Outdoor Lighting with Flash (Boom!)

[Ernest Purdum]

I once encountered an antique store absolutely crammed with flammables, cloth, paper, etc., There was also a dresser drawer filled to the brim with flash powder, flash compound, flash sheets (which long ago I used myself) and flash ribbon. Shudder, shudder.

During WWII there were some four engine bombers with bomb bays full of capacitors that took from England to Germany to charge up so that a flash picture of an entire city could be made. A simpler approach to the same intent was to drop a bomb casing filled with magnesium powder.

[Donald Qualls]

Photoflash bombs were used pretty routinely for bomb damage assessment. The photo-recon plane would follow the main bomber fleet, drop the flash bomb with a timer and parachute, and then take a series of exposures with the bomb's light (they'd burn for something like two or three seconds).

Much slower burning than flash powder which, in those quantities, could stand in nicely for the usual filling in a blockbuster.

[ra89]

If you are going to do night photography go with flash powder not flash ribbon. Ribbon is used for wet plate photography back in the 1860's-70's. I'm 17 years old and have been using flash powder for four years now. When I went to photograph something and didnt have a flash lamp at the time I used to fill a tea bag with 2 grams of flash powder and hang it on a nearby tree and light it when it came to exposure (open flash method). Aperature always at 16f for best exposure. Now I use an c.1888 Hayden & Co. Flash Lamp for my work. Of course, I have to make my own flash powder because they do not make it the same anymore. I use red paper caps from toy guns to ignite the powder. Never once burned myself. Here is a picture.

[Bruce Watson]

As I recall, flash powder was also sensitive to how it was poured into the flash pan, suggesting that the poof is in the putting. ;-)

Ouch. That hurt!

[Neal Shields]

There is a documentary showing Harold Edgerton holding a newspaper about 2' in front of a surplus WW2 aeriel strobe. They fire the flash and the newspaper bursts into flames.

I had a friend working on one, that put it in a cardboard box to avoid blinding the whole room when he test fired it. He set the box on fire.

[Scott Davis]

Mark, I apologize if you find offense in the term “exploding Muslims”. It is intended solely as a space saving, more concise term for “radical fundamentalist Muslim extremist suicide/homicide bomber evil-doer”.

As the old saying goes, “all kangaroos are Australians, but all Australians are not kangaroos”.

I’m sorry but can’t recall a single incident involving an exploding Presbyterian...

But then, the point of this thread is that an old-time replacement for flash bulbs is surprisingly still apparently available.

I think Presbyterians explode only when they've had too much beer and sauerbraten. Either that, or when they find out their teenage daughter is pregnant by the kid from the other side of the tracks.

[Ralph Barker]

Please note that this thread was started back in 2005. Since then, John Cook has passed away.

[Robert Hughes]

Rather interesting hearing about how concerned Federal agencies have become about ounce quantities of flash powder. I've been in farm supply stores in the Midwest where you can still purchase 50 pound bags of ammonium nitrate and no government agencies involved.

As for exploding Presbyterians, they subcontract out...

[erie patsellis]

Please note that this thread was started back in 2005. Since then, John Cook has passed away.

Having worked with John at an un-named commercial studio years ago, I can only say that the world truly lost a unique and talented individual, who will be sorely missed. (He had a bitchin' sense of humor, too)



erie