The Art of Fire

The Combustion Institute, an organization of scientists and engineers who study fire, hosts an annual art competition for photographers of fire. You can view the five winning selections, including this one by Nelson Akafuah and Kozo Saito:

[...]this fire whirl was created by igniting benzene, a simple petrochemical, then mirroring and rotating the resultant image to produce a distinctive "S" shape.

Link -via Make

Comments (4)

Newest 4

Newest 4 Comments

So it's just a Photoshop contest. Is this Neat-o-rama or Lame-o-rama?

Abusive comment hidden. (Show it anyway.)

So this has absolutly no connection with reality. It should have won the award for biggest fake.

Abusive comment hidden. (Show it anyway.)

When I first saw it, I thought, "Not bad", but then I read about the photoshopping and I lost my respect for it.

Abusive comment hidden. (Show it anyway.)

Eh, it's actually pretty unremarkable knowing that they allow image manipulation.

Abusive comment hidden. (Show it anyway.)

(NH4)2Cr2O7 is Ammonium dichromate which is sometimes called "Vesuvian Fire" as it was commonly used to simulate a volcanic eruption. I remember building ing a plaster of paris volcano model and making it erupt in my 6th grade class (circa 1967--yeah, I'm old)
The other compound is Mercury(II) thiocyanate (Hg(SCN)2) AKA "Pharoah's Serpent" It used to be used in fireworks because of its black-snake effect. However, it isn't readily available anymore because it is toxic.