Water Wigs by Tim Tadder

Inspiring photographer Tim Tadder and his series of Water Wigs photos.

These shots made his bald (or bald-capped) subjects look as if they had hair made of water, and required incredibly precise timing — and this video shows just how he did it.

Taking a look at the shapes of the “hair” in the resulting photos, it’s pretty easy to figure out how the pics are taken. Tadder’s assistants carefully place or drop differently shaped water balloons onto the models’ heads as he attempts to capture the ideal water wig shot.

Capturing the photos at the perfect time and freezing the action properly, however, is far from easy. His technique requires that the studio be completely dark (even a small flashlight can cause problems) and as much as we’re sure his models enjoyed having balloons thrown hard at their heads, Tadder eventually decided to start taping thumbtacks to their bald heads or bald caps to facilitate the perfect pop.

Each pop is unpredictable, and more often than not leads to an un-usable shot, but when he gets it right, the results are pretty darn cool.