A week and a half ago we asked the community to submit their best environmental portraits to be critiqued by Lee and Patrick. We got some awesome submissions and one lucky entrant won a free Fstoppers tutorial.
If you watch a lot of YouTube vlogs or tutorials on landscape photography, you're probably pretty used to voice-overs and background music. And while those are fine for storytelling and education, they might hide what the experience is actually like. This great video will show you the natural experience.
A few months ago, Fstoppers released “Photographing The World 3” with Elia Locardi. This 18-hour tutorial covers everything you could want to know about landscape and cityscape photography.
Have you ever wondered how people start full time in photography and even take it one step further by working and living as a full-time landscape photographer? Dave Morrow is one of those people and he spends his days in the middle of nowhere to capture the best images.
G.A.S (Gear Accumulation Syndrome), is something all photographers feel it at some point in their careers. That feeling the gear they have is never good enough. Learn how to overcome that, and start taking the photos you've always dreamed of today.
Creating long exposure is fun, but having the right tools to paint magic shapes with light makes it even better. The Magilight by Fotorgear is meant to help you bring to life the most insane long exposure you’ve ever dreamed of. Here is its review.
My social media feeds are full of awesome photographs at epic locations taken by talented photographers. So, why don’t any of them want to tell the Internet where they got the shot?
Sports Illustrated is doing something it has never done before in a project titled, "In Her Words," for its 2018 Swimsuit Issue. The magazine ditched the swimsuits for fully nude, all black and white, unedited shots that convey incredible messages to society.
Artificial lighting can be a bit daunting when you're first starting out, with a range of modifiers, setups, and techniques to learn. This great video will introduce you to grids and show you both why and how they're used in artificial lighting scenarios.
A photo you have taken going viral is a double-edged sword: you want it to happen, but at the same time, you relinquish control and too often, credit for your work. When Michel Klooster’s controversial wedding photo went viral, his Photologo watermark kept his name intrinsically linked with the story.
Quick Masks in Photoshop are used while making selections within your image and can help speed up any local adjustments needed. Here’s a jump start at getting familiar with the tool and its potential.
I went through some situations over the past four months that was making me question if I chose the right company in Sony. After hours of research and really weighing the pros and cons of all the big name companies, I chose to stick with them. In this video, I’ll give you my five reasons why.
I often struggle to give my videos the same energy and flow that Peter Mckinnon or Casey Neistat have in theirs. I would blame the fact that I might not have the gear or budget they have. But, those days are over.
The word portrait often comes associated with studio and lights. But let us not forget the fun in shooting with natural light. This quick article is about the importance of understanding the light when you are making natural light portraits.
Danielle King walks through the advances that we’ve seen from major lens manufacturers in recent years, and peers into what we’ll want the most from the future.
LRTimelapse is without a doubt the best piece of software to manage extreme day-to-night and night-to-day transition when capturing a time-lapse sequence. This flicker remover program changed the industry for good and a new version with many improvements has just been announced. Here is what you need to know about it.
The Sony a7R III has generally been receiving glowing reviews for being a more refined and capable version of its predecessor. In this video, you'll see one area that has seen a huge improvement is tethering speed, allowing for a much faster studio workflow.
I will speak from a perspective of a non-American here. I find lots of U.S.-based photographers who are working on projects they hate, and they admit it. I tried to dig into the reasons for that, and here are my conclusions, and my advices.
This video of SpaceX's Falcon Heavy rocket sending a Tesla into space is extra special. Why? Because of 3D sound. Grab your headphones, as this is truly immersive audio.
The voyage we opted to take is exactly that, an adventurous voyage and not a straight, smooth road to success. Remember that when you doubt yourself and question your potential. Unlike most occupations, the artist has no roadmap for their success. We’re not handed a list of classes to take in a preferred order created by the educational institute.
With wildlife photography, much of it is giving yourself the opportunity to be in right spot and the right time. But sometimes it’s not realistically possible to be present behind the camera when your skittish subject is nearby in the frame. That’s where camera trap photography comes in.
When it comes to retouching as best as possible, a graphics tablet is crucial. It gives more control and allows for fine adjustments that are extremely hard to get with a mouse or trackpad. I’ve been a longtime Wacom Intuos Pro user and always loved it. However, I’ve always wondered what it was like to edit on a screen. Recently, I've had the opportunity to try a couple of these including the Acepen 2150, a cheap alternative to the Wacom Cintiq line. In this review, I’ll explain what I loved about it but also tell you why retouching directly on a screen is not for everyone.
The U.K. recently experienced an incredible lunar eclipse by the name of “super blue blood moon.” Here, one professional skyline and cityscape photographer, Michael Tomas, aka London Viewpoints, talks us through photographing the momentous event, as well as his other impressive works.
Cruising in an airplane high above Earth you sometimes get to see places that are nearly impossible to reach, or even view, from the ground. Taking photos of those sights is not only fun but it can serve as a memory that you were sort of there in the first place. If you like geography, geology, or history in general it can also be an excellent reference so that you can investigate the area further once you’re back on terra firma.
The business of being a creative is a challenging one. With the market becoming ever more competitive and more people entering the industry, it's becoming increasingly more important to learn new strategies to help us not only compete, but dominate. In this video I will share three principles that I learned from playing video games that helped form my mindset on business and how it can help you improve your business in 2018.
Relying on your camera screen to nail exposure is a sure recipe for disaster. Depending on the lighting situation, the contrast of your display, how it’s back-lit, as well as other parameters, you’ll see the luminosity values differently. To make sure you get it perfect, there are tools available to you. In this 10-minute long video, Haapoja from TravelFeels will list most of them and explain which is best for what situation.
They say you never really know what goes on behind closed doors. This photography series, though, is shedding light on one of the most taboo sexual trends there is: BDSM. Here, one photographer shoots his subjects in both their everyday clothes, and their BDSM style.
Let's face it, these days most of us don't print the majority of our photographs. Typically they will live on forever on the Internet whether it be via social media, cloud storage solution, or your own website. In today's world, people rather compare sensor technology by pixel-peeping and zooming in to a photograph at 300 percent, criticizing the camera for not rendering a leaf out perfectly half a mile away on screen. What if we took a step back, away from our crazy magnification, and actually hit Cmd+p and looked at how photographs were meant to be viewed: printed.
Want to win over $30,000 in cash and a full Leica M system? Well there's a photo contest for you. One of the most acclaimed international photographic competitions is back for the 38th year and we've got the entry dates so you can start shooting.
The process of color correcting and color grading in filmmaking is an art of its own. Even if you do not work with video, such techniques can bring your photographs to the next level. The goal of this short tutorial is not creating an orange and teal look, but rather teaching you how ambient light affects highlights, midtones, and shadows of the skin. Knowing this technique you can color grade visuals the way you see them in many films.
Peter Lik, whom many believe is the world's most successful photographer, recently released an image that is pretty unbelievable.
For some of us becoming old may be a thing of a distant future, for others it may be a day-to-day experience. However, for many of us "empathy for our older population is lacking, and audiences need reminding that we are all aging and old people need to feel the joy of human interaction too". This is one of many reasons why photographer, known simply as "Z", has put together a photographic exhibition to highlight the legacy of those who may find themselves lonely and forgotten.
Photography is complex. I’ve mentioned it before and I’ll state it again: it is not easy. There’s so much to learn in order to become proficient in the art. Cameras, composition, light, and subject interaction. These are just some of the things that will decide if you’re able to do well. The key to learning each of these things is time. Time, and a sprinkle of perseverance, will get you so much further than any new gear purchase you can make. Today, I’d like to take a look at how we can learn some elements of our photography and further our craft.
With the new year now well underway, I took some time this week to ponder my motivations for doing photography in the first place. I think it is healthy to every now and again stop and evaluate where you are, what you’re doing, and whether or not it is worth spending your precious time on. Maybe there are some nuggets of useful information from this exercise that will prove useful for you. If nothing else, perhaps it’ll nudge you to reflect on your own photographic journey and help you get to where you want to go.
The upcoming March issue of British Vogue has a Hadid sister on the front and back cover draped in shimmering Versace gowns and in the inside spread a photo suggesting incest?
The trailer has arrived for Steven Soderbergh’s new film. Starring Claire Foy, the thriller was shot entirely using iPhones. Review the footage here.
The price of videography equipment has its reasons, but those justifications often remain a mystery to most of us. From cameras that cost thousands of dollars or cine lenses that are close to the price of a car, it’s hard to justify such prices to ourselves, let alone explain to your loved one why you got a new lens instead of going on vacation! In this video, Sawyer Hartman sheds light on the difference between a $100 photography lens and a $5,000 cine lens in the most comprehensive way possible.
Sometimes, photography is too easy. After churning out perfect images left and right, I really felt I like I needed a challenge that would put my God-like skills to the test. Of course, that’s complete crap, but occasionally I do see the need to challenge myself and alternative processes are a great way to learn about the craft of photography while having a bit of fun floundering in failure. To that end, I’ve learned my first alternative process: the kallitype.
For a while now, I have been a big fan of the videos that Tony and Chelsea Northrup put together. Their channel is a wealth of knowledge that I visit many times. This particular video, one of their most recent, is one I found to be particularly helpful. If you are like me in that you don't often have the chance to shoot in fog, much less shoot in it frequently, then these tips will be helpful to make the timing and execution of your foggy excursions be that much more successful.
Traveling 5,500 kilometers in six weeks, Filmmaker Florian Nick explored the wilds of British Columbia and Alberta in search of beautiful scenery, capturing 54,000 photos along the way. The result is a gorgeous time-lapse film showcasing the best of the region in stunning detail and sweeping scale. Nick discussed the making of the film with Fstoppers.
What if instead of settling in on yet another evening of editing that overwhelming avalanche of photos, and half heartedly watching Netflix in your pajamas, tonight you excite your palette with a tasty libation while rubbing elbows with a group of like-minded photography enthusiasts. I don’t know about you, but I’m sold.
Most of us are relatively familiar with the history of photography in the last decade or so, but I'd argue its early years were far more interesting, with patent wars abounding and chemicals making people crazy (ok, maybe I'm glad that part is no longer an issue). This fascinating documentary details the history of early photographic processes, their development, and the stories of the people behind them.
I just watched Justin Timberlake's "Say Something" video, and then, I watched it again. No doubt that's professional production work. Knowing the technical challenges of such a video, for me it felt like I was watching a reality show. The almost "unplugged" vibe of the song was so right for that video that the rest of my senses could be focused on how those guys pull that work off (pun intended). This article will be a humble attempt to reveal how they shot the video.
If you're a photographer living in a coastal city, hobbyist or otherwise, it's almost a given you've taken your camera seaside to snap what you were hoping to be some stunners. This has been the case for me, and I was sorely disappointed when my photos were nothing like what I had imagined they would be. If only there were an extensive, nit-picking guide to creating the photos you see in your head. Anton Gorlin has created just that: an impressively in-depth guide to seascape photography that really gets down to the nitty-gritty.
Newborn babies tend to have different skin than their older counterparts and thus different retouching requirements. This helpful tutorial will show you everything you need to know about retouching newborn skin quickly and effectively in Photoshop.
I was cycling to catch my train a few weeks ago and after I had folded the bike and stowed it in the luggage area, was pondering the things in life I couldn't live without. It was much to my surprise that, considering this question, I actually decided it was my bike (Joey). I use it for commuting, for shopping, for leisure; it is with me most days of the week, and without it, the impact on my day-to-day life would be dramatic.
You’ve reached a point with your work at which shooting friends and family doesn’t quite cut it. Your curiosity to challenge yourself and move forward is piqued, and you have a good sense of established skills that make you think seeking out agency-represented models is your best move. The question is: Where do you go from here and how do you even start?
When it comes to filming, using a fast shutter speed is generally a bad idea. For most applications, you'll probably want to keep your shutter speed somewhere around 1/60 of a second, maybe even slower, depending of course on what frame rate your shooting at. The reason for this is because it allows for more smoother and cinematic looking footage which isn't choppy or harsh looking. Faster shutters speeds generally can be a little jarring to look at. The problem with this is that to compensate for this slower shutter speed you may need to stop your lens down. This, in turn, prevents you from getting that shallow depth of field, especially when filming outdoors.
Wrapping up the shooting for your latest vlog is always a satisfying feeling but, of course, the work has only just begun. Cutting, editing, adding sound, text; the list of finishing touches for your vlog goes on. One way to speed up that workflow is to accomplish as much of the work as possible in camera, reducing your workload once you've uploaded your content to your computer. Daniel DeArco has put together a vlog showing off some really easy and effective transitions that will take your vlog from static to dynamic with minimal extra effort.
At one point or another, we all end up questioning our decisions to pursue a creative career over more “traditional” options. If you've never questioned yourself along the way, then congratulations, you're an outlier. It's far too common that we find ourselves creating stress when dealing with self-doubt. Whether you're just beginning to think about a creative career, you're just starting out, or you've been at this for decades, this video might be able to offer some perspective on addressing some of the tough questions that we ask ourselves.
