Do you often think about the significance of the subject you are photographing? What if you knew it would be gone forever someday? Though we don’t always realize it in the moment the shutter clicks, the images we capture with our cameras become more precious when the subjects in those images no longer exist.
With the market inundated with countless products, it can be overwhelming to choose the right price point for the gear you need. Does the price tag truly reflect the quality and performance of the equipment? Let's dive into this question.
Camera manufacturers have faced a tough time in recent years as sales dwindled, whilst photographers have demanded ever better products and the development of mirrorless systems. COVID-19 added insult to injury by essentially halting production. How have manufacturers fared? Everyone is a loser, but who has lost less than anyone else?
If you love shooting landscapes, you probably thought about using neutral density. Perhaps you already own a set of nice filters, but do you know which filter you need to use? This beginners guide can help you choosing the right neutral density filter.
You've probably seen thousands of articles on screen calibration and you may strive to deliver perfect images and videos. Unfortunately, in the end, your client views them on their non-calibrated way-too-blue or way-too-orange screens. Sometimes they say "looks good to me." Other times the response may be "it's too dark," or "it's too blue." They may even edit your photos to make them look "better." How do you handle these situations and is it really critical for you calibrate your monitors?
As a personal approach to traveling, I generally bring more gear than I think I’ll ever use. As is almost always the case, I find that there’s something more I should have brought or, conversely, something I should have left behind.
Scrolling through my Facebook newsfeed this week brought up something interesting. Dan Fable, a Manchester musician turned photographer/videographer, was offering an insane deal for bands. What’s more insane is that people weren’t taking him up on the cheap offer.
Raised in a small farming community in Saskatchewan, Canada, Chad Carpenter found himself far from the idea of ever being a boudoir retoucher. Boudoir in a small conservative town can be considered taboo and Carpenter never imaged he would be leaving his job in order to work as the main retoucher for his wife's boudoir company.
A major concern I hear from boudoir photographers is the lack of a formal studio space for shooting. While I do have a downtown studio in a historic area of Palatka, Florida, if I am traveling there is not always that option of finding a shared area. Understanding how to create your own studio space in hotels, vacation homes, or Airbnbs can bring your boudoir business front and center to potential clients.
What a time to be alive for photography! Advances in technology, combined with reduction in pricing and the “gear wars” that brands wage against each other continue to make image-making hardware of the highest quality more and more accessible to the every person. This market process continues to make it possible for us to minimize sacrifices in image quality we once made when shooting in less than optimal conditions.
In the world of photography, preparation goes a long way. From creating mood boards weeks in advance, communicating with everyone who will be on set, to making sure your gear is in proper working order, there is a lot to do before you even shoot. Whether you are shooting in the studio, working on a large scale shoot, or just going for a photo walk with some friends, here is a simple list of steps to make sure you are ready the night before a shoot.
The golden hour, a cherished time for photographers, offers breathtaking opportunities at both sunrise and sunset. While both moments provide stunning lighting conditions, there is something truly magical about sunrise photography. This article explores the top five reasons why sunrise photography shines brighter than its counterpart, sunset photography, why many choose to set their alarm at a ridiculous hour, leave their warm bed, and head out into the darkness with their camera bags packed with both certainty and uncertainty.
Storage management is a common issue shared by many photographers due to the constant increase of the megapixel counts in our cameras. Here is a detailed guide about the storage options and how to make the right choice based on your photo-video needs.
When Lightroom mobile was initially released a few years back, I, like many Adobe users at that time, was curious, and found myself finger tapping all the way to my phone's respective App Store to download it. After that addition to my phone was made, the once fresh home screen icon for a long time sat irrelevant, and relegated to the end of the bench, placed inside of a seldom seen, far lateral, home screen folder.
A short while ago, I wrote about a kerfluffle with White Castle’s social media team about a photo I took of their Impossible Slider. At issue was the way White Castle (and other large companies) treated people who asked for some form of compensation for their photos to be used on the company’s social pages.
If you began shooting video within the last five to eight years, it's quite likely that you rode the "5D Mark II wave." Maybe you didn't own a 5D, and still don't, but that camera revolutionized the world of video production forever. Not only did that camera enable many "budget" filmmakers to make top notch content, it inspired almost every manufacturer to begin shoving video into every camera they could. No longer was it necessary to buy a dedicated video camera to create motion pictures. While I will certainly credit Canon with originally bringing professional video capability to the masses, I have to hand it to Sony for rocketing "DLSR video" to another level entirely.
Announced back in June, Nikon’s first macro lenses for the Z mount appeared to be typical successors to their F mount predecessors, covering 50mm and 100mm focal lengths. The Z 105mm, as before, is a more premium choice, offering a few more features and a more choice designation. I’ve finally gotten my hands on one, and after some thorough testing, I’m ready to share my thoughts on this recent entry to the Z lineup. Whether you’re a macro specialist or Z photographer, you’ll want to check out this review.
Whether you are looking to get into astrophotography or take your skills to the next level, 2021 has lots of great astronomical events happening all over the world. Planning in advance and being in the right place at the right time is the first step to getting amazing shots.
When creating imagery of any night landscape, you are taking your camera and the other equipment you own and pushing them to their limits. With that in mind, should photographers be upset when their favorite imagery is put together in post?
We all know that one of the necessary parts of starting as a photographer is working for free in order to gain exposure. Working for free is a great starting point to build your portfolio, develop your technique, and build a name for yourself as a photographer without the pressure or expectations of a client. The hard part is knowing when to accept free jobs and when to start charging for your services.
There’s nothing worse than wrapping up a shoot that you’re really proud of only to have your client tell you that they’re not happy with the final images. If this happens, you really only have two options: either take the time to re-shoot or provide a refund. Either way, there’s about a zero percent chance that you will get a referral from them. By simply sharing your images with your clients on set, you can make sure that everyone is on the same page and you can begin the editing process with peace of mind and confidence that your client is going to be thrilled with your final product.
Photographers get your resumes and portfolios updated. A recent search lead to some interesting opportunities for the right people with varying degrees of experience.
When I first saw this photo series, I don't know what resonated with me more: the images or the stories that accompany them. I reached out to photographer Waleed Shah to discuss the poignant project.
Shooting live music appears to polarise photographers, with some enjoying it and some disliking the lack of creative control. While it isn't my favourite genre to put my camera to work, I do get some satisfaction from the atmosphere, unusual lighting, and singular poses. I noticed, however, that I had a bad habit: I didn't move very much and simply reframed the images using different focal lengths of my 70-200mm. So I decided to take a risk.
When a commercial photographer, Sasha Leahovcenco, decides to document the touching experience and life of people he has never met before, the result is quite astonishing. You would think pre-production played a huge part and that he had to have had exceptional gear, carried by a huge team, but the truth is far from that. The experience was the heart of this series, and the pictures show it well. Combining both journalistic and commercial genres with a very personal approach yields pictures we only wish we could see more often.
On a day-to-day basis, we go through hundreds or even thousands of photographs mainly through social media. Especially for people with many photographer friends, every scroll is a stroll through a usually poorly curated gallery. If you stop and take a close look at most of the photographs, chances are that you will see certain instances where the photographer has "stopped seeing" somewhere in their creative process.
This past February I had the great privilege of meeting Allan Henry, general manager and the main driving force behind the up-and-coming camera bag company Atlas Packs. After our first interaction, I knew that this product and company were doing something special.
As a beginner to photography, you can feel as if you're at the base of an infinitely tall mountain. However, there are many different paths up it, some easier than others.
For freelance creatives, earning passive income is a great way to increase your annual profits, but getting a large library of images uploaded can be a daunting task. Plus, which agency should you use? When will you find time? The simple answer is the time is now, and the sooner you jump on, the sooner it will pay out.
One of the first things I heard when I sat down at a large white table with Light CTO and Co-Founder Dr. Rajiv Laroia and VP of Marketing Bradley Lautenbach was that, when it comes to lenses, plastic is better than glass. Scratching my head for a bit, while searching for some logic, but keeping an open mind (I did ask for a meeting with the guy who decided to put 16 lenses in a small box and call it the future of photography), the meeting proceeded to somewhat blow my mind… if it’s all true.
Lars Schneider, an adventure and landscape photographer from Germany, spent two months on the road with his family traveling across the Southwestern US. This video documents his trip, but I also interviewed Lars about the challenges and rewards of running a photography business on the road, while at the same time taking care of a family.
A photographer has claimed he is ready to retire due to his dire financial situation after a multiple year-long legal battle over the copyright surrounding images taken by monkeys on his camera.
An artist recently won a respected photographic portrait competition with a work that wasn't a portrait at all in the traditional sense, causing a large controversy and outcry. For the most part, however, the work is not being given fair or proper consideration it deserves, and that's a shame, because it stunts the growth of a genre.
It’s about the time of year where many people are looking for gift ideas. This list outlines multiple options for a film photographer at multiple price points.
Shooting fashion can be a whirlwind of activity as you try to corral a team of creatives into constructing an amazing array of images. More than with any other type of shoot, I find that things have tendency to go wrong during the course of the fashion shoot. As the photographer, it is your job to not only be prepared for these things to happen, but also to be fully equipped to solve the problems as they come up. Below you will find a series of things I like to keep in my camera bag that are often saviors during a shoot that seems to be going belly-up.
There's a lot of negativity and poor advice on photography on the internet, and that can put off amateur photographers — photographers who would otherwise go on to become full-time professionals. So, here's some of the best advice for amateur photographers who want to make it.
The dreaded 2016 has come to an end and from the ashes has risen a brand new year filled with creative opportunity. Everyone wants to be better this year than they were last year, no matter what year it is and 2017 will be no different. Improvement, however, doesn't just happen, it begins with a plan. If you don't have one, you need one. Antoine De Saint-Exupéry once wrote: "A goal without a plan is a wish." He was right, stop waiting for a road to being a better photographer to reveal itself and instead start paving one for yourself.
Some photographers still believe that it’s important to shoot in manual mode, no matter what situation they’re in. As long as the correct exposure is achieved, it isn’t important if this is done manually or partly by the camera itself. But sometimes, manual is indeed the best choice.
You don't have to look too far right now to see terms like crypto art and NFT being banded around. What is all the fuss about? And what could this "gold rush" mean for photographers?
When the Sony World Photography Awards (WPA) suddenly decided to remove photographs of Hong Kong protests from its website, it destroyed its credibility as a competition. If the decisions of the judges are being edited to avoid upsetting the Chinese government, how is this not censorship?
We’ve all been there; the studio is set, the model is awkwardly waiting, but the light isn’t quite right and the stress begins to build. With every test shot, the light quality increases and the anxiety level decreases. Finally, like a blast of cool breeze on a hot day, everything clicks into place. The light is perfect.
The Perseid Meteor Shower peak has come and gone for 2021. This year the Moon’s interference was minimal, setting early in the evening around the predicted peak days, but luck always plays a major role in anyone’s success.
A lot of photographers seem to fall for promises that presets make, and sometimes, they are true. There are packs out there that give decent results. But the problem with presets is that they do the creative work for you instead of helping you be the creative you wish to be. And that is what is holding you back. But what if there's one unique preset that will distinguish your work from everyone else's? You can't buy it, but you can develop it. Here's how.
In the past few years, the growing number of wedding photographers and their vast range of prices have made finding your value as a photographer challenging. This series of articles will help you to navigate your prices to meet your goals and earn your worth as a wedding photographer.
The mania surrounding food photography is a pretty recent phenomenon. In the last decade, what used to be a niche in photography took social media by storm and ever since has been one of the favorite topics for a huge amount of accounts. It is supposedly the second most popular subject of photography fanatics on Instagram after the selfie tsunami. I sat down to talk with Hein van Tonder, a food photographer carving his way into the food royalty.
In the world of digital photography, our discussion topic has always revolved around equipment, software tricks, and tips for getting better images. But deep down, we should know that data management discipline after every shoot is also crucially important. After all, what is there to edit and publish if there is mishandling of our photo files?
Like any specialist occupation, photography is an expensive one. There are big savings that can make it affordable for the professional, some of which can help the amateur too.
When most think about maternity photography, the visual is light airy looks with flowers wrapping the soon to be mother. However there have been many changes in the way photographers are shooting this genre and many photographers want to break the stereotype.
I read articles on here all the time about wedding photographers losing all of their gear while traveling, break-ins at studios, and general destruction of camera gear. In spite of all of this, I decided to cancel my equipment insurance.
