“So what do you do,” asks Brad Kremer, “when you have a day off and a $300,000 camera package sitting at your house? Invite all of the neighborhood kids and throw a water balloon party of course! Duh!”

Having enjoyed this sort of thing with stills, I’d love to try it with high-speed video. [Via Mark Kawano]

Power or simplicity? How about both? PSE 11 features a totally overhauled interface & much more. Here’s a 1-minute tour:

And if you’re up for trying a bit of filmmaking, check out the new Premiere Elements:

Don’t worry: no DSLRs were, to my knowledge, harmed in the making of this music video—though boy does it test the viewer’s tolerance for motion sickness.

The filmmakers write,

The device is powered by an electric drill, constructed from bicycle and drum parts, wood and metal plates, which was strong enough to allow us to rotate the heavy weight of a Canon 5D MKII stably and at a very high speed. The drill was plugged to a variable speed controller, allowing us to adjust the speed of the cameras rotations by turning a dial.
The setting of the video is the band preforming live in a studio set. The main camera rotates at a selected speed as the band performs. While the camera is rotating, objects such as the skin of the bass drum start to rotate at the same speed as the main camera, giving the effect of those objects becoming static in the frame while everything else is spinning. When a person stands in front of these objects it gives the effect of the person spinning rather than the background.
Other circular boards with graphics are turned on and off running in and out of sync with the main rotating camera. Each of these graphics have variable speed control dials to adjust their speed.

Here’s the making-of:

[Via]

Days of miracles & wonder…

The 11 floors tower of the HESAV (Health High School Vaud) has been animated as a rudimentary screen whose pixels are, in fact, all the windows and shutters that students, staff and friends shake for hours

The second half of the vid features making-of content, and a participant writes,

[It took] Just a couple of hours with the instructions. We NEVER did all the combos you can see in the video, just twice or three times all windows / shutters positions, all together at the same time. The rest is all post production.

[Via]

I couldn’t quite catch the show overhead this morning (dammit), but Lightroom team member Ben Warde more than made up for it. Check out his shots.

How great is this?? Designer Megan Orsi writes,

When I was in high school, I spent every waking moment in Photoshop creating websites and collages for my favorite show, The X-Files (don’t laugh!). Thankfully, all of the time I spent paid off and now I’m able to use my Photoshop skills on a daily basis doing a job I love. Photoshop’s been a big part of my past, and now, it will always be a part of my future. Thanks, Adobe 😉
Hope everyone enjoys the Photoshop Toolbar Tattoo =D

Fantastic. (Your move, Goran Peuc. :-)) [Update: Tom Hogarty has posted more info about & from Megan on the Photoshop team blog.]


[Via Mike Giordano]

The editing & soundtrack verge on the assaultive, but it’s still cool to see so many examples of this technique overlaid in quick succession:

[Via]

Self-proclaimed “pale, gray creature” (i.e. photo retoucher) Becci Mason spent three weeks helping in Japan in the immediate aftermath of the tsunami. Soon after she turned to restoring photos lost & found in the wreckage. PetaPixel writes,

Within 2 weeks after putting out a call for help, she found herself with 150 volunteers willing to offer their time and services. Half a year later, the Photo Rescue volunteer count had ballooned to 1,100.

In the end, Mason’s efforts led to over 135,000 photographs being cleaned, and hundreds were retouched and returned to their owners.

Fantastic work.

Here’s a neat peek inside the AP’s ongoing hunt for new, fresh perspectives. I’m kind of charmed by the (now obsolete) approach of having some farmer-tanned dude jump into the pool to retrieve memory cards. Check out Wired for more details.

Russian photographer Vadim Trunov may well have the best-lit back yard/Jurassic Park Nano in the world, judging by his terrific macro photographs of snails and insects in the rain.

“For the past five years,” writes the Daily Mail, “photographer and adjunct professor at Virginia Commonwealth University Gordon Stettinius has been sending intentionally awful portraits of himself dressed as one of more than two dozen creepy-looking characters, as follow-ups to industry professionals.”

In related news, Gordon Stettinius is the man. [Via]

Check out a lovely bit of filmmaking (dig those close-ups & sparks) featuring dirty-snow aerial mayhem (you’ll see):

[Via Justin Cole]

The folks at T-RECS shot some lovely nighttime time lapses around the US this spring.

The creators have also created a tutorial on how to make your own star trails in After Effects. [Via]

Sorry for the late notice, but if you’ll be in San Francisco this evening, you can meet photojournalist Bruce Haley & view his work at Carte Blanche gallery (973 Valencia) 6pm-8:30pm tonight. The Facebook event page features more details.

Taken between 1994 and 2002, Bruce Haley’s photographs reflect the complexity of land and life in the former Soviet Bloc. Decaying industrial sites and toxic landscapes, rich farmland and traditional villages: his images capture the joys and challenges facing these newly independent nations, as they struggle to leave behind the legacy of Communism for an unknown future.

Bruce Haley

Bruce Haley is the recipient of the Robert Capa Gold Medal, one of the most prestigious photography awards in the world. Haley received this honor for his coverage of Burma‘s bloody ethnic civil war.

“The world’s fastest sedan,” say the creators, “recreates super slow-motion bullet footage on a much grander scale. The result: High Performance Art.” Works for me:

I found this peek into the making vs. photographing of McDonald’s food surprisingly down-to-earth & refreshing:

[Via Adam Pratt]

Our friend Mike Hill shot 2043 photos at 1-second intervals on New Years Day at Xangri-la, Brazil, producing this lovely result:

He gives a hat tip to Lightroom & Premiere Pro for the adjustment & editing.

“Turns out that video of people in front of really powerful fans,” writes Kottke, “is better than just photos.” I can’t disagree:

From Tadao Cern.

“What would you do with 50 GoPros at the touch of a button?” Hopefully (though not likely) something this cool. Check out Ryan Sheckler in action, and if nothing else, check out the neat burst effects that show up about 1:33 in:

A couple of weeks ago my friend Bruce & I did strap a couple of GoPros to the belly of a B-24 bomber that took us for a spin. I’ll try to share the footage soon. [Via Bryan O’Neil Hughes]
[Previously: A Skateboard’s-Eye View of Manhattan]