Long Exposure with Sparklers

In the USA, the 4th of July is just days away and that means watermelon, BBQ, and of course fireworks!

This is the perfect time to pull out the sparklers for some light play. My kids absolutely love using sparklers and I try to keep them on hand year-round because they are just so much fun. :) If you have sparklers in the home, kids do love this and I never have an finding a willing volunteer!

I started with my base image. This is where I set the camera settings to the desired exposure for my background.

In this case, I chose: F/8, 1/10th shutter speed, and an ISO of 100.

I then added in my flash at around 1/16th flash power.

I used my 28" Glow Foldable Beauty Dish set up diagonally from my daughter so that I could get plenty of light on her face.

After that, I gave my daughter a sparkler and let her play with it. 

I wanted to see more motion from the sparkler so I lengthened my shutter speed to 1 second. I had to compensate by bringing my aperture to f/18 in order to maintain correct exposure. 

This is always a hit with the kiddos but you can also try something similar with still objects.

I would love to see your results if you try this out!

Happy creating.

-Leah