Nickel (Ni) thin films were deposited on glass substrates in high vacuum and at room temperature with third-harmonic or 355-nm output from a nanosecond Nd:YAG laser. At low laser fluence of 1 J/cm(2), the deposition rate was about 0.0016 nm/shot which increased linearly until 4 J/cm(2). Above 4 J/cm(2), the onset of phase explosion in the ablation abruptly increased the optical emission intensity from laser-produced Ni plume as well as thin-film deposition rate by about 6x. The phase explosion also shifted the size distribution and number density of Ni droplets on its thin-film surface. On the other hand, the surface structures of the ablated Ni targets were compared between the scan-mode and the fixed-mode ablations, which may suggest that droplets observed on the thin-film surface were caused by direct laser-induced splashing of molten Ni rather than vapour-to-cluster condensation during the plume propagation. (C) 2010 Elsevier B. V. All rights reserved.