Balloons Inside Balloons

As a follow-up to coloring the water inside water balloons, I focused this photoshoot on popping balloons with balloons inside them. The idea is to dye the water in the inside balloon and the outside balloon different colors or leave clear water in the outside balloon so, when it pops, there will be a cool effect and/or mix of colors. The only problem is that the 300fps airsoft pistol I've been using wasn't powerful enough to pop both balloons. It still made for some interesting shots; I'll have to get a metal pellet gun to do them right.

Setup is the same as last time: piece of clear fishing line that I used to hang the balloons, a Nikon D60 on tripod about 10 feet away from the balloons, two Sunpak 333's on stands at 1/16 power to the right and left of the balloon, IR remote, 1/160, 200ISO, f/9, WB set to flash. I picked up some new balloons to solve the issue of BB's piercing and not popping the balloons. Or so I thought.

It definitely happened a lot less and still makes for a great shot when the water splashes in a particular direction.

If you're going to do the balloons like this, put one inside the other, fill up the inside balloon and tie it off, then fill up and tie off the outer balloon. If you are using dyes/food coloring, be sure not to wear nice clothes. I now have a semi tie-dye undershirt.

Even after moving the gun fairly close, it wasn't enough to pop the inside balloon. I had anticipated that this might happen and actually was wanting to do it for a few shots (before I knew they would all turn out that way) since it would be cool to see the complete balloon inside a balloon of water.

And the shots I uploaded to Flickr.

"The Pear"

A shot of a multicolored balloon. No colored water.

With a few balloons and still wanting to pop both, what do you do? My slingshot was broken, so I went with the next best thing: an old and small amateur archery kit. Unfortunately, my timing basically sucked, so the only shot I got that was even close was one right before the arrow hit the balloon. It leaves something for next time...

All photos on this blog that are not on Flickr and as a result do not have a specified license are "All Rights Reserved." Please contact me for use - as you can imagine, I'm usually fine with bloggers using them.