The goal of this experiment was to capture images of water dripping and splashing into liquid nitrogen.  We achieved this goal and have numerous photographs of water splashing into liquid nitrogen.   The photographs are also of decent quality, with most of the splash in focus and most of the subject in view.  There were, however, several times when the pictures came out black or over expoused as well as a few times when the subject or splash were not entirely in the picture.  Due to the nature of macro images, it was also very difficult to get all of the flash in focus and in most photographs the back of the splash is much clearer than the front. 

Discussion

     As it turns out, liquid nitrogen is very difficult to deal with.  It boils as soon as it comes into contact with anything warmer than itself, including the air, meaning that a set of pictures had to be taken within seconds of the nitrogen being poured.  After those short seconds pass, the rigorous process had to be repeated.  This was, at times, an advantage as it was easier to pause and review the photographs and make any necessary changes.

     Despite how quickly it boils, liquid nitrogen is also cold enough to cause severe frostbite if it remains on your skin for even a few seconds and any container that has been exposed to the liquid for long enough can freeze to a tabletop or become too cold to handle without gloves. This caused some difficulty in getting decent photographs, but, after several days' trial and error, the project produced interesting results. 

Conclusion

    Overall, our project was a success, despite multiple failures.  It was a success in the sense that we accomplished the true goal of any project: we experimented and learned from our experiments.  We discovered that water has too high of a specific heat to freeze on its path towards the liquid nitrogen, both in water balloon form and in drop form, and that water only froze after being suspended in the nitrogen for several seconds. However, we did manage to take photographs of a crown with ambiguous characteristics.  Was the water freezing in the picture below?  Or is it merely cutting through the steam from the nitrogen?  Photography, like all art, is a message from the creator that is to be interpreted by the viewer.