A month or so ago I was touring NBC’s studios at 30 Rock with a friend of mind who works on Late Night With Jimmy Fallon and he introduced me to the show’s photographer, Lloyd Bishop. After meeting Lloyd I checked out his work online and discovered that this guy has an impressive portfolio! I knew I had to catch up with him for an interview to share his work and his story with all of you. Enjoy! [more]
This was a very special shoot to me. Cami has been a good friend/photographer for a long time so we go way back. Although this shoot had nothing to do with her photography. Cami is an amazing vocalist. By far the best I know. I used to produce music and she sang on the first track I ever had signed. So we had a good connection to start with and I knew this was going to be an amazing shoot. [more]
Hi, my name is Tam. Most of you don’t know me, but I’ve been with Fstoppers for a few months now. As a system engineer, I’m more or less like a ghost in the machine; I make sure the awesome writers here have a functional server to keep the fresh content coming, and everyone else have their daily Fstoppers fix. The job is simple 90% of the time; the other 10%… you probably don’t want to be near me. [more]
Although being a photographer means you are in direct competition with every other photographer out there , I think it is very important to build a strong community and look out for one another. Our jobs as photographers are never secure, most of us live our lives one day to the next with out a guarantee of when our next job will be. I have always been one to help people to the best of my abilities, whether it be sharing knowledge our lending out equipment. Can you imagine what you would do if someone stole every piece of photographic equipment you owned. [more]
Marc Donahue from Permagrin Films has been busy since his production of Dream Music, which got over 2 million views on YouTube. Most recently, Marc has been experimenting with GoPro camera arrays for a unique effect, most similar to bullet-time like in the Matrix. Click on to see the final video and read an interview with the man behind the lens. [more]
If you are like me, the acronym SEO brings a shudder to your bones. If you are a photographer with a website, you have no doubt received countless emails from sites offering to optimize your site for a fee. In this post, I will tell you the things I did for free or next to nothing that helped push my photography website to page one of organic Google searches. The one thing that I already had working to my advantage is that my website is a non-flash site that was launched almost seven years ago. [more]
Sometimes a Journey song can wax poetic. “Small town girl…lonely world.” We’ve heard it before. But for whatever reason, it’s the song I can’t get out of my head while I’m sitting with Jenny Woods in a small, Persian restaurant in the Upper West Side of Manhattan. Standing a towering five-foot-nothing and with a demeanor that couldn’t ruffle a sleeping kitten, Jenny, or Bunny Jenny, as she goes by, is a photographer from a very small town in Florida. [more]
A few weeks ago, the South Carolina Military Museum offered me the chance photograph some of their massive collection of World War II firearms, shooting for the excellent Curio and Relic Firearms website C&Rsenal, and I jumped at the chance. I’ve always been fascinated by antique firearms not because of their destructive capabilities, but because they are incredibly elegant machines that are very, very simple. So needless to say I was very excited to get the opportunity to “shoot” them.
The iphone is such a powerful device, download the right apps and you can create some inspiring photographs. Don’t get me wrong I am just as big of a gear head as anyone else, but I don’t let lack of equipment stop me from constantly taking pictures. I find myself taking excessive amounts of photos on my iphone. Adding on to nick Fancher’s “Inspiration over gear” post, for me I need to create. Many times I find myself wishing I had my camera with me, then realize my iphone is in my pocket. I have been able to capture a lot of moments in my life that otherwise would have evaded my memory as time passed. [more]
Telephoto lenses are a key part in nearly every photographer’s camera bag. Having a solid long telephoto lens in our arsenal lets us be prepared for numerous scenarios without having to switch out our primes and possibly miss the shot. Tamron’s latest lens revamp is the 70-200mm f/2.8 DI VC USD, and it’s a solid option for those looking at this focal length. [more]
When I first got into portrait photography, I saw his work and I wanted to be Zim Killgore. Years later, I still have inspiration folders that are filled with his stuff. I’ve always been interested in his work because its nothing like anything I’ve ever seen before. Its a fresh take on portrait photography, that encourages you to just sit down and stare at it.
So I have seen quite a bit of caricature portraits and fell in love with them. I decided to try my hand at doing a few and kind of fell into a new little series with them. Everyone who has seen them has asked if I could shoot them or their families in this style. This little tutorial will show you how I go about doing these shots. [more]
I first came across Richard Johnson‘s work in a group I belong to on Facebook called CREATIVOS. I have watched his Imagination series grow and grow over the last month or two, and his post processing really is quite unique. Richard is a 30 year old graphic and motion graphics designer, residing in Orlando FL. I have said it before, and I will say it again, but I believe that shooting personal work is a great way to grow as a photographer. I asked Richard some questions about himself and his series for the readers of Fstoppers.
This past Monday I wrote a piece titled “Six Things Every Beginning Photographer Should Know”. One of the points I made was the importance of sometimes shooting for free. Here are just a few excerpts of reader responses:
“Shoot for free? Really lol?”
“Shooting for free is what’s wrong with the photography business.”
“Go ahead shoot for free. You set your price point and show how much you value your work that way.”
So I thought it would be worthwhile to explain what I meant.
Websites such as Twitter and Facebook can be extremely powerful tools for our businesses however most of us are using them all wrong. Over the years we have continued to pile on layer after layer of distractions that in the end leave us feeling guilty of even trying to use social media. We walk away feeling like we wasted our time. It’s time to regain control of these tools and use them for good to connect, be inspired and market ourselves. Read on to learn some valuable tips that have been real game changers for me. [more]
