Being inspired is a part of creative expression in all mediums. We are all inspired by different people and things, but when are you no longer inspired and instead just stealing? There's a process to understanding how you should take inspiration and apply it to your own work. Once you find that line, you can be more comfortable in finding inspiration.

The Fstoppers community is brimming with creative vision and talent. Every day, we comb through your work, looking for images to feature as the Photo of the Day or simply to admire your creativity and technical prowess. In 2019, we're featuring a new photographer every month, whose portfolio represents both stellar photographic achievement and a high level of involvement within the Fstoppers community.

Getting skin tones just right is a subtle but very important aspect of creating professional portraits and setting your work above that of others. Photoshop has lots of tools for working on skin tones, but if you want to keep everything in one application, this helpful tutorial will show you how to get great skin tones working solely in Lightroom.

Getting started in astrophotography doesn't have to be expensive or complicated, and there is no better time to give it a try.

One of the biggest misconceptions I have come across in the industry is that tilt-shift lenses are just for people who shoot architecture. Once you understand how these specialist lenses work, you'll realize how big of a deal they can be for almost any genre of photography.

An amateur photographer has revealed his experience of selling a camera through Amazon. Despite eventually resolving the matter, the company first sided with a fraudulent buyer, refunding the scammer the money and letting him keep the camera.

A photographer was free-diving in the Great Barrier Reef, when he spotted a bunch of manta rays. Except, upon taking their photo with his strobes, he realized one of the rays wasn’t the species’ usual black or white in color. It was bright pink, leaving him initially questioning if his camera had malfunctioned.

A few days ago Sony announced the 20mm f/1.8 for full frame E-mount and I must admit, my ears pricked up.

The new firmware 3.0 update for the Nikon Z 6 and Z 7 has officially been released, and it seems the autofocus has undergone a huge upgrade. Here, one photographer reviews the enhanced AF tracking and the new subject-tracking.

Shoot-through umbrellas are some of the cheapest and quickest lighting modifiers to work with, and despite often being cast aside for other modifiers, they can still produce great photos in a range of scenarios. This awesome video will give you four tips for working with shoot-through umbrellas.

Shooting in low light can be tricky for lots of reasons ranging from needing slower shutter speeds to having difficulty acquiring focus. If that is something you struggle with in your own work, this helpful video will give you some great tips to improve your low-light photography.

Composition is one of the subtlest and trickiest aspects of photography to truly master, and there is a massive trove of guidelines, tips, and "rules" out there that can be hard to wade through. If you struggle with composing a compelling image, this excellent video will give you eight helpful tips to improve your work.

Besides looking at tutorials and learning how to handle your camera and composition, it’s often helpful to take a look at the life of inspirational photographers. Here, you’ll find out why you should take a look at the life and work of Sebastião Salgado.

A few weeks ago, Pye Jirsa from SLR Lounge traveled back down to Puerto Rico to battle Lee and I for the "World's Best Photographer" award. Today, we have the results and the full behind the scenes video of the shoot-off. Brace yourself; things do not go as expected.

Sell the fake or add to the surrealism. As a creative retoucher and composite photographer, these are two aspects that in my opinion are very important: you either learn techniques to help blend realism into the piece or to make it stand out and add surrealism.

“A wide angle lens is the best for landscape photography.” Does that sound familiar? I am continuously surprised by how little I use the wide angle lens.

Pye from SLR Lounge is once again visiting us in Puerto Rico. In this four-minute video, we each teach a quick and easy two-light setup.

With the commercialization of drones and their accessibility to the public, there has become an increased issue of the public piloting their (gear) into places uninvited. Who recalls the Gatwick Airport Christmas chaos? Now, an Israeli defense tech company has unveiled an “anti-drone solution” that uses laser beams to shoot down flying drones from miles in the distance.

AI-generated gender labels for images are being removed by Google and being instead replaced by the word "person." The AI, which the tech giant provides to developers, is making the politically correct change after it was decided “a person’s gender cannot be inferred by appearance.”

Product photography doesn’t have to take a lot of equipment nor the most expensive lighting or camera gear to create highly polished images. Take a look at this breakdown showing how product photography taken with high, mid, and almost no equipment still delivers highly valuable results.

The ultra-clean, perfectly lit white background look is in high demand these days and is an important skill to have in your toolbox. In this video, learn how to create that aesthetic, no matter what budget you might be working with.

Whenever we travel and have our camera with us, we want to capture pictures, so any tips from a photographer who has built an established career off of just that are more than welcome!

Last year, I spoke to a number of leading industry professionals and collated 29 of their combined unpopular opinions. This year, so that people can put a face to the opinion, I'm going to give 10 of my own.

The two heavyweights when it comes to flagship sports and wildlife cameras are the Sony a9 II and the recently released Canon 1D X Mark III. The ability of the autofocus to track a subject is critical, so how do the two compare when placed side by side?

When you are new to photography, you can spend a lot of time practicing your technique and exploring your creativity, but there is no shortcut to experience. Thankfully, though, a lot of longtime professionals are quite happy to share the lessons they have learned over time. This excellent video features five successful professional photographers giving their best advice for new creatives.

Portable drives are getting better and faster all the time, while the cost of high-capacity drives has finally started to come down. Yet, new technologies always develop faster than the leading brands can get products to market. That's where DIY solutions shine.

How many photographers do you know who travel to different countries and photograph weddings in beautiful and exotic locations? The question is: are those wedding photographers legally allowed to work outside of their home country, or are they rolling the dice on having their equipment confiscated and them being blacklisted from entering that country again?

Have any experience in a studio? Yes? No? Doesn’t matter. You should give 4x5 a try. It’s addictive.

You read that right: ARRI makes compromises in order to make good lenses. The logic behind those decisions is similar to the one behind making digital camera sensors carry more information in the green channel than the other two. It's about image perception, not about mathematical perfection.

It is a strange claim to make, but is it right? Is doing a degree in photography worthwhile, or are you better off getting into the industry instead?

The L-Mount Alliance marked the culmination of a remarkable period in the history of the (digital) camera. However in five years time, will we look back and see this as the beginning of the end? Was the L-Mount Alliance simply too little, too late?

A couple of months ago I was given the opportunity to photograph Korean-American stylist, lifestyle blogger, and digital influencer, Chriselle Lim for the cover of Female Malaysia magazine. It’s always exciting to be able to shoot a cover for a magazine, especially one that is the leading fashion and beauty magazine in Malaysia, and I particularly love photographing strong, successful women. Gotta be around these role models!

Successful composition in landscape photography is often a careful balance of a range of subtle features and ideas that can be difficult to master. This great video features seven helpful tips to help create stronger and more compelling compositions in your landscape images.

A photographer who discovered a 120-year-old time capsule box in his old family home has developed the images. Deciding on one of the oldest ways to make photography prints, he used Cyanotype to develop the prints and recorded the entire process for this newly released video.

A YouTuber has undertaken the task of upscaling video clips taken in New York City back in 1911. Despite the footage being 109 years old, he managed to upscale the footage to 4K, while also colorizing it and increasing its frame rate to 60fps.

Diffraction is something that can rob your images of sharpness, and as such, it is important to have a functional understanding of what it is and how to avoid it. This excellent video explains what diffraction is and how it varies based on different parameters.

Fujifilm recently announced the X-T4, and it contains a bevy of improvements and new features sure to excite photographers and videographers alike. This excellent video takes a first look at the new camera and what you can expect from it in usage.

Lenses are not cheap, and you can potentially save thousands of dollars by buying used, but of course, you assume certain risks in doing so. If you are thinking of buying a used lens, this helpful video will give you seven things to check to ensure that you get a high quality optic that will give you years of good performance.

Beauty lighting is a genre full of a range of nuance and subtlety, and one of the best ways to explore that is through the use of lighting modifiers. This excellent video will show the differences between a reflector, beauty dish, and scrim, along with a wide variety of sample images showing their uses.

I love seeing weird and quirky lenses and this one from Samyang certainly ticks those boxes. Is it any good though?

The launch of the new Olympus O-MD E-M1 Mark III has reminded the world that micro four-thirds is not dead, and right now, it’s almost exactly the same price as the Sony a7 III. If you were in the market, which would you buy?

Being a technically proficient and creatively inspired photographer is only a small part of becoming a successful professional, which requires many skills beyond what you do behind the camera. If you want to cross into the realm of being a professional, this excellent video will give you nine helpful tips to get you started.

When you are starting in video, you will probably notice that a lot of terms and techniques carry over from photography, but it is not quite all the same. There are some video-specific terms and settings you will need to know, and this excellent video will introduce you to 18 of them in less than 10 minutes.

Most macro lenses provide 1:1 magnification. However, if you want even more powerful capabilities, the Venus Optics Laowa 65mm f/2.8 2x Ultra Macro APO lens can offer double the magnification of standard macro lenses, and it comes in at quite an affordable price as well. How does it perform in practice? This great video review answers that question.

Being a photographer with a “real” camera always carries risk. People well within their rights to photograph in public are harassed online all the time. I’d argue, though, that being a brown person in the United States adds an extra layer of risk that other photographers don’t face, namely fears that you’re a terrorist taking photographs to plan for a future attack.

Elinchrom has always been known for its superb light modifiers. But the strobes designed by the Swiss flash manufacturer are just as good. Now marks a new direction for the brand with the introduction of the ELC 125 and ELC 500.

The number of things I have learned, unlearned, and relearned all over again along the road from hobbyist to professional photographer would require something of a short novella to recount in their entirety. So today, I want to share just one of them.

For many photographers, space can be an issue when it comes to your shooting area. It can be difficult to obtain a variety of looks when you are working with just one room. However, with just a few small changes, you can give your clients more than enough to chose from to create an album.

When it comes to buying a new camera, the big question is: "How much should I spend?"