SMOKE GRENADES
Okay, it just doesn’t get more fun than this. As if the Fourth of July isn’t fun enough, add smoke bombs and a little fashion into the mix and things get really fun real fast.
WANNA TRY IT YOURSELF?
The smoke bombs I like the best are Enola Gaye smoke grenades and they work great. They go off for about 60-90 seconds, and put out a lot of colorful thick smoke. You can find some at firework stands but they don’t work nearly as well. Scroll through these and you can probably tell which were Enola Gaye and which weren’t. Smoke grenade photography comes with a steep and quick learning curve as they only go off for about a minute of shooting. Here are some things we learned.
POSING
Since you only have about a minute to shoot while the grenade is going off, make sure to have a lot of poses in mind beforehand. Swiftly move from one to the next and basically hold that shutter down, you never know when you will get a good shot so the more the better.Â
If your model doesn’t have built in skills to strike several poses  make sure to direct them and switch up the pose quickly.Â
We found that focusing more on good poses and letting the grenade just follow seemed to work good. Posing with both hands even though only one may be holding a grenade. Also drawing shapes or spelling your name can create cool effects.Â
LOCATION
First and foremost, make sure where you are shooting is safe and legal. Also pay attention to which way the wind is blowing. This will effect which direction you will shoot and where the smoke will blow. If there is no wind you may need to occasionally step out of the smoke cloud to not be lost in it.
SETTINGS
I always love shooting with a wide aperture (low f-stop number) but it can get tricky when you are trying to focus on a subject that is constantly moving and blocked with smoke so do what you feel capable of.Â
A semi quick shutter will help to freeze the movement of the subject and smoke, and the ISO can be used to compensate for whatever light you need.Â
THE OBVIOUS
 When you first pull the string to start the grenade it sparks, don’t light you or your surroundings on fire haha though those images would probably be cool.
Please clean up after yourself, it’s easy and kind.
Hold at the base of the grenade, it gets warm as it lights so be prepared for that.
It can stain clothes though we have never had that happen. It will stain the ground if you set it down.
Don’t point it at yourself… though if you have to be told this we can just let evolution do it’s thing haha.Â
Megan
Tate
Sydney
