The Dubai Chronicles

Tuesday, August 08, 2006

g i f t . f o r . m o r t a l s

shutter speed: 3 secs, aperture: f/6.3, iso: 400, focal length: 50mm, wb: tungsten, af-s nikkor 18-70mm dx, kaiser 67mm uv filter, tripod mount, manual focus

prometheus, or prometheas (ancient greek, "forethought") is the titan chiefly honored for stealing fire from the gods and giving it to mortals for their use.

he held no awe for the gods, and he ridiculed zeus, though he fought alongside the gods against the other titans. prometheus was the creator of man. when he and epimetheus, his brother, set out to make creatures to populate the earth under the orders of cronos, prometheus carefully crafted a creature after the shape of the gods: a man. prometheus felt sorry for his creations, and watched as they shivered in the cold and winter's nights. he decided to give his most loved creation a great gift that was a "good servant and bad master". he took fire from the hearth of the gods by stealth and brought it to men. thus mankind was warm. to punish prometheus for this hubris (and all of mankind in the process), zeus devised "such evil for them that they shall desire death rather than life, and prometheus shall see their misery and be powerless to succor them. that shall be his keenest pang among the torments I will heap upon him." zeus could not just take fire back, because a god or goddess could not take away what the other had given.

source: wikipedia

setup was easy, achieving low-light condition with just fire as source of lighting. i asked my roomie to model for me and let him dressed like the gods with just white blanket covered on parts of his body. i focused the subject posing first using a tripod and with sufficient lighting then turned the lights off when ready.

the trick, however, was keeping the fire in hand without moving and staying for long periods. we used rubbing alcohol then ignite it... the fire didn't last long due to water percentage is bigger than alcohol and the fire was small. to avoid burning of the hand, we put lotion to the exposed parts of the hand and put a damp cotton with alcohol (alcohol has a cooling effect) then put on top with a thin dry cotton. next was adding an additional light to illuminate the subject. i lit a small candle mounted on monopod and raised on top front of him. the finale was to set the camera on remote to avoid shake and instructed the subject to "ignite" his hand and took several shots.

no other pp work done except resizing it to frame and adding title.

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