Fire Eater

Messages
6,502
Name
Peter
Edit My Images
Yes
We popped over to Whitby for the Goth event on Sunday (photos to follow once I edit them) and found this guy busking within an inch of his life - or at least within an inch of his eyebrows which were covered in vaseline. From where I was stood I could certainly feel the heat from the flames. Rather him than me

Fire Eater by Delta Skies, on Flickr
 
Impressive photo (would make a good poster) and takes some nerve
 
Vaseline being petrol based is an unusual choice of protection from flame.
 
Vaseline being petrol based is an unusual choice of protection from flame.
That's what I thought too...

Great shot, might be tempted to clone out the dribble hanging from his chin. My eyes keep getting drawn to it (this may be because I have a one year old son, so i'm used to cloning out the odd bit of dribble...).
 
We popped over to Whitby for the Goth event on Sunday (photos to follow once I edit them) and found this guy busking within an inch of his life - or at least within an inch of his eyebrows which were covered in vaseline. From where I was stood I could certainly feel the heat from the flames. Rather him than me

Nice pic, with great timing and well controlled highlights.

Next time you see him run a mile and get ready to take some snaps with a telephoto to sell to the local paper when he immolates himself. He hasn't got a clue what he's doing. Any fool can put paraffin in their gob and spit it out over a flame; most such fools will be lucky. Learning to firebreathe properly takes (a) knowledge and (b) practice.
 
Thanks everyone for the comments. It's funny I was happy with the dribble but now I'm not so sure.

@juggler - As for his fire eating technique, I'm not sure he was completely comfortable himself with what he was doing. He really was suffering between goes. Maybe the use of petroleum based vaseline suggests he didn't know entirely what he was doing?
 
Lovely, colourful and dynamic image.
Good use of the flame going to the upper diagonal.
Got to agree about the spontaneous combustion, hope you used a 300mm +
 
Vaseline being petrol based is an unusual choice of protection from flame.

Years ago when I worked in the TV industry, when the stunt guys were doing flame shots, they used a gel which looked very much like Vaseline, but wasn't, it was some sort of flame retardent
 
Thanks everyone for the comments. It's funny I was happy with the dribble but now I'm not so sure.

@juggler - As for his fire eating technique, I'm not sure he was completely comfortable himself with what he was doing. He really was suffering between goes. Maybe the use of petroleum based vaseline suggests he didn't know entirely what he was doing?

This is OT but on the off-chance that you're interested, there are a number of errors, the most obvious being how close the flame is to his mouth. That indicates that he doesn't know what he's doing and probably isn't aware of the most serious danger, namely inhaling hot paraffin vapour and igniting it in his lungs. The proximity, angle of the flame, dribble and obvious lack of control increase the chances of this happening. The results are often fatal.

Years ago when I worked in the TV industry, when the stunt guys were doing flame shots, they used a gel which looked very much like Vaseline, but wasn't, it was some sort of flame retardent

That'll probably be zeljel. I've never heard of it being used during firebreathing.
 
Fab image fella.
You caught it perfect. What this image as is impact and great subject matter, something very different from what most of us will get to photograph :)

Gaz
 
Thanks for the kind words folks.

This is OT but on the off-chance that you're interested, there are a number of errors, the most obvious being how close the flame is to his mouth. That indicates that he doesn't know what he's doing and probably isn't aware of the most serious danger, namely inhaling hot paraffin vapour and igniting it in his lungs. The proximity, angle of the flame, dribble and obvious lack of control increase the chances of this happening. The results are often fatal.
That's worrying Simon. To the general public watching this sort of thing it looks impressive but we are oblivious to the real dangers beyond just thinking he might burn himself. It certainly makes me think again about being so close to the action.
 
Thanks for the kind words folks.

That's worrying Simon. To the general public watching this sort of thing it looks impressive but we are oblivious to the real dangers beyond just thinking he might burn himself. It certainly makes me think again about being so close to the action.

My apologies again for derailing your thread...

There are three grades of fire breather: the lucky, those who are competent but unaware of all of the risks, and the small minority who really know what they are doing. It's extremely difficult to get PLI for a reason. (I used to do it, btw, which is how I know this stuff. I'd have said I was competent but aware of the risks; I knew what I needed to do to be an expert but never quite achieved it).

Fire eating (as opposed to blowing) is much safer. It has it's attendant dangers too - the risk of inhaling hot vapour still exists and many practitioners aren't aware of it - but it's far safer.

I find it very difficult to watch fire breathing since I once witnessed it go wrong.

Still a great shot though :)
 
Back
Top