Photography Education

Whether you just picked up your first camera or you've been shooting for years and hit a plateau, there's always more to learn. This section is where Fstoppers publishes educational content aimed at genuinely improving your photography — not just gear tips, but the foundational understanding of light, composition, and visual thinking that makes the difference between a competent photographer and a compelling one.

10 Tips to Improve Your Waterfall Photography

Waterfalls are one of the most popular subjects for landscape photographers, as they offer the chance to create dramatic images that capture the viewer's imagination. If you are interested in improving your waterfall photos, this great video will give you 10 helpful tips to get you on your way. 

The Creative Use of Color in Editing Photos

Editing is your chance to add your personal touch to an image, and perhaps nowhere is that more possible than the manipulation of color. This excellent video features two professional photographers discussing one's creative use of color to give his photos a strong identity and how you can apply the principles to your own photos. 

Learn How to Create These Stunning Valentine Beauty Shots

It can be a lot of fun to deviate from the standard shoot and explore your creative side a bit. If you are looking to invigorate your photos a bit, this excellent video will show you two different looks based on a Valentine's Day theme and how they were shot. 

Three Things You Shouldn't Do in Lightroom

There are many articles and videos on how to do certain things in Lightroom, but how often do you read about something that you shouldn't do? Let's cover a few of them. 

Lightroom is a fantastic digital asset manager and image editor. Whether you use Lightroom for just organizing and keywording your photos or use it for editing, there are a few things you shouldn't do.

Straighten Extreme Distortions With Ease

Super wide-angle lenses can expand the field of vision in your images, but they often come with an unwanted side effect — lens distortion. The good news is distortion can easily be fixed in Photoshop with this tool. 

How to Use Radial Filters to Accentuate Your Subject in Lightroom

While there are a lot of advanced and intricate techniques for working with your images, one of the simplest but most effective methods for accentuating your subject in Lightroom is the radial filter. This helpful video will show you how the radial filter works and how to use it to help emphasize your subjects in Lightroom. 

5 Reasons You Might Be Making Couples Look Awkward in Portraits

Posing can be a tricky thing for a lot of photographer, and it can twice as tough when you are doing it with a couple. If you find you have trouble posing couples in a natural way, this great video will show you five reasons why your couples portraits might be a bit awkward. 

10 Tips for Faster Video Editing in Premiere Pro

Video editing can be a really time-consuming task, and as such, it is important to learn not just how to do something, but how to do it in the most efficient way possible. This excellent video will give you 10 tips to help you edit more quickly in Premiere Pro. 

Don't Be Afraid of Failure

Failure is something every creative has to deal with, no matter how talented they are or how far along they are in their careers. Whether it is rejection or a personal project that did not work out as expected, failure is something we will always deal with and something that we should learn to embrace. 

Are White Rainbows Possible?

Much of landscape photography is being in the right place at the right time. Some photographers know these places and times based on their extensive experience. The more knowledge you have, the better the chances that you'll be in that right place at the right time. 

9 Useful Tips on Photographing Waterfalls

One of my favorite disciplines of landscape photography is to photograph waterfalls. If you go through my portfolio there is a waterfall or two in there. Here I share nine useful tips to photograph them. 

Improve Your Portraits with These Simple Posing Tips

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. 

A Beginner's Guide to Autofocus for Action Photography

Action photography will challenge your skills as a photographer, but one thing you should pay particular attention to is your autofocus settings. If you are new to the pursuit and want to increase your chances of getting the shot, this helpful video will show you the basics of autofocus settings for action photography. 

How to Take Great Portraits in Mediocre Locations

We do not always have the luxury of shooting in stunning locations, which can make it difficult to take great portraits. Nonetheless, you can still take compelling portraits even in drab locations with a little bit of know-how. This excellent video will walk you through the process as a photographer shoots in such a location. 

A Comprehensive Guide to Traveling as a Photographer

Traveling with photography gear can be rather nerve-wracking and a bit of a logistical nightmare. Fstoppers alumni Clay Cook wrote an ultra-comprehensive guide based on his extensive experience traveling for work, and he offers numerous tips and guidelines for helping you get to your destination and enjoy your trip as much as possible, while accomplishing all your professional goals. 

How to Use Lightroom’s Tone Curve to Control Contrast and Tonal Range

Whichever application you might encounter it in, the tone curve can be a little intimidating if you’re new to editing. This excellent short video from Mango Street gives you a great introduction to how it works in Lightroom, what it can be used for, and how to achieve some creative results. 

How to Properly Use a Wide Angle Lens for Landscape Photography

The wide angle is often the lens of choice for a lot of landscape photographers, but it can be a tricky piece of glass to work with. This excellent video will give you lots of helpful tips to improve your landscape images when you are shooting with a wide angle lens.  

Manual Mode: Misconceptions and Myths

Members of the mysterious and magical craft of photography may have mentioned that mastering manual mode may be the most meandering path to making magnificent masterpieces. There's a shortcut, though. 

6 Easy Tricks to Create Great Portraits Anywhere

Being a master of your craft sometimes means taking exciting and memorable portraits in not-so-interesting locations and circumstances. Here are six simple tricks to help make your portraits more creative while removing distracting elements and creating more engagement. 

Why You Should Copy Other Photographers

It might seem like a strange idea to encourage people to copy other photographers, but there can be a huge benefit in doing so, particularly for newer photographers. This excellent video discusses why you might want to take time to emulate other photographers more often. 

An Excellent Look at Lighting On-Location Portraits

Lighting in a studio environment is tough enough, but shooting on-location portraits presents its own set of challenges. This excellent video takes you behind the scenes on an on-location portrait shoot for a magazine and details the problems the photographer had to deal with and how he solved them.  

Photographing a Black Product on a Black Background

Product photography is a fun genre that will challenge you to really fine-tune your lighting and post-processing skills. This excellent video will show you the process of building up an eye-catching image of a black product on a black background. 

Four Different Ways to Dodge and Burn in Photoshop

Dodging and burning is one of the most fundamental and useful techniques in photography, and it is applicable in quite a wide range of genres. This great video will show you four different ways to dodge and burn your images using Photoshop. 

How Do You Work With Difficult Cast and Crew?

Photo and video work is just like any industry: they come with plenty of difficult people who can make your life a pain in the neck. Unfortunately, you do not always get the choice of who you work with. This excellent video discusses what you can do when you are stuck with difficult cast or crew. 

The Different Types of Light in Landscape Photography

One of the things I have always loved about landscape photography is the way the same scene can be rendered in vastly different ways by various types of light. This great video discusses the many different types of light you will encounter in landscape photography and offers some helpful tips for working with them along with some example images. 

Five Advanced Color Techniques for Premiere Pro

Working with color in video is a bit different than working with it in images, and it is important to learn the proper techniques and order of operations to produce the best quality footage possible. This excellent video will show you five techniques for more refined color correction when working in Premiere Pro. 

How to Create Professional Product Photos With Just One Softbox

Product photography can be a very tricky genre with lots of specific techniques and hidden tricks, but you might be surprised by how much you can accomplish with just a single common modifier. This excellent video will show you how to create a professional product image using nothing but a single softbox. 

Don't Overlook the Power of Umbrellas for Lighting Your Photos

Most photographers forgo using umbrellas for one reason or another, generally opting for other more advanced and expensive modifiers for their work. However, you might be surprised by the professional-level images you can produce with umbrellas. This excellent video will show you the stunning photos you can create using umbrellas and how they are made. 

The Reality of Being a Landscape Photographer

Spend enough time on the internet, and you might begin to think that landscape photography is all about traveling to beautiful locations and creating jaw-dropping images while basking in the best light. And while there can certainly be a lot of adventure in the genre, it can also be quite a slog at times. This honest video takes a look at the reality of landscape photography. 

3 Creative Ideas to Attract Wedding Photography Clients

The top question that haunts wedding photographers is: how do I get more clients? When it comes to wedding photography, get creative with your marketing tactics. These ideas to attract wedding photography clients will refresh your routine and expose you to clients you may not otherwise reach. 

A Beginner's Guide to Hard Versus Soft Light

One of the most fundamental concepts any photographer or videographer needs to understand is the quality of light and how to change it to suit your creative needs. This excellent video will give you a quick lesson in hard versus soft light, both what it is and how to affect it.  

3 Types of Image Banding That Can Negatively Affect Your Photos

Image banding is a lesser-discussed phenomenon in photography, but it can leave annoying artifacts that can degrade the quality of your photos or ever outright ruin them in some circumstances. This informative video discusses three types of image banding, including why they occur and what you can do to mitigate or entirely eliminate them in your own work. 

A Beginner's Guide to Flash Photography

If you are new to flash photography, it can be pretty tough trying to understand the combination of light behavior, technical parameters, and creative choices, but taking the time to power through and learn how it is done will open up many new avenues for your work. This great video will give you a comprehensive introduction to flash photography to get you on your way. 

Common Wedding Photography Pricing Myths

Wedding photography is a tricky and demanding genre, and the business side of it can be just as difficult as the shooting itself. If you are looking to improve your wedding business, this great video discusses several common wedding photography pricing myths and what you should do instead to ensure you are putting as much money into your pocket as possible. 

A Guide to Mastering Manual Mode in Landscape Photography

The beauty of landscape photography is how much simply manipulating the exposure triangle can alter your image in different creative ways. If you are ready to take full control of your images, this great video will show you everything you need to know about mastering manual mode for landscape photography. 

The Importance of Embracing Imperfection

Photographers and videographers tend to pursue perfection (no matter how elusive it may be) in so many ways, ranging from technique to the gear they buy. But there is a lot more to life than perfection, and a lot of the most worthwhile creative pursuits can be found by embracing imperfection. 

Helpful Tips for Being a More Productive Photographer or Videographer

Being a freelance photographer or videographer is an never-ending onslaught of emails, invoices, phone calls, marketing, networking, and occasionally, picking up a camera. It takes a lot of discipline and savvy to successfully balance it all while still having a life outside work and not getting burned out.

Helpful Tips for Posing and Photographing Men

Posing can be one of the trickiest aspects of photography for many people and takes a lot of work to truly master and feel confident at. If posing is something you personally struggle with, this helpful video will give you lots of tips and examples specifically for working with men. 

5 Simple Tips for Getting Better Landscape Photos in Mountains

Sadly, there is no linear relation between the effort to get a photo and the quality of it. However, if there was, mountain landscape photography would be of the highest quality. In this article, I will share five tips to upping your photography quality in the mountains. 

How to Edit Faster With the 'Dark Mode' Technique

Is there a faster and easier way to create dramatic images in Lightroom that still sticks with your style? Here’s a quick tutorial and a different way of taking one of your images and using the power of Adobe’s software to create a stunning portrait.