Few months back we featured the incredible and unique rock climbing photos of Seattle-based photographer Kiliii Fish. This week Kiliii finished his newest photo series he worked on for a long time - this time survival was the theme. The results? Nothing short of epic. In this interview he explains the whole process and reveals how he shot and edited it all.
I've spent the last 2 weeks in Michigan’s Upper Peninsula, shooting stills and video in freezing winter conditions. Snow, ice, blisteringly cold wind and more. In this video I share what I found to be best for packing my kit, protecting it in the field, and keeping my eyes from freezing to my viewfinder.
If you're anywhere outside of California, good chances you're kind of sick of this winter by now. More specifically - sick of the all that snow and sleet. Seeing the ugly NYC snow this week made me think of all the beautiful snow photos I've seen as a kid. Photos that made me believe snow is a magical thing. Here are some of these amazing images found on Flickr to remind us snow CAN be a good thing.
Adventure Sports Photographer Tim Kemple was one of the only photographers in the world who was lucky enough to try out the new Phase One IQ250 that was just announced earlier today. Check out the behind the scenes video, but also read the full article for my interview with Tim, where he shares his thoughts on the system, as well as what it's like to beta test cameras.
A group of conservators restoring one of the century old supply depots established by Robert Falcon Scott during his expedition to the South Pole found more than they bargained for. In the corner of one of the huts lay a solid block of ice containing 22 negatives that have been quite well preserved for an entire century.
This year's most notable ski film, "Into The Mind" wasn't just your average sports reel. Camp 4 Collective and Sherpas Cinema put together a visually striking feature, along with a narrative that is filled with symbolism. In this behind the scenes video, the filmmakers discuss how certain shots came about, and how the story elements came together serendipitously.
San Diego based photographer, Michael Shainblum, is not only a great photographer, he's also an incredible time-lapser. When Michael was young he was diagnosed with Dyslexia and learning disabilities, and got discouraged when he saw that other kids succeed and do well while he struggles. He quickly realized he can excel in art, and decided to take this route to succeed in life. For the past few years Michael has created some of the best time-lapse videos ever created. VICE filmed this very interesting documentary about him and his work - sit back and enjoy!
This powerful timelapse video called "Wyoming Wildscapes II" was put together by photographer Nicolaus Wegner. Taking 14 months, this video covers the cycle of the seasons, the shifting of the landscape, and the ever-changing weather. To find out more about this project, I interviewed Nicolaus and asked about his gear, workflow, and experiences.
A new time-lapse of the planet that we call home has been released by editor David Peterson using photographs taken by astronaut Don Pettit while he was aboard the International Space Station. The sequences were taken during expeditions 29, 30 and 31. It's quite impressive seeing the sequences put together and witnessing just how beautiful our planet can be from space.
This shoot combines two things that I really love as a photographer: motorsports and incredible shoot locations. This comprehensive behind the scenes video captured by Ron Risman really gives you a great idea of how photographer Gregor Halenda put the campaign together. The resulting images were crisp and clean, showing off the bikes and locale.
What does it take to be innovative? What can happen when you put your work out there and others see as innovative, or inspiring? Matthew Vandeputte, a photographer and film editor based in Sydney helps answer some of these questions. Yesterday he put out a fantastically well shot and edited motion lapse piece that I think raises the bar, and with 250,000 300,000 views in less than a day, also suggests others feel similarly. What does over 100,000 images look like over the course of 90 seconds? How did he put the piece together? Read on and find out with this exclusive Fstoppers interview.
GTA 5 is not just a successful video game, it’s the highest grossing entertainment product of all time. Part of it's success is down to it’s beautiful, immersive virtual environment. This environment has inspired a number of keen eyed photographers out there to bring us some beautiful street and landscape photography. It beggars the question – is this really photography and if not, well, what is it?
Like any truly talented artist, rock musician Lou Reed, who passed on Sunday at 71, worked in more genres than simply songwriting. Inspired by his close friend pop artist Andy Warhol, Reed explored landscape photography, often working with a digital camera converted for infrared. This body of work, known as “Romanticism,” was shown in 2009 at the Adamson Gallery in Washington, DC.
You may already be familiar with Dustin Farrell. If you're not, you should be. His time-lapses are incredible. Dustin's shoots all over the world, but some of his most epic are from the American West. In this video, we get to follow Dustin on location in Utah and the step-by-step process that follows.
Whatever type of photography you focus on, I doubt there are many of us that aren’t mesmerized every time we pick up and thumb through a copy of National Geographic magazine. Over it’s lifetime, it's become synonymous with capturing images of people, places and wildlife that show us the undiscovered or hidden side of our increasingly homogenized world.
Kiliii Fish, Seattle-based commercial photographer, was always fascinated by how people interact with nature and how they use it to live their lives. Aside from being a full time photographer Fish is also an avid rock climber. Recently he decided to combine these 3 things he loves to a unique photography project showing the grace, power, beauty and vulnerability that goes into rock climbing. Kiliii spent days in each location and worked for months to complete the series. The results are absolutely amazing.
Exactly one week ago we marked the 12th anniversary of the 9/11 terror attacks which resulted in the deaths of nearly 3,000 people. As they do every anniversary, The Municipal Art Society of New York created two vertical columns of light ("Tribute In Light") right next to the World Trade Center in remembrance of the Twin Towers using 88 powerful searchlights pointing up to the sky. Every year I photograph the Tribute In Light from a different spot, and this year, for the second time, I decided to photograph it from above. From a helicopter. Here is how and why I did it.
In my work, I do a lot of traveling for shoots and one of the most tedious and difficult parts of going to a new place to produce a shoot is the location scouting. There is a reason that people can turn location scouting into a lucrative profession. It is very time consuming, costs money (gas) and is constantly changing (because of season, construction, whatever).
The Nokia Lumia 1020 was met with a lot of skepticism, and sparked yet another battle in the megapixel war. But for a cell phone, it's hard to deny that the photos look pretty darn good. Now when you think of National Geographic you think of incredible photographs of rarely seen places and people.
Django Greenblatt-Seay and JJ Dreier joined together to form Tree Speed, self proclaimed as "A of couple of Mid-Western guys who spend vacation time traveling the country shooting time lapse photography."
Based out of Omaha, Nebraska, the duo recently took to the road and self produced a 10 day trip to Utah to create a series of time lapse videos. In order of appearance, the team shot in Latuda, Utah (a ghost town), Arches National Park, Canyonlands National Park, and Lake Oahe.
While on a kayaking trip in the Great Lakes, I stopped just after sunset to shoot some images on the beach. The sky was still bright and very saturated, while the sandy ground was losing light and getting dark in my exposures. My kit was small, and I had no graduated ND filter, but I came up with something that worked well in a pinch.
Many times when shooting objects in an uneven light (usually outside), we have to choose if we want to expose for the darker areas, or for the brighter areas. This means part of the image will be exposed 'correctly' while the other parts will be overexposed (or underexposed). There are few solutions that can help us avoid these issues like shooting HDR or adding artificial light. But these solutions are not always handy and not always something that can be done. This great tutorial shows you how to fix overexposed highlights in only few minutes.
Lightning is hard to photograph. You have to have patience, solid timing and a general acceptance of the possibility of getting soaked. If that doesn't really resonate with you there's always the route that Matthew Albanese chose. Rather than go through the stress, waiting and danger of shooting an actual lightning storm he
io9 scored some interview time with the talented, patient and hard working, Jeffrey Martin. How do I know Mr. Martin is all these things? Simple. Because that's what it takes to make a photo so large it took 2 days to shoot, 4 months to edit and is comprised of more than 8,000 frames, at a resolution of 600,000 pixels wide. Watch this video that demonstrates the awesomeness that is the largest, most detailed, and zoomable, panoramic photo of Tokyo ever taken. Then go play with the photo for yourself.
Last night, National Geographic Traveler announced the winners of their 25th annual photo contest, and as you can imagine, the images are nothing short of amazing. The prizes weren't bad either - the winning photographer received a 10-day Galápagos expedition for two - so one could assume there would be a lot of competition. The contest received over 15,500 entries. Of those, here are the top 11...
Whenever I take a moment and look at landscape photography it's like a tiny escape. An escape from the busy commotion of the cities that we live in and the chaos of the people in those cities. Most landscape photography is calm and serene with a beautiful array of colors acting as a canvas. Photographer, Benjamin Edelstein known for his stunning work sits down with us to talk about what it is to be a landscape photographer.
Ever wondered how cool could it be to photograph different planets from close by and show how each one of them is different and unique? Well, unless you're an astronaut or a robot named 'Curiosity', you'll have to wait with that dream. But until then, why not making your own planets, all based on planet earth? Check out these awesome examples of mini-worlds (or "mini-planets", "Stereographic panoramas") found on Flickr.
In what may be one of my favorite 30(ish)-minute commercials ever, Canon 'introduces' one of the greatest living photographers, Don McCullin, to the world of digital photography. McCullin is old-world; he's charming and sweet and sad-eyed and every bit as British. McCullin's shaman into the digital realm is Jeff Ascough - Canon Ambassador and all-around stellar wedding photographer.
Combining her love for landscapes and risk taking, photographer Jody Macdonald is able to capture some of the worlds most gorgeous landscapes, from 20,000ft in the air. By paragliding, Jody photographs some of the worlds most beautiful places, with a perspective previously unseen, and the results are stunning.
On the Fourth of July, legions of photography enthusiasts like you will head out with their tripods to make images of firework displays. To minimize your failures on location, here is a quick primer to insure that you are in the ballpark to make successful images when the explosions begin.
Adrift is a breathtaking timelapse film created by Simon Christen, the same guy who brought us the incredible 'The Unseen Sea' from a couple of years ago. Adrift is what Simon calls his "love letter to the fog of the San Francisco Bay" and what a love letter it is. Over the course of two years, Simon waited for perfect atmospheric conditions to capture fog rolling down the Marin Headlands and into the SF Bay. Shot entirely at sunrise, this required Simon to be on
If you've been outside earlier this week, you must have noticed the gorgeous moon up there in the sky. Not only it was a full moon, but it was closer to us than usual. The 'Supermoon' is 11%-14% larger and 30% brighter than the normal-distanced moon we see every night. The reason for the change in the distance is the elliptical orbit of the moon around the Earth. Take the big-looking moon, add a telephoto lens, and you get some epic landscape and cityscape photos.
The likelihood of this experience ever happening to you is pretty small, however, while you may never make the same mistakes I made, this story is a reflection of the stupid decisions that tend to tag along with us as people. The same warnings and lessons that I'm about to share apply to everyone.
In this short behind the scenes video, photographer Philip Lee Harvey takes to the sky, as well as the earth, for shooting images of Angel Falls in Venezuela. This expedition hits home with Philip, as he looks to follow the same path that an aviator named Jimmie Angel took when he became the first american to discover the area in 1933. With this backstory towing the line, Philip's shoot becomes that much more interesting of an adventure.
Photographer Mike Olbinski has been visiting the Central Plains to shoot it's storms since 2010, and last week he encountered a supercell straight out of an apocalyptic thriller. The views in this timelapse are breathtaking! It's incredible to watch this massive storm tear through the fields near Booker, TX. There really isn't much more that I can say, just watch the video. Well done Mike! Amazing footage
A few months ago Lee and I went out to Gulf Photo Plus to see what all the fuss was about and absolutely had one of the greatest trips of our lives. While we were filming our "What makes photographers successful" video, we were hearing rumors that Joe McNally was about to shoot from the top of the Burj Khalifa, the world's tallest building. If you've spent any time with Joe, you know he absolutely loves a challenge and lives to create images taken from exotic places (like his shoot on the top of the Empire State Building).
Photographer Carlton Ward Jr. doesn't want to save the world with his imagery but he definitely wants to try and save Florida. Specifically, a wildlands passageway that connects the Everglades of southern Florida to the Okefenokee swamp in Southern Georgia. For 100 days in 2012, he, along with a filmmaker, bear biologist and conservationist, crossed the entire state in a continuous path using kayaks, paddleboards, bicycles, horses and their own feet. The visual chronicle was recently published as a book and broadcast as a PBS special.
Sometimes those obligatory travel photos snapped on location are great on their own, but (at least for me) a lot of them aren't visually dazzling. Luckily, that can be rectified. Jonas De Ro recently published an absolutely breathtaking composite image psd.tutsplus that is jaw-droppingly amazing. Best part is, he shows you how to make it so all you Photoshop fans can try a similar project yourself. Turn ordinary into fantasy!
A number of deadly tornadoes touched down around Union City, Oklahoma on Friday afternoon, killing at least 5 people. Storm chasers Brandon Sullivan and Brett Wright were hoping to get as close as possible to the tornadoes to shoot videos of it, but when they realized that the tornadoes are coming right at them, it was (almost) too late to run away. The mounted video cameras in the car caught this crazy video of their attempt to save their lives while the city collapses around them. INSANE.
Winners of the 4th International Earth and Sky Photo Contest, hosted by The World at Night (TWAN), were announced this week with some awe inspiring photographs.
TWAN is an international effort to photograph nightscape and time-lapse videos of the world’s landmarks. According to TWAN's website "The contest was founded by TWAN and Dark Skies Awareness project in 2008 as a regional
Time and Google have created an astounding, multi-decade animated timelapse of the Earth. It is nothing short of amazing the amount of satellite photographs that has been collected and crunched. Trillions of pixels of satellite data which until now, have not been available to the public. Locations around the Earth can be searched and viewed through the latest project Timelapse: Landsat Satellite Images.
Guest Writer and photographer Phillip Schmidli wanted to harken back to memories of the movie ET with this stellar shot of the moon. To do so, he placed a model in front of the full moon and shot with a telephoto to recreate that famous scene from the classic film.
Seven months ago I shared the trailer for a documentary about French Landscape Photographer Alexandre Deschaumes, as he creates stunning landscape images all over the world. His travels have taken him to Patagonia, Iceland, Austria, and more, while the time he spends in nature is the time where he seems to get the most creative. The hour long documentary is finally available (for a small fee.)
Astrophotography is one of the most interesting types of photography, but it is also one of the rarest ones. Shooting galaxies, stars and planets is among the the hardest forms of photography, and in order to do it you need to get the right equipment, and also the knowledge and techniques.
DSLR Video pioneer Vincent Laforet partnered with Canon to create a 4 part instructional video series where he shares many great tips for getting started with shooting timelapse sequences. He takes viewers with him on a shoot in Bryce Canyon and explains his setup, and also goes in to detail on: finding a subject matter, lens selection, how to calculate properly to get enough frames, using intervalometers, and so much more. This is loaded with tons of great tips, a must watch if you do any timelapse work.
Being in the right place at the right time is often critical for making iconic imagery. Astronaut Chris Hadfield is always in the right place for creating powerful landscapes of planet earth. In a video released yesterday by the Canadian Space Agency, Hadfield demystifies his photographic process for capturing stunning landscapes of the planet from the International Space Station.
Tim Kemple has "always been an adventurer, an explorer, a climber", but how did he make the transition into being a photographer? A new web mini-series from F-Stop Gear is setting out to tell the story of outdoor and adventure photographers. In this premier episode, Tim Kemple shares his background while running around the mountains in France, and he explains what it takes to capture images in those environments.
Ok so many of you will not be fond of this technique. That is totally your preference. But for those of you who like good HDR photos, the guys are PHLEARN show a method that will teach you a method to get faux-HDR final images that will make some of your images go from good to great.
We all have been in the situation. A great shot pops up through a building, plane, train, maybe even a submarine window and you snag it. Only to see after that you got more of your reflection then the scene. Well photographer and web designer Michael Courier has a simple DIY project he discovered while preparing for a train trip.
Extreme action photographer Alexandre Socci and a team of professional kayakers Pedro Oliva, Ben Stookesberry and Chris Korbulic do not seem to fear much.
The crew can be seen here pushing the boundaries by paddling through Hawaiian waters to get up close to Kilauea Volcano, one of the world's most active volcanoes. The footage and stills were created for a television show out
