[IanHoughton]

Basic equipment setup shown below, a torch would be useful as you need to work in the dark!!



Camera settings to start:
Camera mounted on tripod
Aperture priority mode (around f7)
External flash ( I found using a homemade snoot stopped the flash from spilling onto the background or into the lens. This can be as simple as a small cardboard tube.)

1. With the lights on, place the incense stick in the holder and manually focus on the centre.
2. Light the incense stick and turn out the lights.
3. You’re aiming for a vertical column of smoke but a small amount of movement will create the swirling effects you’re after.
4. Take plenty of shots whilst varying the swirling effect.

Photoshop manipulation

1) Open your image into Photoshop. This was my start image.



2) Create a new levels layer (Layers > New Adjustment Layer > Levels)



3) You can see that the histogram is over to the far left. Adjust the black point so that the background is completely black. Then adjust the middle slider so that the smoke appears brighter. Don’t overdue the brightness otherwise you’ll introduce to much noise in the image.



4) In this example I have rotated and cropped the image to suit the image.



5) Flatten any levels layers. (Layer > Flatten Image)

6) If you want the image to have a white background, then invert the image (Image > Adjustments > Invert)



7) You’ll now need to remove any unwanted elements to the smoke. In this example you can see wisps’ of smoke in the top right corner.



8) The smoke looks ok as it is, but I would like to colour this example.

9) Add a gradient fill layer. (Layer > New Fill Layer > Gradient)



10) Change the colours of the gradient to suit.

11) Change the layer from normal to screen.



Summary

The natural effects of the smoke and the endless variations in colouring means you can create some pretty cool abstract images. You could also try copying the finished image onto new layers and then rotating / flipping them to get a symmetrical shape.

Hope you enjoyed the tutorial, have fun !!!

[Whipspeed]

Thanks for that Ian, much appreciated. Shop next door to the office sells incense sticks, so off to buy some on my way home & have a go at this over the weekend.

[Steve]

Thanks for the tutorial. I'll be having a try at this method myself. Its something good to try when the weather is bad.

Rep points added from me

[silkstone]

Ditto - thanks.

[Dabhand16]

Black bed sheet, eh?

[Dave]

Top tutorial .... Tx

[IanHoughton]

Originally Posted by Dabhand16

Black bed sheet, eh?

Yeh, I found the satin sheets too reflective....

[j sotelo]

love it!!! great work. you know whos is very good at this too. Maybe the admins. can help with the name he or she uses here but the website is Lumendipity Photography - photography, fine art & smoke photography

like the Tutorial Ian.

[dogdots]

Thanks for sharing. I hope to try this soon.

[j sotelo]

Some friends came to my Office to look at some pictures I had taken a week ago and I decided to show them this tutorial, they really loved it, but 3 of the 9 that where here asked one question, How did he open a RAW file in Photoshop mine always opens in ACR (Adobe Camera Raw). so I decided to add how to open it here, hope you dont mind.
when you open the image at the bottom right hand side theres a button that says Open Image.
Click to open as normal image.
Alt - Click to open without updating metadata.
Shift - Click to open as Smart Object

or just hover your pionter over the button and it will tell you the same thing i just wrote

this is assuming your using CS3.

They Printed a copy of your tutorial and said they will try it

[Whipspeed]

Well, tried out your tutorial last night Ian and it worked really well, very simple to follow and results were good. Although my smoke was a bit weak & whispy. I'm going to have another go tonight, but let the incense stick burn for a while longer before I start to get some better smoke.

[simpbow]

Thanks Ian for the great tip.

[cpd23]

Thank you I will give this a try