ICM Photography - Intentional Camera Movement Discussion

I didn’t realize there was a name for this style of photography. Some of my best works are “light play”, which is what I’ve been calling it since 2010 maybe? I tend to use a bright light source and shake the phone. This was much easier on the older iPhones before image stabilization. Reading this thread makes me want to play around with it again.

examples..





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Pole dancing
Slow Shutter Cam (1/2 second), ACDSee Pro (to darken and intensify)

I find that SSC shots tend to come out rather pale and flat. I first tried opening the original in Leonardo, duplicating its layer, and adding a multiply blend. It worked,for what I wanted, but in the end, I went back to the original and used the light and color controls in ACDSee Pro to get roughly the same result.
 
I think I'll head over to Cogitap's web site to see if there's a contact address for suggestions.

EDIT: OK, did that, and gave them a link to this thread, just in case.
And I got a reply from the Slow Shutter Cam developer, who said "I will definitely check into adding the possibility to save capture as a project for later editing."
 
I didn’t realize there was a name for this style of photography. Some of my best works are “light play”, which is what I’ve been calling it since 2010 maybe? I tend to use a bright light source and shake the phone. This was much easier on the older iPhones before image stabilization. Reading this thread makes me want to play around with it again.

examples..





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These are neat. Let's see some more? (I like "light play" better than ICM, which is the buzz word of the moment. "Camera painting" also works for me.)
 
First up, the original Slow Shutter Cam shot with no alterations. The camera movement was right to left, first up 45 degrees and then down 45 degrees.

After that comes the gussied up version that's been through BeCasso (Watercolor/2) twice for the Splatter effect and ACDSee Pro for pushing the colors this way and that. I ran several Watercolor variations in BeCasso but finally settled on the one without outlines. (The outlines did some interesting things in the foreground, but the sky got very busy.)

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First up, the original Slow Shutter Cam shot with no alterations. The camera movement was right to left, first up 45 degrees and then down 45 degrees.

After that comes the gussied up version that's been through BeCasso (Watercolor/2) twice for the Splatter effect and ACDSee Pro for pushing the colors this way and that. I ran several Watercolor variations in BeCasso but finally settled on the one without outlines. (The outlines did some interesting things in the foreground, but the sky got very busy.)

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If you'd have took a straight photo of the scene and then ran it through one of the numerous painting type apps, would you have achieved much the same result?
 
If you'd have took a straight photo of the scene and then ran it through one of the numerous painting type apps, would you have achieved much the same result?
(I had to look back to see if I did have a straight shot from this session, but I don't.)

I think the answer is maybe/maybe not. Those shapes that look like mountains and the cloud shapes in the sky are creations of the /\ camera movement. The real life landscape is pretty flat. I don't think I could have produced those with a motion blur or other edit tools (or if it's possible, I don't know how). The colors, the splotchiness, and the general fogginess, yes, I could get those looks on a straight shot.

I think a lot of Instagram pics tagged #ICM could be matched using blurs and edits without any camera movement. But camera movement turns up some looks I don't see any other way to get and also produces some surprises. (And, for what it's worth, although I'm always starting with camera movement in this thread, in general I don't care how I get to a result, as long as I get there.)

EDIT: ...as long as I get somewhere. :lmao:
 
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First up, the original Slow Shutter Cam shot with no alterations. The camera movement was right to left, first up 45 degrees and then down 45 degrees.

After that comes the gussied up version that's been through BeCasso (Watercolor/2) twice for the Splatter effect and ACDSee Pro for pushing the colors this way and that. I ran several Watercolor variations in BeCasso but finally settled on the one without outlines. (The outlines did some interesting things in the foreground, but the sky got very busy.)

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I think that’s why I find ICM so interesting. You can get just interesting abstracts from it.
 
These are neat. Let's see some more? (I like "light play" better than ICM, which is the buzz word of the moment. "Camera painting" also works for me.)

Thanks! I like “Camera Painting” too:)

hres a couple that were apped Into abstracts

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my favorite light source was a large boat/fishing dock that was out over the water. I’ve got quite a lot of these images. Taken mostly with hipsta with no other edits.
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I used a slow shutter like app during sunsets. I can’t remember it’s name and it’s no longer available. It allowed me to create “light trails”. That’s how these were done. Most I would completely (and slowly) turn the camera upside down in a circle. Or half way, then back half way.
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this one has a little bit of decim 8 also.
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I haven't watched any of these yet, so I can't swear as to their quality, but...

Andy Gray (mentioned earlier in this thread) has a YouTube channel he calls Tuesday Night Edits, where you can see him working live on his ICM images. Might be interesting to watch someone actually doing the edits rather just talking about them.

 
Here’s a couple I did this weekend.

the first two taken with Hipstamatic. 1. With no filters 2. With Kuhn lo and Blackey’s 1942 (random feature)

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this one was done with slow shutter, light trails setting. Then some edits in Snapseed

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Here’s a couple I did this weekend.

the first two taken with Hipstamatic. 1. With no filters 2. With Kuhn lo and Blackey’s 1942 (random feature)

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this one was done with slow shutter, light trails setting. Then some edits in Snapseed

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The first one is my fave, with the silver curlicues and their reflections, the gold above, and the sneaky streak of red. (It also reminds me of learning to write cursive and handwriting practice in elementary school, although I was never that elegant.)
 
The first one is my fave, with the silver curlicues and their reflections, the gold above, and the sneaky streak of red. (It also reminds me of learning to write cursive and handwriting practice in elementary school, although I was never that elegant.)

thanks! Made me think of learning cursive too. On IG I labeled it “dancing in cursive” :thumbs::D

oh! Also I *think* the sneaky streak of red is a firework.
 
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This one's all camera motion, no added blur. Slow Shutter Cam in Bulb mode. (The metadata says the exposure time was 1 second, which sounds about right.)

One advantage of Slow Shutter Cam and similar apps is that you can get results like this on a fairly bright day. It would take a stack of neutral density filters to do this with a regular app like Camera-M.
 
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This one's all camera motion, no added blur. Slow Shutter Cam in Bulb mode. (The metadata says the exposure time was 1 second, which sounds about right.)

One advantage of Slow Shutter Cam and similar apps is that you can get results like this on a fairly bright day. It would take a stack of neutral density filters to this with a regular app like Camera-M.
I like this one, Slow Shutter Cam seems to give good results (for ios anyway). My nearest relative is Bluristic which sometimes seems like a sledgehammer!!
 
I took 9 ICM shots in an alley (using Slow Shutter Cam) and combined them in an Affinity Photo stack. Depending on the stack mode, I got quite different results.

City life
(Stack mode: Minimum)

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The city at night
(Stack mode: Range)

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Blade Runner
(Stack mode: Skewness)

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