Photographing the Mpemba Effect

Here in Michigan and all over America,

we have been in the deep freeze for most of this winter.

Being outside with my camera can be downright painful when the

high temp for the day is ZERO!

That's why we decided to have a little fun and try out the

MPEMBA EFFECT.

There is a scientific explanation for this effect, but

the gist for photographers is...if you throw boiling water into 

frigid air...it should freeze quickly

and create some photographic art!

The temp was zero degrees Fahrenheit when we shot this.

We had several pots of boiling water ready because

we didn't know how BIG the SPLASH would be

and we wanted to try it several times.

My brave husband volunteered to toss the boiling water.

I framed him like this:

But the POOF got much bigger than expected and didn't

fit in my frame.

I widened out and here's the second sequence

I shot with my DSLR on high speed continuance mode:

These next photos are cropped:

Did it freeze in mid-air?

I have no idea, because I was standing on our back porch too far away to tell.

It looked more like it vaporized, but still made for a cool photographic effect!

We did this just for fun in our backyard on a Saturday morning.

I envision shooting this back-lit, close to sunrise or sunset in a wider field 

with less annoying distractions in the background.

You can try tossing the water over your head to create a dramatic

circular ice display as I have seen in photos.

Photographer Michael H. Davies has a spectacular shot on his website!

Hubby didn't have the nerve to try that...afraid he would toss boiling

water right in his face!

I hope you will be more creative and try this fun technique 

when the thermometer plunges into the deep freeze!