Photo Plus

step BY step meet your match

how to set up the shot without burning down the house in the process

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01 Safety first

At the worry of sounding like a risk assessment, you need to make yourself safe. We had a bucket of water on the floor near us, to extinguish matches and use in case we dropped them on the floor. We also had a damp tea towel in case we burnt our hands.

03 Near a window

We shot this light leak portrait inside, so the ambient light was inherently darker. The advantage of shooting indoors is that you can do this project even if it’s raining. The large window on the left-hand side of the model provided us with flattering and soft illuminati­on.

05 Make your flame

Use Cook’s matches or a long-necked lighter to take these shots. It’ll give you a longer burn time before either the match scorches your fingers or the lighter warms up so much it burns your skin. They’re readily available from most homeware or kitchenwar­e shops.

02 LENS of choice

Experiment with focal lengths to see what looks best to you. Our 50mm f/1.8 was the perfect lens to frame a nice portrait while compressin­g the perspectiv­e and blurring close-up foreground elements. The wider the lens, the less perspectiv­e compressio­n occurs.

04 camera Settings

In Av (aperture priority) mode, we set our ISO to 500 for the lower light levels inside. Our aperture was f/2.8 to blur the fire sufficient­ly when held in front of the lens. Our shutter speed was around 1/250 sec, which was fast enough for a sharp image when shot handheld.

06 fire placement

Strike a match, then hold it close to the front element in order for the fire to blur as it has here. Don’t obscure the model’s face with the fire, and of course, take care not to melt the lens! Use a lens hood to keep the flame away from the glass if you’re feeling clumsy.

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