Water Drop Crowns For Idiots Wednesday

It has been raining all day - perfect for playing inside with water drops and trying to work out how I do it! Bear in mind that I am no expert but this is aimed at the beginner in this type of photography from a beginner´s point of view. The blind leading the blind, so to speak.
There are many websites dedicated to this topic. Thisis a good one and here Many of these methods are complicated and require more equipment than I have so I tried to work out a simpler set up. I used my stove top which is black ceramic and the site of many blips! The surface can deal with spills and the overhead light is good for set up and focus.

The set up I used for last week´s blip is HERE
Make sure you have spare camera batteries and memory card on hand!
1.Pipette or eye dropper - I used an eye dropper as it is easier to control but requires more frequent filling. I found the plastic bag with a hole in it too messy.
2.A clamp to hold the eyedropper - I used a desk lamp and secured it with a rubber band.
3.Shallow baking dish/mirror
4.White back board to enhance flash - I used a rectangular plate
5. Coloured paper or cloth to put under dish if desired.
6. Shallow dish to fill eye dropper
7. Jug of water
8. Cloth to mop up drips
9. Something to focus such as a pen - I used the bulb of a pipette.
10.A tripod. I used a mini table tripod last week but found hubby´s Gorilla pod worked better today.

Camera:
A macro lens is recommended but I used my standard 12-32mm.
A remote flash is recommended to “freeze” the motion but I used the camera flash
Manual focus and manual setting
Set up equipment as shown. The dish I set up with the long side pointing away. Without a macro I have to crop considerably so need enough background around the drop. You can see later on some of today´s images that I haven´t done this.
Fill dish with a thin layer of water. Drop some water from dropper onto centre of dish. Observe where it hits then place the end of a pen there to focus. Confirm focus by dropping again onto pen if desired. Remove pen or THIS happens. A good drop ruined. Turn off lights and darken room.
Now the tricky bit. It will be trial and error. I fixed my eye on the dropper rather than the dish and pressed the shutter just after the drop fell. Usually it worked better if I pushed out 2 drops, probably the 2nd drop was captured. It will take lots of control and hand/eye coordination. But possible.
chantler63 did a wonderful image SEE HERE last week using the surface of a mirror I tried this as well and got some passable results. More HERE. Maybe Kathy would be so kind to add her tips as well!
I also tried cooking oil which looked more like a CONTACT LENS than a crown.
Milk seemed to be the easiest medium. See HERE.
More here.
Good luck and have fun. Give up after 2 hours - becoming tired is not productive!