Welding photography

Posted this in rec.metalworking, but decided to put it here, too.

Has anyone here any experience with welding photography? I am going to take some pictures of welds during real time welding. Does the shielding of a normal lens work?

I have a Sony DSCH1 camera. A decent camera that is worth about $300. Has manual mode to set focus, and override some of the automatic things that may cause it to misfire. I don't want to screw it up. I may have to buy a dedicated camera, though, as I will have to make a protective box and a remote shutter release.

Steve

Reply to
Steve B
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I'd shoot through the spare filters for hoods - in the range that your eyes use - e.g. 9 or 10 ? Buy a 4x6" replacement filter and you have a CCD protector, camera protector (melts...).

I've taken the complex sparkle under my plasma table as I cut heavy metal steel - pre-hard AR400 Cr-Mo-Mn-etc... And I got some reasonable pictures with my cell phone and camera. I was 6' or so away so I didn't use protection.

Mart> Posted this in rec.metalworking, but decided to put it here, too. >

Reply to
Martin H. Eastburn

Why all the protection? I've taken pictures of welding (probably

1/8th inch stick) with a normal Nikon F2. The big problem was filtering so that you could see the weld puddle without blacking out the rest of the scene.

As I remember I was probably 3 ft. away from the actual weld and probably shooting through a 85 mm lens.

To be honest, with color I could get good details of the actual puddle but a very dark background or good background with a "flare" for the weld. I think we ended up using two shots for each example - one filtered for weld and one for background.

Cheers,

John D. Slocomb (jdslocombatgmail)

Reply to
J. D. Slocomb

I use this camera for real estate analysis, so I don't want to get any hot dingleberries in there where they will either cause cosmetic or mechanical damage. I will have to set it up on somewhat of a remote, manually focused, and let er rip, so just want it enclosed.

However ................ it may just be the excuse I've been looking for to justify buying that Nikon D90 package with the multiple lenses ........... but that's another story.

I have many scars all over my body in places I cannot even see myself from hot dingleberries that I thought I was protected against. And some I just let burn in so I didn't blow the xray ........................

What's a nickname for an old welder? Sparky?

I think Spot is a better one. White spots all over the place. I can't get my Lincoln SP175 + to work without spitting. So, Thursday when I go to Vegas, I shall take it to the Lincoln Hospital.

Pray for us. I'm gonna stress that this has been a problem since day one, and hope that I can at least get a break on the price. Whichever way it goes, it does not look terminal, and it's going to be nice to have it back to its former self.

My two favorite settings on any welding machine are "ON" and "OFF".

Steve

Heart surgery pending? Read up and prepare. Learn how to care for a friend.

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Reply to
Steve B

I have had no luck using modern cameras. They think too much. Simple old film cameras with manual focus can work through either a standard filter or an autolens.

My experiments with video hit the same snag. You need either a very simple dumb industrial video camera or a very high end one.

Reply to
Ernie Leimkuhler

If you can stand a melted ball of steel or high energy spark given and it hits the lens - one hopes you have a protective lens screwed in or a UV at least. Otherwise the camera - and I have an F and F3 myself would be melted glass in a nasty spot.

As they say, "XXXX" happens.

Mart> >

Reply to
Martin H. Eastburn

Superimposition of elements of those two photos could give excellent results, letting one see the weld pool AND the surrounding base material, too.

I keep thinking- Is it possible, with the most modern LCD and light sensing technology available, could one build an auto-lens that selectively darkens at the puddle, and gradually lightens up away from it? We can achieve awesome switching speeds with LCDs now, can we sense light or EM radiation well enough to control when, how long, and the shade of certain LCDs in the panel of the lens?

Reply to
TinLizziedl

Many years ago I learned through bitter experience that ALL lenses must have a UV or clear filter mounted at all times :-)

Cheers,

John D. Slocomb (jdslocombatgmail)

Reply to
J. D. Slocomb

I don't know but with today's electronics it is probably possible to have a camera that accurately exposes all portions of the screen.

The photos I took (for a corporate brochure) were all shot with fixed exposure and shutter speed. The ones best liked by the company was with the welder and the pipeline almost black and the weld a bright flare with sparks pouring down. Hardly the best welding technique though :-)

Cheers,

John D. Slocomb (jdslocombatgmail)

Reply to
J. D. Slocomb

What's that Lassie? You say that TinLizziedl fell down the old sci.engr.joining.welding mine and will die if we don't mount a rescue by Mon, 13 Sep 2010 21:21:51 -0700:

They do have filters that are darker in the center, lighter to the sides.

Reply to
dan

Hide quoted text -

Google "High Dynamic Range Photography" or "HDR Photography" This functionality is built into Photoshop and even into some cameras.

Reply to
RangersSuck

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