Help capturing beam

[trist-10]

I've desperately spent the last few hours trying to figure out why my laser beam won't show up on camera. In dark lighting, the red laser beam is clearly visible with the naked eye. Through my camera lens however, all I can see is the dot. My camera is an Olympus SP-500 UZ. I've tried my best experimenting with slower shutter speeds, changing aperture and ISO. My flash is turned off and i'm aligning my camera so that it's facing in the same direction as the laser. I have little knowledge with cameras and can't figure out what i'm doing wrong. Could someone please explain how I can take good laser beam photos? I'm at my wit's end. Thanks guys.

 

[lamborgini8]

Would like to know this as well. My camera can just about see my 75mw greenie without smoke.

 

[lazerlover]

I'm not a familiar with your particular camera, but a lot of camera's have a shutter speed setting where you hold the button down as long as you want, this is one way to achieve the affect your looking for.
Another way would be to use hair spray, mist water, or a fog machine, then snap the picture. Either of these should work equally well.

good luck

 

[shikari_rock]

If your camera can't handle a 1 second exposure, then you won't see it without smoke or fog.

 

[Chris.]

My camera phone can see both my 50mW green and 200mA red in the dark :-/

 

[shreknow91]

try setting the camera to one of the longer shutter speeds, that and add just a little smoke/mist etc.

 

[Rhith]

Yeah just bust out the fog machine or hazer, sometimes even humidifiers work well from what I've heard. Will give more "density" to the air of the light to reflect off of thus letting you see it better. An easy fix that last for a little bit is for body spray or something similar.

 

[MarioMaster]

if you don't have a fog machine try just lighting a few matches where you're going to be taking the picture, it should make it quite visible, even when i'm using my fog machine in the bathroom with door closed, it makes the beam on my 35mw laser much brighter than normal all the way downstairs

this pic was only a 1/2 second exposure with no smoke added at all - both lasers around 30mw

 

[Daedal]

Best camera guide right here...

http://www.steves-digicams.com/

--DDL

 

[trist-10]

i just took my SLR camera outdoors and played around with it again. I managed to snap up one decent photo. The shot was taken at night with very little lighting. The aperture was set to F/2.8 and I had the shutter speed set to bulb, and gave it roughly 30 seconds of exposure. ISO speed was set to ISO-80. I might take the camera out again another night and play around with a few different settings. For now though, I hope this helps someone.

 

[lamborgini8]

Or try the good old hair spray technique, works well for my laser and scanner.

Only downside is I now feel very light headed... *falls off chair*

 

[shikari_rock]

Just yesterday my mom and dad were eating pop corn, and the beam was more visible there than in my room, so anything in the air helps.