The Hamsa or Hand of Fatima

In North Africa and in the Middle East the symbol of the Hand of Fatima (or "Hamsa" as it is also called) is supposed to be a sign of protection against the evil eye. Some versions of it show as a hand with the eye in the palm which you can interpret maybe as: "stop thou evil eye" or you with the eye, can you please stop eyeing me. Anyway, that is the symbol. I don't know; I'm just a photographer.

This shot I took is using one of my DIY creations, Airchinapilot's Cookie Gun. I keep meaning to make version TWO of it but only get around to trying to make the cookie gun version ONE do more.

Original cookie gun concept

The original concept is simple. You use an old telephoto lens as a fresnel. Behind the telephoto you place a cookie object. Cookie is short for cucoloris which is a shape that you project onto a background. Projectors are nothing new of course but this one is not powered by a constant light, it is powered by a strobe. Originally I had a small Sunpak powering it but along the way I picked up a more powerful 6 battery Sunpak 555 that fits sungly behind the mounting ring which I constructed with tape and glue and a drainpipe connector from Home Depot.

This Cookie Gun has a telephoto range of 80mm and so I have to really get close and/or use wide angle lenses to get this kind of projection. It is very finicky to use because, unlike a real projector, you only see it at the moment of the flash. Of course, a real projector would not be as portable as my Cookie Gun besides costing more. My next version of this would surely need a longer telephoto and because that would entail a heavier lens would also then require a heavier, more secure mount.

More innovations in use

My main innovation in this shoot was to use two cookies. One cookie would be the shape. I got a print house to make me an acetate of various symbols that I then cut out to fit the Sunpak head. But behind that cookie would be gel or a slide for colour. A gel of course is single colour and worked well for shots like this:

But by employing a slide with various colours and shapes in it you can get multiple colours in the cookie shape like so:

Surprisingly, all of these cookies survived being shot through by the Sunpak at 1/2 power with maybe a hundred or more pops without melting too much.

You can use the slide itself for a nice varied background:

Thank you VPW and Tamara

This was the last series that I took at the Vancouver Photo Workshops as part of an advanced lighting course. For the last segment of the class we were asked to bring in our own subjects and make use of some of our knowledge. Here I used an available track light for the background and then introduced my cookie gun concept. Plus, I love the space and would use it again any time. This model is my good friend Tamara who has a dancer's physique and also the fortitude to work through anything including when the C-stand collapsed and hit her in the head. Sorry about that, Tamara. Tamara is a wonderful painter as well as entrepreneur.