadn't thought of that.

No specific project in mind, but I have ideas.

Does anyone know where I could get some kind of phosphorescent paint that isn't harmful to humans or animals?

 

[Akki14]

Theatre shops. You can get glow in the dark paint (expensive) or UV reactive pigments/paints (also expensive).

 

[walter23]

I really think something that fluoresces under blacklight is the way to go here. But I'm sure you'll find a way, however you end up approaching it.

 

[Ole]

Some phosphorescent materials will fluoresce in a different colour when exposed to UV light, but those will mostly be natural materials and not paint.

There is also a time factor in phosphorescence, where the colour will change over time. Naturally this will be most evident in the first few milliseconds, so you may get entirely different results when using flash at M-sync compared to manually triggering the flash just before releasing the shutter.

 

[keithwms]

Here's some bioluminescence that might inspire ya!

http://www.faculty.virginia.edu/nanophysics/photo/firefly_side_flash2.gif