Pictures of bullets

Hello,

I am wondering about e.g. this picture:
https://webmuseum.mit.edu/detail.php?module=objects&type=related&kv=96483

They write the flash duration was about 1/3 of a microsecond, so around 333ns.

How bright was this flash gun to record a good exposed picture on the film? How could I do this at home?

regards,
chris

Harold Edgerton's work was pretty amazing. There are several good books available that discuss his technique in fair depth.

swchris said:

Hello,

I am wondering about e.g. this picture:
https://webmuseum.mit.edu/detail.php?module=objects&type=related&kv=96483

They write the flash duration was about 1/3 of a microsecond, so around 333ns.

How bright was this flash gun to record a good exposed picture on the film? How could I do this at home?

regards,
chris

Click to expand...

First you need ammo.

Good luck finding some at a normal price.

Edgerton worked on enormous flash intended to pointed at the ground from a plane for nighttime surveillance. There's a photo from WWII era of Stonehenge that was taken by flash from a plane. I've seen on TV the flash was so intense it would start a newspaper on fire if held near the flash.

The flashes used for surveillance photography during WWII were basically large flashbulbs, burning magnesium, but not what Edgerton used for that photo, it's stated in the description he used an air gap flash, which, while bright, mainly serves to have short duration, not extreme brightness over distance.

Wikipedia has a good description of what he used for most of the really high speed photography, an air-gap flash. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Air-gap_flash. It's very similar in principal to the normal Xenon strobes we've all used, but usually uses nitrogen, in order to get a much shorter flash duration. They're not really 'off the shelf' but there are plans out there. Doing some searching around, there is a company here: https://shop.vela.io/products/vela-one-high-speed-photo-camera-flash that claims to have made an LED flash capable to the short duration required for capturing extremely high speed motion. All that being said, half the battle is the lighting, but the other half is timing everything to work as desired. Fortunately, with the rise of more affordable high speed video cameras, triggers for just this sort of thing are pretty widely available.

swchris said:

Hello,

I am wondering about e.g. this picture:
https://webmuseum.mit.edu/detail.php?module=objects&type=related&kv=96483

They write the flash duration was about 1/3 of a microsecond, so around 333ns.

How bright was this flash gun to record a good exposed picture on the film? How could I do this at home?

regards,
chris

Click to expand...

1. You need a flash gun with extremely short burning times1/50k to 1/2k thousands of a second are common but not very bright.that's why You need to get them as close as possible. Do this in a dark room and find a way to time the flash exposure precisely.
good luck

I think Edgerton used a sound trigger to fire the flash so the firing of the gun would set it off. Then it involved a lot of playing around with distance from the gun to the apple so the flash would fire at the moment the bullet was just past the apple.

Edgerton's technique for high-speed close-ups involved high voltages and a lot of improvising. It was more for an electronics technician than for a photographer. Some current off-the-shelf flashes with variable output are capable of fairly good results. Synchronizing the flash might be done by sound, light from the firearm, breaking a wire, closing a contact through concussion, and more.

Brooks Institute in Santa Barbara, CA had a range/chamber for that type of setup, IIRC.
Some Brooks students have that type of photo in their portfolios.
I believe the setup used a sound trigger.

swchris said:

Hello,

I am wondering about e.g. this picture:
https://webmuseum.mit.edu/detail.php?module=objects&type=related&kv=96483

They write the flash duration was about 1/3 of a microsecond, so around 333ns.

How bright was this flash gun to record a good exposed picture on the film? How could I do this at home?

regards,
chris

Click to expand...

What do you mean by "At Home"

You can use subsonic ammo, that would be some help.