Flow Artist Feature
My biggest personal project for the past three years has been a labor of love to show the world a series of images featuring flow artists and their art.
While watching these events in real-time is entertaining, I wanted to show a lesser-seen side of the practice. Taking interesting still shots of an art all about movement has been the perfect challenge for me as I grow as a photographer.
On this page, I will give you an inside look into the process of how I made these images work and a spotlight on the artists I've captured in them.
From Humble Beginnings...
We began our light journey back in 2020 with some cheap flow toys and began learning how to use them and photograph them in the backyard of my apartment complex. These images were the first major step in our effort to capture interesting light painting images. In this set of images, we used an orbit toy and a basic levitation wand.
Shortly after seeing the results of our first impromptu flow photography session, we acquired new props and equipment to create better Images with. Featured in these images are a set of poi and higher-quality levitation wands with LED lighting throughout. These new props made it much easier to catch silhouetted forms and stronger light trails, allowing us to take more expressive and entrancing photos.
Gaining Speed
Our First Studio Shoot!
This photoshoot had a lot of experimentation in it. We used 3 different props and 3 different models. The majority of these photos were long exposure with a manual flash capturing the flow artist and the light trails their props made.
Studio Day 2
In this photo set, I wanted to attempt to create bright portraits while my model artist moved. Unlike the vibrant lights I had photographed in the prior shoot, I used significantly more light and a faster shutter speed to capture brighter still images.
Featured in this set (and many more to follow), is TK, a remarkably talented flow artist with experience with many different props. This photoshoot primarily focused on portraits and silk fan stills, but also is photographed using leviwand and poi in later sessions.
Practice in the Park
During a meeting in the park after dark, we had the opportunity to photograph TK using a pixel whip without studio lighting. Captured with long exposure, the fiberoptic strands glow brightly and you can see where the individual fibers split off from the group as it moved when the image was taken.
Practice in the Park
While these images may look like composited images, they were taken in one shot using a camera flash manually in the middle of a long exposure shot.
