Quick Guide: Oil and Water Photography

Last year, Brett spotted an Oil and Water photography competition run by Jessops. He thought it looked fun, so he decided to try this creative photography technique. After doing a little research online, Brett spent a Saturday afternoon capturing these abstract images using various objects.

Note: You don’t need to have a specialist macro lens to try out Oil & Water photography. You could even do this with your phone, then crop and edit your shots to get similar creative effects.

Oil & Water technique used to create abstract images:

NiSi featured one image on their Facebook page. As a result, I really believed that the Close-Up Lens could seriously increase Brett’s chances of winning the Jessops Oil in Water photography competition.

When I asked Brett to show me the images he’d taken with the NiSi Close-Up lens, he told me that it didn’t really work. Brett said the images were blurry. Huh? I thought. The Close-Up lens works perfectly, and I am going to show him just how perfectly!

Quick Guide: How I created my Oil and Water photos

I experimented with different backdrops, like this plate, but I wanted something more vibrant and colourful. So, I asked Brett how he had obtained the brighter images above. He told me he used his iPad and increased the screen brightness as needed. After this, I switched to using my phone, and I searched for different screensavers to obtain various backgrounds.

Oil and water photography technique:

1. Use a tripod or gorilla pod

You will need a flat surface to keep the camera, the backdrop, and the container of water and oil nice and steady. Use a shutter release cable/trigger or the shutter delay to reduce camera shake. This will help avoid any spillages and enable you to compose the oil and water mixture in your glass container.

2. Mix the Oil and Water

You need to suspend your glass container or dish over your background (tablet or phone). To achieve this, I used two old VHS tapes, but you could use similar-sized books. Note that I used the lid from a pyrex dish because it had fewer scratches and marks. Anything with scratches or marks could be visible in the final image.

Add the Oil and Water to the glass container. Use a little washing-up liquid to help make your oil droplets appear brighter and sharper. Don’t add too much oil because you want to move/swish the oil around the glass container. Adopt a less is more approach.

3. Camera settings

Use manual mode for more control and shoot in raw. Adjust the ISO, shutter speed, and aperture and check the histogram to capture a nicely exposed image. Experiment with the settings and change the backdrop image/brightness on your tablet or phone.

If you are using your phone, access the macro settings. If you have one, use a macro lens for your phone (these are usually cheap to buy).

4. Think about the lighting

I used a combination of natural light and lighting from the brightness on my phone screen.

5. Compose the shot

Use the grid and the LiveView screen to help compose your images. The oil is quite slippery and tends to swirl around the container, so focussing on the subject can be quite tricky. It takes a faster shutter speed than you might anticipate, and little patience for the oil to stop/move slowly. Use a spoon or fork to position the oil in water to create interesting compositions.

6. Enhance aspects of your abstract image

Aim for an image with some nice sharp circles, reflections, and some negative space. Think about the position of the circles and how your eye travels around the image.

I cropped my images in Lightroom, but you could use other editing software. After that, I slightly adjusted the exposure, removed some of the imperfections, increased the sharpness, clarity and vibrance.

Oil in Water Photography:

I found it quite relaxing and enjoyable experimenting with different designs and creating these images, it reminded me of art classes at school.

When I created these oil and water images, my main aim was to show Brett how good the Close-Up lens was. Brett was impressed, teasingly he told me they were too good so I shouldn’t enter the photography competition.

I didn’t listen to Brett, and I did enter the competition but I didn’t expect to win because there were some fabulous submissions. However, Jessops selected my flower as the winning image due to the “brilliant combination or colour, oil & composition.” So, I won a Sony Alpha A6000 camera with the 16-500mm kit lens!

Oil and water photography hashtags:

If you try this photography technique, please share your images with us because we would love to see them.
Add #dbs_oilandwater in the caption or comments and tag @duskyblueskies

Other suggested hashtags:

#photographyinspo #bloggerphotographer #creativeshots #oilandwater #macro #colorful #macro_creative_pictures #macrophotography #oilandwaterphotography #abstractart #abstractmacro #abstractphotoart #colour #detailphotography #abstractphoto #abstractphotography #abstractarts #abstractobsession #oilinwater #macrophotography #oilart #bubbles #creativephotography #water #abstractart #create #light #macro #macroworld #oildrops #abstractphotography #liquidart #closeup #colours #drops #visualart #artofvisuals #creativeart #drops_perfection #oilinwaterphotography #oliveoil

How to use the NiSi Close-up lens:

Are you still wondering how Brett ended up with blurry images when he used the *Close Up Lens?
Or did you guess that he didn’t read the instructions?

NiSi recommend using a 70-300mm zoom lens with the *NiSI close-up lens, and they state that the optimal focal range is around 200mm. Also, you need to maintain a gap of 22cm – 30cm between the lens and the subject and use an aperture from f8 – f16 to obtain the sharpest results.

NiSi Recommend a friend scheme:

NiSi appreciate the positive feedback and personal recommendations from their customers, and they have introduced a *recommend a friend scheme. If you purchase a product through NiSi’s online store, you will be able to obtain your own referral link. When a new customer uses your referral link to make a purchase, you will receive £10 towards your next NiSi product. How good is that?