In high school, I took a class in graphic arts. For our final project, we were required to use a process that went beyond what we had learned in class. The goal was to push ourselves—to stretch, to aim higher.

At the time, I had been fascinated by high-speed photographs of animals in motion. Freezing those fleeting moments revealed details that the human eye could never catch in real time. I wanted to try something similar. But with limited resources—one camera, one strobe light, and a classroom setting—I had to get creative.

One day, while watching the rain at lunch, I noticed something familiar: the small droplets that rebound after hitting a surface. I’d seen it countless times but had never thought to photograph it. That became my project.

After several weeks of experimenting with simple gear and single drops, I finally captured my first images. The results were rough, but promising. My teacher encouraged me to enter one photo in the county fair art contest.

Decades later, I still return to water drops. What began as a student project has grown into a long-term exploration. Over the years, I’ve experimented with multiple drops, colored liquids, varied viscosities, and different surfaces—all in pursuit of capturing something beautiful in a blink of an eye.

Click on the images in the gallery to go to the detail page for that image. Hover over the images to see what the image might look like in your world.