Smoke grenades: foul smelling, clothes staining, and a primary tool for celebrating the birth of our nation. Recently, while in Austin Texas, I was introduced to a model, Valerie who suggested we use smoke bombs during the shoot. I was immediately intrigued at the creative possibilities...

Fujifilm's medium format range doesn't have a huge selection of lenses, but it does have some utterly superb glass never the less. Their latest release has turned a few heads, but how good is it for portraiture?

Learning how to effectively diffuse light is one of the most powerful skills any photographer can have, as it leads to softer and more flattering portraits. This excellent video tutorial will show you how to use different kinds of diffused light for better portraits.

Many of the reflectors available today come with a few different colored panels that can create slightly different results in portrait photography. Compare the looks with this quick educational video.

Have you ever wondered what Donald Trump would look like if you combined 50 random photos of him and averaged them together? That's exactly what Reddit user Dwainosaur did with his latest photo/data mashup. Using commonly found images on Google, these composites of celebrities like Barack Obama, Kayne West, Bill Murray, and Brad Pitt almost look like pencil drawings. The results are pretty eerie and give a pretty good idea what each of these well known people would look like as a ghost.

The film versus digital debate has raged on for over a decade now. Digital cameras are so capable that it seems silly for anyone to go back to an archaic medium like film. Film is slow, expensive (sort of), lacks many game-changing features found in today's digital cameras, and has lower resolution (sort of). But it has some qualities to it that make it an entirely viable medium for working photographers and enthusiasts alike. One of which that I firmly believe in is that it will make you a better photographer.

Robbie Augspurger is a professional photographer from Portland, Oregon with a grand affinity for the generation of "Back to the Future," big hair, and stone washed jeans. He's started an ongoing '80s glamour shot series that began when a friend asked him to take his actor headshots. To prepare for the shoot, Augspurger bought a 30 year old Photogenic FlashMaster light kit and asked his roommate to pose for some shots in a three-piece tweed suit. With inspiration from photographs found in an old shoe box, or on the dashboard of his dad's pick-up truck, he had a concept in motion: creating vintage thread clad characters for the portrait series "Glamour & Headshots".

Posing for the camera my not come easily to everyone. If you understand the basics of posing but still find yourself looking for a way to improve the shots, here are a few tips you can use.

While technical education and quality equipment become more accessible every year, one thing remains the domain of each individual photographer: vision. As proof, see how three different photographers interpret the same brief.

After 17 years in the video game industry, Bert McLendon decided to change things up and become a full time portrait photographer. For the past few years he shot many interesting people and families in the studio and had great local success in Austin Texas. Earlier this year Bert decided to try a fun experiment in his spare time, and the result went viral. Check out his great and unique Caricature portraits and learn how he's creating them.

Pet photography is as popular as ever right now, as more and more people become pet owners. In fact, according to a recent survey by American Pet Products Association, nearly 80 million American households have pets.

Retouching and photography have always gone hand-in-hand, but what are the possible implications, if any, for publicly sharing retouched images of your baby daughter?

One of the most important things in photography is lighting. It doesn't matter if it's natural light or artificial light, how you capture it is key. Here are a few tips on how you can improve your lighting.

Many portrait photographers miss opportunities to elevate their work by sticking to the same techniques. Exploring creative lighting, framing, and color choices can make your portraits distinctive and more engaging.

One of the really great things about the Fuji GFX 50s is the fact that it has a shutter built into the camera instead of it being in the lens. With a sync speed of only 1/125 of a second, on the surface, this may seem like a massive downside for the Fuji compared to the Hasselblad X1D which uses a leaf shutter mechanism. Instead, this one feature opens the GFX to a whole world of adaptable lenses and possibilities.

There are many ways to light a subject, both complex and simplistic, and while you might be always tempted to go for the most complicated setups, knowing the classics is important too. Classic lighting is classic for a reason and you may find yourself using it more often than you expect.

Professional models can take a lot of the burden off the photographer by bringing their posing expertise to the table. However, you will not always have the benefit of shooting with a professional model, and it is important to have the ability to pose normal people. This great video will show you lots of posing ideas for men who are not models.

American Photographer Ted Tahquechi is shining a light on visually impaired artists through his own thought-provoking body of work, "Landscapes of the Body." After a car accident in 1999 left him almost completely blind, Tahquechi found himself having to explore new and dynamic ways to capture the world around him on film.

How would it feel to photograph Will Ferrell or Seth Rogen? How would you ever get to be able to shoot clients like these? How do you marry technical capability and develop your own style to deliver something unique? What if you could learn from someone doing this sort of work day in day out? Well, now you can, in this exclusive interview with Emily Shur.

Recently I bought a new Vizsla puppy named Leo. I decided to take a few portraits of Leo in the studio and I put them on Facebook. They became my most liked images of all time. Yesterday I went back to the studio to create a video on how I did it.

Alex Koloskov has had a few of his behind the scenes videos featured here on fstoppers. In this charismatic behind the scenes video, Alex takes the photography assignment of shooting some liqueur bottles in an attractive way and walks us through his set up. His in depth explanation of the lighting and staging process gives you a great understanding of how he got his final "sexy" shot.

The human expression is, for me, the most powerful form of communication we have. We all remember the looks our moms and dads gave us when we did something wrong, or the look on the face of the person we love when we proposed. These looks are just a few of the powerful ways we can communicate with no words, and it’s this that is the holy grail in portrait photography, whether it be stills or video.

It happened. After wrestling with lighting, posing, finding the right angle and composition, and bringing out that perfect moment, you finally caught the shot. It's everything you saw in your head and more. This! This is what it's all about. You've got the butterflies in your stomach that accompany that feeling when you've managed to get your art out into the real world. "Can I see it?" Oh no. "Sure," you say, doing your best to sound enthusiastic. "Hmm...it's nice, but I look fat. Can we try something else?" "Of course we can," you say, "let's switch it up." All the while you're thinking in your head that it was perfect as it was.

When I first saw the Love Wins project, I was moved by the beauty of the photographs and the important message that they represent. As a society, we have come a long way since Stonewall and the beginning of the AIDS epidemic, but there are still so many people in the world who have misconceptions and hatred of LGBTQ people. The Love Wins project is a series of portraits and stories that aim to bring consistent visibility to LGBTQ marriage in a positive light. Its entire premise is to showcase love, family, and equality. I had the opportunity to sit down with Gia Goodrich, the Portland, Oregon based photographer behind the photo project and find out what inspired her to create this collection of photos.

I enjoy taking headshots for people, and I shy away from the commercial, copy-paste, white background styles where the deliverable image is straight out of the camera. However, last month, I combined my preferred style of headshot with the number of subjects you'd typically see with a large corporate, straight-out-of-the-camera shoot. Here's what I learned.