Profile
Photo Synthesis is a rotating showcase of the best science photography on the web.
Ted Kinsman is a scientific photographer that specializes in creating images for books, magazines, and television. His particular areas of interest are in x-ray radiography, high-speed photography, Scanning electron microscopy, and time-lapse cinematography. His work has appeared in numerous books and magazines ranging from Discover Magazine to Forbes. Recently his work has appeared on Gray's Anatomy and CSI New York. In addition to running www.sciencephotography.com Kinsman also teaches advanced placement physics at Brighton High School in Rochester, NY, he also teaches advanced macro-photography at Rochester Institute of Technology.
B.N. (Bobbie) Sullivan has a strong affinity for the sea and everything in it. She first learned to dive in 1970 and has since logged thousands of dives. A wish to document the marine life she encountered prompted her to learn underwater photography more than 20 years ago. More recently, she began to write about the marine life she has photographed. A research psychologist by profession, she approaches her subject matter with the mindset of a scientist, but targets her writing to a general readership in whom she hopes to foster an appreciation for the ocean and its inhabitants.
Bobbie lives in Hawaii with her husband. Together they produce TheRightBlue.com, where you can see more of Bobbie's photos and writing.
B Jefferson Bolender is Training Coordinator of the State of Arizona's
program for disability awareness and assistive technology. Through
her travels she always has a camera at hand to photograph everything
from people to technology and nature. As a teacher of elementary
education, special education and art, her interests include a wide
array of subject matter with an emphasis on documentation with an
artist's eye.
See more of her work in her photo stream on
Flickr and the website atarizona.com.
Steve Jurvetson enjoys rocketry and photography and especially the pursuit of both in the Black Rock Desert. Some action photos and video links can be found here.
Steve is a Managing Director of Draper Fisher Jurvetson (DFJ.com), a leading venture capital firm with affiliate offices around the world.
He was the founding VC investor in Hotmail, Interwoven, and Kana. Previously, he was an R&D Engineer at HP, and his prior technical experience also includes programming, materials science research, and computer design. He has a B.S. in Electrical Engineering, an MSEE and and MBA, all from Stanford University.
Alex Wild is a postdoctoral researcher at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign where he works on the molecular phylogenetics of various groups of insects. He is also a part-time photographer whose images appear in such venues as Ranger Rick, Smithsonian, BBC Wildlife, and even ScienceBlogs.
Alex's galleries are viewable at www.alexanderwild.com, and he normally blogs at Myrmecos Blog.
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January 5, 2010
Category: Photography • Snow • crystal
My journey to the world of snowflakes started about 15 years ago and began with my love for microscopes. Upon showing images from the microscope to friends they had little interest in all the wonderful biology, but were fascinated by the images of snowflakes. There had been little done in this field since Bentley fist took snowflake images from his barn in the hills of Vermont approximately 100 years ago.
Read on »
Posted by Erin Johnson at 2:02 PM • 4 Comments • 0 TrackBacks
November 30, 2009
Category: Fluids • Motion • Physics
Fluids are a constant source of inspiration for high speed photography. Water and milk are two of the common liquids around us every day, but still their complex behavior is a source of wonder. Fluid scientists are still pioneering some of the basic equations that are responsible for the complex motion of fluids. In these pictures a drop of liquid is falling into a container of liquid. The first falling drop creates a recoil splash that shoots up out of the container. Just when the recoil droplet gets to the top of its motion a second falling droplet collides. The timing often happens by chance when pouring liquids, but here it is controlled with a microprocessor so each collision can be studied and photographed in detail. The motion is once again frozen in time with the help of a 1/60,000th of a second flash.
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This post was written by Ted Kinsman for Photo Synthesis.
Posted by Erin Johnson at 12:48 PM • 7 Comments • 0 TrackBacks
November 3, 2009
Category: Perception • Water
The human brain has an uncanny ability to see the human form in the most unlikely places. Religious icons in toast and faces in the clouds are but a few examples. Here it is droplets of water colliding with each other. I call the shot above "Man and Woman." This tendency to create order out of chaos never stops to amaze me. I will leave it to the reader to see what they can find in the image below.
These images were taken with a Cognisys Inc. water drip valve and microprocessor camera controller. The flash is from two off axis strobes with a duration of 1/60,000th of a second. More drops hitting drops in the next post.
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This post was written by Ted Kinsman for Photo Synthesis
Posted by Erin Johnson at 5:06 PM • 10 Comments • 0 TrackBacks
October 19, 2009
Category: Technology • X-Ray
The world of X-ray photography is a very interesting place and surprises are often found in every image. X-rays are similar to Scanning Electron Microscopy (SEM) in the sense that the collected images are only black and white. To take these image I use a scientific X-ray machine at a local company. The source is much finer than a medical device and the exposure has to be taken on film since the large digital detectors have not yet come down in price. Here an antique alarm clock is X-rayed. The film is then scanned into a high resolution digital file that has to be meticulously hand colored in photoshop. The colors are only chosen to look nice together and to highlight the different parts of the clock. It is hard to see on this web resolution file, but the alarm clock has been over-wound and the main spring on the right hand side is broken. Thus the broken clock was only a dollar at the local flea market. By the way, there are several flea markets that I can be found wandering around in the summer, often carrying the strangest of objects. With X-rays the color and scratched surface is of no interest, and often times broken things are more interesting than working ones.
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This post was written by Ted Kinsman for Photo Synthesis.
Posted by Erin Johnson at 3:34 PM • 0 Comments • 0 TrackBacks
October 13, 2009
Category: Motion • Technology • Water
This is how.
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This image was provided by Ted Kinsman for Photo Synthesis.
Posted by Erin Johnson at 6:10 PM • 4 Comments • 0 TrackBacks
October 6, 2009
Category: Motion • Physics • high speed photography
With high speed photography, I can use a high voltage spark to create a flash of only 1/1,000,000th of a second in duration. The problem is that there are not a lot of things that move this fast that such a flash is required to stop the motion. Bullets are such a subject requiring a very high speed flash system. Around the lab we jokingly call this "ludicrous speed". After photographing bullets hit just about every conceivable object it is time to move on to other subjects. In this case a paint ball is sent into the edge of a straight razor blade. The paint ball crosses two optical detectors that measure the velocity (166 feet per second) then trigger the flash when the paint ball has traveled about 12 inches. The momentum of the paint ball keeps the ball in motion even after being sliced in half by the razor blade. A wonderful way to illustrate Newton's Law of Inertia - that is, an object in motion will stay in motion until a suitable force is applied to stop it.
With many photo sessions once the photography is done we will stand around looking at all the equipment set up and wonder what else we can do with it before the set has to be disassembled. At this point someone wondered what would happen if the paint ball were to hit an egg?
The results above show that the paint ball hits at such a speed as to break, then force the yolk out the other side before moving through the rest of the shell. Shots like this create a tremendous mess and parts of the lab will have pinhead specks of pink paint ball dye and dried egg yolk for years to come. I hope this image excites the minds of a few readers. I always welcome ideas, even though it is often years before I get around to doing a certain project.
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This post was written by Ted Kinsman for Photo Synthesis.
Posted by Erin Johnson at 4:47 PM • 9 Comments • 0 TrackBacks
September 28, 2009
Category: Light • Motion • Photography • Physics
I have photographed jugglers several times in the past for physics text books. I have been impressed with the level of skill some jugglers can obtain. It is difficult enough to juggle three balls, four is more difficult, and fire is a another story. When objects move in a circle they can undergo some fairly complicated motions. What would be the best way to show this motion in a still image?
In this case the camera is panned by the juggler at a constant rate on a computer controlled pan head. When the juggler is about the center of the frame a flash is set off. The image shows both the flip the club does at the top of the throw and the uneven motion of the clubs as the juggler makes corrections to his throw as the motion is kept under control. This juggler is has been practicing for three years and is currently only 14 years old!
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This post was written by Ted Kinsman for Photo Synthesis.
Posted by Erin Johnson at 3:25 PM • 4 Comments • 0 TrackBacks
September 23, 2009
Category: Luminescence • Optics
I often get asked to photograph odd things, more times than not the project changes when an art director decides to take a different path for an article. Such requests are a great source of ideas.
In this case a request was for triboluminescence. This is where my background in physics and optics is a big help. Triboluminescence is an optical phenomenon in which light is generated when asymmetrical crystalline bonds in a material are broken when that material is crushed. There are a number of materials that do this including quartz, sugar and even ice. In this image I am hitting a wintergreen lifesaver candy fairly hard with a hammer. This is clearly visible to the human eye, but very difficult to capture with a camera. To get enough light 10 candies had to be smashed in the same location. The outline of the hammer and candy is a double exposure from a separate frame. This image conveys what you would see if you did this yourself- I hope some of the readers give it a try. The lifesavers also give off light as they are dissolved in solution - such as saliva in your mouth. This is a good excuse for you and a friend to go in a dark room and eat lifesavers. If you do not have a handy assistant for this experiment - use a mirror and look at your own mouth as you eat a wintergreen lifesaver. There is still a lot that is unknown about the physics of triboluminescence. As far a photographing the process in ice - that is top of my to-do-list.
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This post was written by Ted Kinsman for Photo Synthesis
Posted by Erin Johnson at 12:30 PM • 2 Comments • 0 TrackBacks
September 15, 2009
Category: Butterflies • Insects
A scanning electron microscope image of a monarch butterfly wing.
Since a scanning electron microscope only collects a black and white image (representing intensity of electrons) the image must be colorized with photoshop. The colors are fairly close to the real colors of the wing.
The wing is composed of scales or platelets that in turn have a micro structure that creates turbulence as the wing moves through the air. The turbulence is responsible for decreasing drag on the wing and allows the butterfly to move with less energy.
Monarch Butterflies are native to North America where they migrate each spring from a wintering ground in Mexico. Each generation moves further north until the last generation gets the urge to migrate back to Mexico. Many Monarch butterflies are blown off course by storms. The butterflies in modern times have established themselves where ever there is a suitable host plant. Fairly recently monarchs have become established in New Zealand. Monarchs were not established in New Zealand until the caterpillar's host plant of milkweed was accidentally released in the early 1900's.
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This post was written by Ted Kinsman for Photo Synthesis
Posted by Erin Johnson at 1:31 PM • 5 Comments • 0 TrackBacks
