Most Bookmarked Articles

Environmental portraits are great for capturing people with the scene around them. If you want to show more of the environment you should try doing panoramic portraits. While traveling in New York shooting panoramic landscapes, Jay P. Morgan from The Slanted Lens had a thought to add people in the photo so he gave it a try. Since then, Morgan has taken more panoramic portraits so he decided to share his tips on how he sets up and shoots panoramic portraits.

I love visiting the countryside. It's a great way to unwind, relax, and forget about the daily office hustle, the traffic, and whatever else is synonymous with a suburban lifestyle. As a photographer, the first thing I pack is my camera bag in the hopes that I'll get a chance to capture some landscape shots. What I did not expect is to get more than I bargained for. Especially this last weekend.

I’m not a trend-setter. I’m 31, pudgy, married, and writing this from my modest ranch hidden among 5000 other modest ranches in a suburb about 90 minutes outside of New York City. I shop at Big Y, buy my clothes at Khol’s, and look forward to Sunday Night Football every Fall. I’m also not really a trend-follower. Ultimately, I spend my time under-the-radar, paying my taxes, and mulching my lawn. Which makes my switch from Nikon to Fuji pretty remarkable. 

Going through retouching related Facebook groups, it seems like the frequency separation trend is fading away. Some people even call the images edited with split frequency "filtered" as if it was as bad as using some kind of filter. Instead, many are learning to grow some appreciation for the art of dodging and burning. It’s said that with the latter, you won’t lose skin texture and it’s not destructive. But if it really is this great, how can some people still manage to have a plastic-like effect on their model’s skin? Let’s have a look at the most common mistake that may keep your images from that sought after natural look.

We have featured a few techniques to reduce noise on night sky images using multiple exposures. For a change, Greg Benz shows us how we can achieve almost similar results with images we shot in a single exposure. The process is slightly more complex than when having multiple frames, but surprisingly, the final image is quite clean! So, let’s discover the workflow offered by the maker of Lumenzia.

One of my favorite things to do, when I'm able to, is to do pro bono work for local charities that need the help. There's something special, in a way, about not being paid: the "client" is usually a lot more flexible in their expectations and they allow you more leeway in your creative process. So when I got a chance to do some marketing material for a half-marathon that benefited local emergency services, I took it. 

The modern sleep-optional lifestyle means that more and more of us have permanent bags under our eyes, which in turn means being able to retouch them is a required skill. This great tutorial will show you how to do so in almost no time.

The third and final sunrise in this series was by far the easiest to pull off and the most successful. Once again our setting is on a family vacation, except this time it featured Grandparents. Close your eyes (after the sentence of course) and imagine yourself alone about to enjoy a sunrise all to yourself on a beautiful beach in Cape Cod, MA.

Posing a client during a boudoir session can be tricky if you are not comfortable yet in your flow. Creating a set of images that you can move through without disturbing the energy in the room takes practice and a few simple tricks.

So, you’ve discovered a passion for photography and after lots of practice, you’re starting to feel more and more confident in your skills. Great! But what comes next? How do you take this growing passion from a hobby to a full-fledged career? When you’re trying to figure out how to make the jump from amateur to professional, figuring out the best way to get there can be a bit daunting, especially if you didn’t have a formal photography education. So we asked a few of the photography mentors at RookieUp to share a few of the major tips and lessons they learned while growing their own successful photography careers.

Got a spare minute? Pick one of these videos and learn a new Photoshop technique. 

Creating and maintaining backups of our data is essential in the business of photography. There are countless articles out there about the importance of backup, and anyone who has lost precious data will feel that need acutely. Data loss is not a question of if but a question of when. We need to take the necessary steps to prepare for that loss. How we do it, and the tools we can use are about as varied as the types of photography we all do. Today, I'll run you through my workflow.

The most important tool in any photographer’s arsenal is their ability to use and manipulate light. However all too often many photographers either shy away from, or completely rule out using hard light and it may be hindering not only their flexibility but also their creativity. What if you could shoot in direct sunlight and love it?

The Fujifilm X Series Mirrorless Interchangeable Lens cameras have gained a dedicated, almost cult-like following over the last few years for their colors, ergonomics, image quality, and firmware updates. However, getting into the Fuji world, especially from a DSLR user's standpoint, can be a daunting experience. Here are a few things you can do to make sure you get the most from your Fujifilm X Series system.

The inverse square law is one of the most important yet misunderstood concepts in photography. On the surface, it basically says that the intensity of a light source will decrease as you move the light away from your subject, but how does that apply to the highlights and shadows in a portrait? In this small excerpt from the "Illuminating the Face" tutorial, Peter Hurley breaks down both the math and the practical application of the inverse square law. 

Have you ever captured a really amazing picture of a car or motorcycle only to realize that you forgot to turn the headlights on while you were on location? Don't you worry about a thing because Photoshop makes it a breeze to flip on those high beams in just a few easy steps. 

Toronto-based Destination Wedding Photographer Derrel Ho-Shing created a video demonstrating the difference of natural light, flash, and high-speed sync. This might seem trivial at first glance, but having the same model, same setting, and three lighting approaches makes it obvious which setup is the winner, at least to me.

A few weeks ago I was introduced to Picspotr, which is a place for photographers to keep track of everything from their finances to contracts, clients, packages, and more via computer and mobile device. Once I hopped on and signed up, I began to really like the way everything worked. I think that this is a great business management program for a lot of photographers out there, and it wouldn't be a bad idea to check out if you don't already use another program.

We Photographers sure love our lenses! So much so that the previous article of a rather similar name received so much love that I couldn't help but write a follow up. The world is filled with amazing glass that doesn't have to completely bust the bank. Sure we all want that new Nikon 105mm f/1.4 and certainly the enormously priced brand new Nikon 70-200mm f/2.8E but do we really need them? I'd argue probably not, the market has an enormous selection of great lenses, many of which are cheaper and offer exactly what many photographers need.

For me, storage is a huge pain. On one hand, it’s simple. Buy a bunch of hard drives, back everything up, repeat. But I want to simplify it further. I hate having one system that’s speedy for in-office editing and another that’s slow, but network-connected. I couldn’t find anything that offered both a network connection and fast thunderbolt-like speeds when attached locally until I came across QNAP’s TVS-871T networked-attached storage solution that also features dual Thunderbolt connectivity.

For the past few days, the work of Russian Retoucher Max Asabin has been circulating the Internet. Much attention is turning to the talented artist, who possesses the ability to merge several photographs in order to create a dramatic scene. See more of his work and gain an insight into his work process here.

Is LinkedIn one of the most overlooked social media networks for photographers? With over 460 million users and growing, it’s not something you can just ignore. Yet, that's exactly what a lot of photographers do, myself included. We joined Facebook because everyone was already there, and Instagram just makes sense for visual professionals. LinkedIn started out as a tool for building a resume and finding a new job. As self-employed freelance individuals, do we really have a need for that?

For many photographers, the holy grail of “making it,” as a photographer is a sponsorship. The truth is that it’s really not as difficult as it sounds, but to make it easier, I’ll give you three tips to landing your first sponsorship.

How many of you like to add atmospheric effects to your work to give them more life? This is completely subjective but I tend to add fog and light streaks to my automotive glamour work to give it a little more “pop.”