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> The idea was born from a mistake. One night near Death Valley, California, Wu set a camera to make a time-lapse series in the dark. A pickup truck drove by an
by sradman 6y ago
> The idea was born from a mistake. One night near Death Valley, California, Wu set a camera to make a time-lapse series in the dark. A pickup truck drove by and washed out the scene with its harsh headlights.
> At first, says Wu, “I was really annoyed. But when I looked at the images, I was fascinated. Here was artificial lighting in a natural environment.”
The quote above indicates that Wu stumbled upon the technique by accident but, sandworm101 is correct, this technique has been known and widely used for decades. I know the technique as "painting with light" and a Google image search should convince any skeptics. Add "stars" to the search and you will see that the technique is often combined with star trails.
Using drones is a nice enhancement. The criticism about originality doesn't make Wu's images any less spectacular.
EDIT: The Luminous-Landscape article Introduction to Landscape Astrophotography [1] includes a section on "Light Painting".
[1] https://luminous-landscape.com/introduction-to-landscape-astrophotography/ https://luminous-landscape.com/introduction-to-landscape-ast...
- spaetzleesser 6y agoMaybe Wu didn’t know about light painting before this happened. A lot of people rediscover things. I found out by accident that you can see the Milky Way in all its glory when you do long exposures. But yes, this is an old technique. I guess the big difference is that drones can write shapes into the air and also reach locations and angles you can’t reach with traditional light painting.
- underwater 6y agoI'd be showed if this were not rediscovered time and time again. Photography is all about painting with light.