Bubbly

[Loose Canon]

Took me two days to round up everything I needed for this shot, build the set, and take the shot!

[Wavelength]

Standing ovations!!!

[Downrigger]

Amazing. Striking. Great work. Just one question - I would have thought there would be evidence of carbonation in the initial expulsion - not so, or not just not lit for it? Maybe I should do some experimentation at home.

[Shadowman]

Very nice.

[bnnrcn]

I like it very much.

[IzzieK]

Very nice Terry -- get another bottle and test the carbonation shot that Dan suggested. It might be interesting...

[Manfred M]

Interesting shot, but somehow the liquid flow looks all "wrong".

1. WIth the cork in that position; compressed gas should be spraying some amount of liquid past the cork;

2. The liquid should be falling vertically (gravity pulls things down, not back on an angle), not on the angle back from the bottle and would be sweeping down the bottle, not totally clearing it; and

3. The Champagne would have a lot of bubbles, especially where it is welling out and exiting the bottle.

[Brownbear]

A beautiful and highly creative image, and one of my favourite of your images. I love the hint of gold and green in the colours, the green highlight, and the way the champagne is frozen and seemingly supporting the cork mid-air... The lower droplets look like jewels and the champagne up top is just a little golden like champagne is. The bottle is kind of like a bird in flight. A truly magical image for me.

Aside.... I suspect that Manfred is correct but I may have to buy some champagne to test his theories. Anyhow I absolutely adore this image!

[TonyW]

My mind boggles. There are so many questions about this. As Manfred says, champagne should not flow sideways like this unless that is how it looks after dealing with the contents from the first few unsuccessful attempts. How can you time this and have the cork in just the right place?

Nevertheless, it is a fantastic image with what looks to me to be perfect lighting.

[chauncey]

Yeah, the champagne may have been a little flat and yadda, yadda, yadda.
It's still a nice shot...especially if this was your first attempt.

[kaneohebud]

Terry:
This is a great shot. I'm very curious on how you did it.

[Loose Canon]

Interesting comments!

I appreciate everyone taking the time to make them.

Honestly guys? I have no idea what Champagne is supposed to do when it spews. If you count the two bottles of Champagne I have corked these last two days that would come to a combined total of exactly two bottles of Champagne I have opened in the last 15 or so years! And they didn’t spew either! So admittedly I was remiss in undertaking any scientific experimentation to reveal the exact properties of a Champagne spew, cork position relative to length/volume of spray (and about that the cork would be long fired out of the frame and through the ceiling when it blows long before the liquid erupted from the bottle so best not to overthink this!), when or where the initial compressed gas burst would be overcome by gravity and start its earthward plunge (I shot the scene on a Dutch Tilt), or how much bubble Bubbly contains!

I’m just not that deep guys! Nor do I feel any particular need to be that literal when I’m just shooting for myself! I can’t even say I came up with this idea! I have seen it done before, so please forgive me for taking a couple of liberties with my shot!

But I can say this with great certainty! There was no way on God’s Green Earth I was going to open a couple of cases of Champagne bottles to test how a spray was going to behave or try to open it, shoot it, and catch the cork/spray all at the same time to get a great shot!

What I wanted to do was shoot some moving liquid in a studio environment (again) and see how that went. Maybe mix it with something as fun as glass just to make it a challenge, and that’s exactly what I did!

Here’s how it went…

Took a bottle of Champagne, opened it and (gasp) dumped it. No worries, it didn’t mix well with vodka anyway (I tried!)!

Took a diamond hole cutting drill bit and cut a hole in the bottom of the bottle.

Took a section of utility garden hose and epoxied it to the hole in the bottom of the bottle. This setup was going to produce the splash.



Attached the bottle/hose to the end of a boom arm using an electrical conduit hanger. Affixed the cork to a piece of heavy gauge wire and attached that to the boom arm. The connection of the boom arm/bottle has to be pretty solid. When you kick in the waterworks it fills the bottle first, then pressures out the bottle neck. There can be a lot of movement and be sure to overcompensate for the added weight of water.





Shot one establishing shot of the dry bottle before I turned on the “fountain”. I planned the final result as a composite and I wanted to make sure I had the bottle/label nicely lit without any liquid all over it so I set the lighting for a static scene.

Once I had the dry bottle bagged I set the lighting for the bottle/liquid. Next was to fire up the waterworks and start shooting for a splash!

I wanted to originally duct tape (gaffer tape?) the hose to the kitchen faucet and run the hose through the house to the studio (in the house), but for some unknown reason my Beautiful Bride nixed that idea! So I relocated to the garage and ran the garden hose from an outside faucet into there. Where I connected the long garden hose with the piece of utility hose epoxied to the bottle I installed a shutoff valve. Absolute must because the flow of the water must be controlled on the set.



Lighting:

Two strip boxes behind diffusion material severely feathered on either side of the bottle. One from above with barn doors for the label/splash and that was the shape of that!



The shot ended up being a two-shot composite. One for the bottle and one for the liquid and that’s it!

Post:

Aside from the compositing, an interesting note is that I had to tint the water. I actually looked up the color “champagne”. I tinted it to “deep champagne” which is supposedly rgb: 194/178/128. And there are other shades of this color.

An even more insane amount of cleanup than normal due to the apparatus involved!

[kaneohebud]

Damn, you're clever.... and talented. No matter what concerns others may have regarding the physics of champagne openings, I think you did great. I'm envious.

[Stagecoach]

Terry,

Full marks for initiative and thanks for sharing the image and info. To me this is an excellent example of what photography can be about, having a goal, enjoying yourself trying to achieve it and having fun producing images that both yourself and others can appreciate.

Grahame

[AB26]

Terry,

What you have proven here is my suspicion that us Photographers get nuts when we get serious about our “game”. Duct tape a hose to a kitchen faucet and run it trough the house. If your Beautiful Bride was not at home you might have done it.
The idea and the effort is admirable.
The shot itself : When I opened the thread I thought to myself, how the hell did he do that. I looks faked but it is a really cool shot.

Very well done.

A tip: next time consider blowing water trough the bottle by using compressed air.

[Sergio M.]

Bravo on the planning, setup, and execution.

Sergio

[dabhand]

Bravo on the planning, setup, and execution.

Sergio

+1

steve

[Bobobird]

Bravo on the planning, setup, and execution.

Sergio

+2

Make my head ache just thinking about your setup and the lengths you went to for the shot. Wow!

[Kaye Leggett]

Terry,

Full marks for initiative and thanks for sharing the image and info. To me this is an excellent example of what photography can be about, having a goal, enjoying yourself trying to achieve it and having fun producing images that both yourself and others can appreciate.

Grahame

Couldn't have put it better myself.

[wlou]

Terry,

Full marks for initiative and thanks for sharing the image and info. To me this is an excellent example of what photography can be about, having a goal, enjoying yourself trying to achieve it and having fun producing images that both yourself and others can appreciate.

Grahame

Grahame says it perfectly. I thinks its great, imaginative. As of putting water pressure into a garden hose attached with duck tape in the kitchen, the water would most certainely leak all over at the sink ( i.e. shooting in all directions)when you would shut the valve under the bottle. A great shot.