Behind The Scenes

On today’s winter solstice, for some reason, I thought back to that time a couple of years ago when the Ice Bucket Challenge was floating around the internet. Remember that? The “either donate to ALS research or record yourself having a bucket of ice water dumped on your head” craze that filled up your Facebook feed in mid-2014 with terrible vertical cell phone videos of water going everywhere? Sure you do.

On a recent visit to my hometown, a friend of a friend asked if I would be able to photograph some inventory for her online art business. Most of her products were small to medium sized and she had a considerable backlog that needed to go up as quickly as possible. Being away from most of the gear in my studio, I had to improvise a bit if I was going to earn the business.

When you ever have a creative idea for a photo shoot, what do you do with that idea? When considering my own creative ideas for automotive photography, then tend to go into realm of compositions. Shooting a toy car instead isn’t the first thing that pops into my mind, but that is exactly what photographer Felix Hernandez of Hernandez Dreamphography did.

Fstoppers is happy to announce one final sale for 2016. Enjoy the holidays and dive into some fantastic photography education by getting $50-$100 off our original tutorials. If you've received some extra gift money for photography or want to share valuable knowledge with a loved one, act from now until New Years day to save on Fstoppers products. Check out the full list of deals below.

About a year and a half ago, I was walking on a local beach and realized that for a few weeks of the year, the sun would set in a perfect line of sight down the beach. I thought it might be a fun photographic challenge to create a super telephoto picture with a body builder "holding" the sun in an Atlas style pose. In my mind, the entire scene would be lit rather than have a typical sun silhouette image. Little did I realize how much work I was getting myself into.

Something about taking a simple, ordinary object like a plastic bottle and turning it into an extraordinary idea to send a message to the world is one reason why we love photography. That's exactly what Von Wong sought out to do in his latest viral project. Lets take a look at his work and behind the scenes!

Motivated by a passion for Civil War era photography, photographer Willis Bretz spent nearly two years researching battles and individuals specific to the United States Civil War in order to create a set of portraits that pay homage to those created by war photographers more than 150 years ago.

Looking to get into portrait photography? Maybe you just want to learn more or perfect your trade. Adorama’s Daniel Norton has teamed up with Joe McNally once again to bring us a series of portrait lighting tutorials for us to learn from and enjoy.

In this episode of The Slanted Lens, Jay P. Morgan is running around downtown Los Angeles capturing some product photography. He demonstrates how he is able to create interesting compositions and work with natural light to get the most usable shots possible with just a camera and a reflector.

Old and damaged photographs are easy to come by. Most have been stored in boxes in the back of a closet left to dust and wither without a second thought. That is until said person goes to tidy up one day and finds an invaluable treasure trove long forgotten.

Yet another challenge for you, gear fans. There is a nice short film shot with an iPhone 7 Plus and a RED Weapon. You watch one of the versions. Can you tell if it's shot with a $50,000 camera or with a sub-$1,000 one?

When life serves you lemons, make lemonade. At least that’s what I was always told when I was younger. Now as a professional photographer, I’m sometimes dealt lemons in terms of weather conditions. How do you make lemonade out of less than perfect weather so it benefits your set?

My latest fascination in the photography world has to be toy photography. Not just any toy photography either, I love seeing it mixed with other elements and effects to create a sense of realism to the project. Felix Hernandez of Hernandez Dreamphography is one person in particular that has me in awe.

I have a confession to make: I’m not a huge "Star Wars" fan. In fact, it’s best that no one ask me any questions about the series because I’d likely embarrass myself. Sebastien Del Grosso on the other hand may be able to provide more insight, or rather, some impressive images that pay tribute to the iconic series known across the globe by so many.

Can iconic photography be passed from father to son? This was the question that caught my attention at the beginning of this short film. Los Angeles-based street photographer Estevan Oriol’s style is intense. It’s raw and it’s edgy. It depicts a side of street culture that isn’t always positive, yet within the images a captivating reflection of humanity can be witnessed.

Nikon has teamed up with sports photographer Tom Miles and world champion martial artist Tom "Fire Kid" Duquesnoy for its new #MomentOfImpact campaign – which largely involves epic action photos of the latter smashing watermelons, cakes, and pumpkins. Check out the intense photo series here, and learn more about how it was lit and executed.

If you've kept up with what goes on in the photography world or even in the conservationist realm, chances are that you've come across at least one of Benjamin Von Wong's projects. Von Wong has recently strung together a few transcending projects that focus on conservation, raising awareness on environmental issues, and how we can make the world a better place. One of his most recent projects is focused on raising awareness of plastic pollution in the world. In part one of this video series, he shares his mindset and the preparation that goes into one of his shoots.

Being a celebrity photographer means you have access to interesting subjects, and you may have the new and cool gear. However, this is not the key to make iconic portraits. A great photographer can get the job done with almost any gear that works properly. What would you say when you see someone shooting with natural light when they have Profoto equipment at hand?

For those of you familiar with the band OK Go, in addition to their catchy songs, they've also made a name for themselves with their intricately planned out and executed music videos. With their newest video "The One Moment," they sought to literally film the entire video in just one moment.

Need a few suggestions to help you take full advantage of that inevitable Turkey-coma that's sure to set in at some point this Thanksgiving? Fstoppers compiled a few photography-related shows and documentaries for you to comb over – just in case you need some “Netflix-and-chill” time while all of that tryptophan hits your system.

Drones have grown into a standard item to own not only for videographers, but also for many photographers. Most have used them to capture images from the sky or places hardly accessible otherwise. A few have played around with these small machines to light their subject in a unique way, just like our very own Patrick Hall did when lighting a lighthouse with a DJI Phantom and a Nikon strobe. Photographer David Robinson took this to the next level and strapped an Elinchrom ELB 400 to an octocopter.

I'm that photographer who watches silently while waiting for the moment to arrive and snap one or two frames, then quickly moves on to the next worth while split second to capture. Yes I'm that girl, the one who shoots on slow shutter. At weddings this style of shooting suites me just fine, however it wasn't until this last year I learned with this skill there is another genre that lights me up even more. Grabbing up a single moment, purely just off gut instinct as a Still Photographer on an Indie film starring Ed Harris called, "A Crooked Somebody," I really harnessed my timing. Rather hunting you could say, for the exact moment when I choose to fire away, just less dramatic.

A lot of us think we know what set photography is, but Ron Jaffe is here to tell us about his incredible career and what’s going on behind the scenes that we don’t know about.

How many of you have tried to use fire to light paint a subject? What about just shooting fitness? In Brandon Wells' latest project, he decided to the mix the two together for some amazing photos.

French photographer and digital artist Cal Redback has been creating images that bring new meaning to the term, "organic portraits." Sparked by a fascination with double exposures, Redback began to photograph friends along with local plant life, blending the two together to create a unique set of portraits that seem to take on a life of their own.

This article is a twist on the more common behind the scenes post. Instead of writing about the thought process of the shot in retrospect, I am starting this article several days before the full moon, to showcase my process and mindset when planning for a once in a lifetime shot of the Supermoon.

The sequel to the BBC-produced nature documentary series, "Planet Earth II," released a few clips into the wild recently to promote its U.S. release in January. You may have noticed one of these scenes making the rounds on social media in the last few days, which was a masterfully edited clip that features snakes chasing an iguana. If you were curious how they filmed some of this material, there are a few behind-the-scenes clips out that show how it was done.

Adobe Sneaks is the software company's behind-the-scenes sneak peek into ongoing projects that could eventually — if we're lucky — find their way into one or more products. This year at MAX, Adobe previewed a number of tools that should excite virtual-reality editors, desktop designers, and audio editors working on long-form speech formats.

A couple of years ago I was tasked with getting a shot of grape stomping for a local food magazine, Edible Ozarkansas, who were doing a story on the history of local wine production in Arkansas. Right away, images of Lucy and Ethel of "I Love Lucy" stomping grapes in the giant barrel came scrolling through my mind. Challenge accepted.

Canon’s newest flagship cinema EOS camera was put into the hands of Cinematographer Russell Carpenter and ASC and Canon Explorer of Light Tyler Stableford. Together they created the beautiful short film, "The Calling," that takes a look into the lives of three people in the American West.

Filmmaker Stephen Vitale and Writer Eric Carrasco​ created a truly epic Star Wars fan fiction. When I came across this short, I found myself wishing they made a behind-the-scenes video so I could post them both for you all to enjoy. Turns out they did. So I did. And you will.

It's finally time to wrap up our behind the scenes series of Mike Kelley's Where Art Meets Architecture 2 photography tutorial. In this episode Mike photographs a 12 million dollar house on a cliff in Hawaii, and we wrap up our trip with an incredible swim with wild dolphin.

From a personal experience I've found that the more mature the person is, the more honest the portraits are being captured. These people have seen it all, especially celebrities. They are not camera shy. It's a privilege to work with such subjects. You can't have a bad photograph of them, yet you need to make history by capturing an iconic photo of that person. In this behind-the-scenes video, Celebrity Photographer Mark Seliger captures portraits of legendary singer Tony Bennett on his 90th birthday.

Since I fell in love with portraiture I've daydreamed about traveling the world to take pictures of people. It's not a unique dream and it's not an overly farfetched dream, but it isn't a job that often comes up. One of the ways in which artists get commissioned to do something along those lines, however, is the Lavazza Calendar. It has seen the likes of Mark Seliger, Annie Leibovitz, and Steve McCurry behind the camera for them in recent years and this year, Joey L got the nod.

Benjamin Von Wong is back with another magnificent set from his latest series, ‘Surreal Lava Portraits,’ where he ventures out on the Big Island of Hawaii to photograph some lava flows with his team and models. If this was anyone else, I would jump to the conclusion that this is all composited together to make the final image. But with Von Wong, this is all real.