Sunken Set: an underwater pool AI photoshoot
You get a staged room on the floor of a deep diving pool, with dark, unplugged television sets on the tiles and a figure drifting among them in a long floating coat. Seen from below, the surface becomes a bright round window ringed by a mirror of the whole scene.
Art direction: Alex But
- Lens
- 35 mm, dome port
- Aperture
- f/5.6
- Shutter
- 1/250 s
- Camera
- Underwater, 4 m deep
- Light
- Sun through the surface
Best for
Six frames from this shoot
Five frames and one detail, made by haloshot from three phone photos of one person.
Frame 1 · Sunken Set 
Frame 2 · Sunken Set 
Frame 3 · Sunken Set 
Frame 4 · Sunken Set 
Frame 5 · Sunken Set 
Detail · Sunken Set
About the snell's window look
That ring is Snell's window: from underwater, the whole sky squeezes into a cone of about 97 degrees, and outside it the surface reflects the pool floor. A 35 mm behind a dome port at f/5.6 and 1/250 s works from one to three meters, often looking up. Sunlight is the only source, so caustic lines crawl over skin, jade silk and the curved screens.
Clothes, place and when to pick it
Women wear a black neoprene one-piece under a jade silk faille coat-cape with long sleeves; men get a neoprene wetsuit top under a long jade coat with a wide collar, both over billowing pale gray crepe trousers and dive socks. It is staged in a five-meter pool on a sunny day. Good for album art or an art series, with your face crossed by caustics.
How it works
Add three photos of yourself: face, half turn and full length. haloshot renders a free five-frame preview of Sunken Set with your face. Pick the frames you like and keep them in 4:5 HD.
How to shoot Snell's window with an underwater set
Refraction draws the window: from below, the sky compresses into a bright circle about 97 degrees wide, and the surface outside it mirrors the floor.
- Book a 5 m diving pool on a sunny day; weight empty CRT cases or prop replicas on the tiles.
- Dive with the 35 mm behind a dome port at f/5.6, 1/250 s, shooting up from 1 to 3 m.
- Keep the surface nearly still so caustics read as lines and the window edge stays sharp.
- Have the model exhale, sink and hold a few seconds per take, breathing from a safety diver's regulator between takes.
Never sink intact picture tubes, and never let anyone hyperventilate before a breath-hold take.
Set notes by Alex But, art director · Updated
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Shoot Sunken Set with your face
Three photos in, five free preview frames out. Keep the best ones in HD.