Why I Still Prefer Hot Lights to LEDs

There are numerous articles that are discussing the advantages and disadvantages of hot lights and LEDs. Knowing these, I want to share my opinion from a practical standpoint.

What Are the Best Ways to Send Traffic to Your Photography Website?

For the last month, we've teamed up with Wix for a series called "How to Build a Website." In this series, Lee and I talk about some of the advantages and mistakes photographers make when creating their own website. Today, we are releasing the last video in the series, and it might be the most important information in making sure your photography business becomes a success financially.

Sony Updates RX10 IV With Real-time Eye AF for Animals

The Sony RX10 IV bridge camera was released in October 2017 and features a 24-600mm equivalent lens with the capability of shooting up to 24 frames per second with autofocus. Pairing those kind of specs with Sony’s newer Real-time Eye AF for Animals tech makes perfect sense, and now it’s here.

Tips for Better Time Management and Decision-Making in Landscape Photography

Landscape photography is a strange genre when it comes to time management, and it can lead to some difficult decisions when it comes to committing to a location or moving on to somewhere else. This great video discusses some helpful tips for improving your time management and decision-making in landscape photography.

Shooting an Entire Wedding After Dark

Wedding photography is a difficult enough genre without any extra challenges thrown in the mix, but can you imagine having to shoot a wedding after dark with no flash to help? This interesting video follows a photographer as he tackles that exact challenge and contains some helpful tips in case you ever find yourself in the same situation.

How to Manage Your Gear Acquisition Syndrome This Black Friday

Gear Acquisition Syndrome (GAS) is something photographers deal with all the time: that feeling you get by purchasing something that you think might be the one tool you need to really upgrade your work. Here are some ways to manage these impulses and stop you from buying unnecessary gear.

Fujifilm X-Pro 3: A Personal Review of a Personal Camera

There is no getting away from it: Fujifilm's decision to implement a “hidden LCD” on their brand new Fujifilm X-Pro3 camera was always going make this a divisive camera. The question is: has Fujifilm created such a niche camera as to make it unusable? After using the camera extensively for the past couple of weeks, here is my purely personal take on this very personal camera.

The Best Images from GuruShots "Amazing Men" Challenge

GuruShots is a website that hosts, "The World’s Greatest Photo Game,” in which it invites participants to submit their best photos to various challenges. They have receive thousands of entries and millions of votes and recently hosted the "Amazing Men" challenge. Check out the three winners of the challenge below as well as the 100 top rated images below.

Fstoppers Hands-On Look at the New and Surprisingly Brilliant Leica SL2

As camera manufacturers go, Leica is probably one of the more polarizing brands on the market right now. Personally, I'm a fan of their cameras, although I'm not planning on owning any cameras from them in the immediate future. Even still, I do think they produce some wonderful devices.

A Review of the Nikon Z 50 Camera

The Nikon Z 50 offers a sub-$1,000 entry point into Nikon's mirrorless system in a compact and lightweight crop sensor body, making it an intriguing option for many photographers. This helpful review takes a look at the new camera to help you decide if it is a good choice for your work.

What's a Parfocal Lens and Why Is It so Important?

If you have ever looked at the price of cinema lenses, your eyes probably watered a bit at their seemingly stratospheric cost. There are lots of reasons for those high prices, one of the most common being that they are parfocal. This interesting video explains what it means for a lens to be parfocal and why it is so desirable among filmmakers.

What's It Like to Shoot a $30,000 100-Megapixel Camera?

In my ramblings as a photographer over the last decade and a half, I've shot with almost every brand of commercial digital camera out there. However, most of my experience has been in the realm of common crop-sensor and full-frame cameras. I've always seen the more exotic offerings in medium format digital as beyond my reach and therefore, not worth thinking about.

Has There Ever Been a Better Time to Buy Third Party Lenses?

Sigma has recently announced that it will be releasing a brand new 24-70mm f/2.8 Art for Sony full-frame cameras, and the price is quite remarkable. Given the sudden shift from DSLR to mirrorless cameras, you’d think that lens manufacturers would be struggling to keep up, but despite that, there’s probably never been a better time to buy third party glass.

Capture One Offers Unique and Powerful Benefits For Portrait Photography

The landscape of the portrait photographer has certainly been in flux over the last decade, in which time we’ve seen photos of people go from unreal alabaster-like skin to something much more real, color grading become prominent, and image resolution grow, even though the consumption of images has moved largely to smaller screens.

How to Get Better Skin Tones in Lightroom

One of the most subtle but crucial aspects of any portrait is the skin tones. And while you can spend lots of time in Photoshop tweaking them to be just right, sometimes, you do not want to invest that much effort into an image. This excellent tutorial will show you how to get better skin tones using only Lightroom.

Submit Your Best "Styled" Photograph
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Submit Your Best "Styled" Photograph

Submit Your Best "Styled" Photograph

For our next critique, we want to see your most "styled" photographs. This means that you spent time choosing the model, location, wardrobe, hair, makeup, etc. to create a cohesive, professional, final photograph.

This contest has ended.
A Guide to Retouching Using Frequency Separation

Frequency separation is one of the most powerful retouching tools you can use, but it takes careful technique and restraint to do it correctly. This excellent video tutorial will show you how you can incorporate frequency separation into your post-processing workflow.

A Review of the Sigma 35mm f/1.2 DG DN Art Lens

The Sigma 35mm f/1.2 DG DN Art lens is one of the newest from the company and one of the first designed specifically for mirrorless cameras. With its ultra-wide aperture, it looks to be an interesting option for Sony E and Leica L shooters, and this great review takes a thorough look at it.

Sigma's New 24-70mm f/2.8 Art Lens for Sony Is Quite Cheap

The Sigma 24-70mm f/2.8 DG DN Art lens for Sony is the newest from the company, and it brings with it the Art line's legacy of high-quality optics at affordable prices. Sigma has released the price for the lens, and it looks to be a great option for Sony shooters.

Finding Calm Photographing Gloomy Minimalist Flowers

Call it a personal project or way of finding the calm again in photographs, lately I've been shooting a portrait style “sad flower” collection and I love it. Check out the how and why and if it tickles your fancy you can give it a try too.

Can an iPhone Really Match Full Frame in Low Light?

The announcement of Night Mode promises “low-light shots never before possible on iPhone.” Between the new mode and the addition of a truly wide lens, the iPhone is more competitive than ever. But do the shots actually hold up in the field? I tested against my Nikon Z 7, with surprising results.

Canon Just Patented Some Insanely Fast Prime Lenses

Canon’s move to mirrorless may have taken a while but the Japanese manufacturer certainly now seems intent on taking full advantage of the new flange distance. Patents for three new wide-angle primes have just been submitted and the specifications are a little bit crazy.

Olympus Responds to Rumors That Its Camera Division Is Closing Down

Last week rumors circulated that on the back of a series of disastrous financial results, Olympus was about to announce that it would be closing its imaging division, ending its production of cameras and lenses. The Japanese manufacturer has since responded to these rumors.

Things You Shouldn't Say During a Boudoir Shoot

It is totally natural for your subjects to feel vulnerable or insecure during a shoot, but a boudoir session requires an extra level of professionalism and sensitivity from the photographer. This excellent video discusses many things you should avoid saying to your client during a boudoir session.

Powerhouse Camera: A Look at the Panasonic S1H

The Panasonic S1H is a highly capable camera that offers a lot of flexibility for photographers and videographers alike. Those specifications make it a very interesting potential option for the kits of a lot of users if it can hold up in real-world use. This great video tests out the new camera to help you decide if it is right for you.

Polar Pro Releases New Filters for Professionals: Meet Basecamp and Summit

Filters are an essential part of any professionals toolkit and Polar Pro has built up a great name over the past few years in the filter industry. From the ease of use, quality, and performance of their products, Polar Pro is expanding into new realms to help filmmakers and photographers at a higher level.

Why Consistency Is Crucial to Being a Successful Photographer

One thing I am always thinking about is consistency. This goes for every aspect of shooting. Does this fit my style? Do these photos flow together? Am I editing these photos exactly the same every time? Consistency is an important part of photography you might not be considering.

Ever Wondered Why Broadcast Cameras Are so Big?

Television studio cameras are massive when compared with any DSLR photography setup and are even bigger than most cinematography rigs. Check out this video for a fantastic breakdown of why they tend to be so large and cumbersome.

A Beginner's Guide to Aperture in Photography

Aperture is one of the most important fundamentals in photography, and mastering it is crucial to learning how to create better images. This excellent video will give you a great introduction to aperture and f-stops and how you can use them to take more control over your images.

The First Half of 2020 Will Brings Lots of Mirrorless Announcements From Canon

Canon is slowly filling out its mirrorless line, but there are still some cameras and lenses that photographers are waiting to complete their kits or to justify switching. The good news is that Canon seems to be planning a lot of releases for their mirrorless line in the first half of 2020.

12 Weeks of Christmas: 7 of the Best Voice Assistant Commands

Alexa, Siri, Cortana, and Assistant are here to help, and that has led to a home invasion not seen since the Body Snatchers first lifted B-rate movies in 1956. Voice control is here to stay, so how can photographers make use of it? Here are seven of the best queries.

Using a Single Speedlight and Modifier to Achieve Five Different Looks

When just starting out, It's easy to think that we need more gear, different gear, or just one more modifier that will let us achieve our goals. I challenged myself to try and shoot five different looks in my humble home studio with a single modifier and light to show just a few ideas of what you can do with them.