How to Photograph Boiling Water with a Macro Lens

Macro Photography  •  Photography Tips

For photographers, even the most mundane moments can yield spectacular beauty. On one particular morning, Swedish photographer Micael Widell was flooded with inspiration during the utterly banal task of fixing himself a cup of tea. So, naturally, he grabbed his camera and got straight to shooting the contents of the glass kettle resting on his kitchen counter:

Evidently, Widell wasn’t the only one to see something beautiful in the water; an Imgur gallery containing the spur-of-the-moment shots went viral straight away, garnering over 70,000 views. However, the artist felt confident enough in his ability to improve upon his original viral photographs that he took it upon himself to record a second take, complete with full explanations behind his process.

Using a Sigma 150mm macro lens, a rainbow’s worth of colored gels, and several combinations of natural and artificial lights, Widell achieved a variety of results. As it turned out, getting the perfect shots took equal parts skill and luck. After all, the air bubbles violently making a bee-line to the water’s surface couldn’t exactly be directed into place. Nevertheless, the end results of all that experimentation proved to be well worth the effort.

Try photographing a boring detail in your daily life, and see what you can get!