Opinion

It's not often that we feature book series here on Fstoppers, but I personally found that the three piece series by 99U was worth mentioning. In their latest book entitled "Make Your Mark - The Creative's Guide to Building a Business with Impact", author and editor Jocelyn K. Glei interviews successful creatives to find the secrets that helped separate them from the rest of the pack, making "Make Your Mark" a must have book for photographers looking to increase their business.

I spend a lot of time shooting or walking on the streets of New York. You see every type of camera imaginable here, from the latest and greatest DSLRs to old Rollei’s and film cameras. If you hang around B&H long enough, you’ll probably see Louis Mendes with his old Speed Graphic. But I have never, ever seen anyone shooting with what Justin Borucki is using. This guy might have the most unique camera setup in New York.

At some point of our career, we find ourselves wandering whether we should continue to develop our skills or channel our efforts into broadening our network to capture potential clients. The answer is more complex than just choosing one or the other. But to be able to compare both concepts I think it’s important to understand them well. They are not really the most ambiguous words, yet some ideas gain different connotations according to the situation in which they are used.

I have always associated a romance with being a specialist photographer, whether this be in the area of weddings, fashion, automotive or dreamy tintype portraits. You are valued as a master in your field and people want you for the style that you create. On the other hand, there are positives in working in multiple industries as a photographer. You rarely get bored due to the variety of work you do, and it’s fun to learn new skills and adapting to various situations. You might have to manage different “identities” but that suits you fine because you love the challenge conquering different fields.

What’s wrong with our industry that we are so quick to belittle formal education? Whenever the topic of an art degree arises, there’s an angry mob that amasses, collectively chanting how “useless” a degree is in photography and that the best school to learn from is the University of Hard Knocks. To really understand this issue, we have to first step back and look at the value of art and why photographers are so polarized on the term. Then, we have to recognize that “art school graduates” are not the real problem; it’s the dismissive attitudes toward them that are.

The Syrp Genie is a great, though imperfect, timelapse machine that has recently added another trick to its arsenal: repeatable motion. Originally, the first couple bits of firmware to the Syrp weren't perfect at the repeatable motion tasks, but the most recent update has fixed all the issues, giving us the ability to fine-tune motions and get them time and again, exactly as they were the first time. With the addition of the new Magic Carpet, there is a lot we can now do with the Syrp.

There are many ways we can find new inspirations and ideas. From researching new work, doing workshops or experimenting with new techniques, most of us have these regular go to methods of getting ourselves out of a photographic funk. Psychologist Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi proposes that thinking more like the opposite gender can expand our creativity and essentially give us more scope in the ways we express ourselves in our work.

When I first attempted to retouch the photographs I took in 2006, I had no idea what I needed to do and how. Today there are thousands of video tutorials on the web on how to retouch, but nobody explains what it is that needs to be retouched to make a female face look more youthful, healthy and beautiful. It took me some time to figure out what the common problems that I needed to remove from my subjects' faces and bodies were, and what I had to alter to make them look more attractive.

Although we’re often reminded of the importance of constantly shooting and developing our skills as photographers, is there a point where too often shooting actually becomes detrimental? Through observation and personal experience I’ve come to the conclusion that there is indeed a case to be made for shooting less if you’re hoping to properly develop your photography business.

I’ll never forget the email; I was on a plane somewhere over the Florida coast, on my way to the Bahamas for the Fstoppers Workshops 2014. Just before I left the States, I had signed on with the artist consulting firm Wonderful Machine. The first step in preparation for a press release was to tear my website apart. The critique was tough and they slashed it hard… here I am in one of the most beautiful places in the world, feeling a truck load of anxiety. For years, I had thought I had a clean and straight to the point website, but it turns out I needed to strip it down even more.

Why is it so hard to hire someone to fill a creative position? At this point I'm afraid that art school might be making most graduates unemployable egomaniacs. I know this because I used to be one.

As photographers, we are all subject to the “I saw this photo on Pinterest” or “I love this photo of my friend” requests. Below are three tips on how to handle these requests without killing your creativity and keeping your client happy.

The guys at Photo Rumors tested the new Canon EOS 7D Mark II and the DxOMark results are a bit haunting for Canon users. In the comparison charts below they found the highly anticipated Canon EOS 7D Mark II tests similar to the five year old Nikon 300s. Has Canon hit a plateau in meaningful updates to push themselves ahead of the rest of the pack? With comparisons to five year old Nikon systems, it could be the case.

Excuse me a moment while I try and reassemble my brain, it’s kind of just been blown by the video reel I’m about to talk about. While I collect my senses, feel free to join me as I showcase this piece of artistic genius and the talent of the young lady who put it together. This might just be the most insane, joyous 50 second video you’ve ever seen.

Yesterday the internet went crazy when it was announced Taylor Swift pulled all of her music from the popular music streaming service Spotify. A lot of speculations and rumors started running around the web on the reasons why it happened. Some said she just wanted to create a buzz, some said she wanted to just increase album sales and some said she just wanted to make a statement. And how this story is even related to the photography world, you ask yourself?

At the most basic level, photographers seem to be in two camps when it comes to image file types. There are those who care about the look of their images and shoot with big RAW files and those who don’t and use the smaller JPEG files.

RAW files offer a tremendous level of control over noise, tonality and color; a hearty file that can cope with the demands of our creativity.

Whether we're a photographer, graphic designer, painter, musician or dancer... throughout our career, we’ll slam right into a rock solid wall and it some cases it can be so traumatizing that some of us may never recover. It’s not really a question of if; it’s a question of when and if you’re a new artist then brace yourself, there will come a time when things just don’t click. I’ll be honest; I hit that wall with writing for Fstoppers this past month. Writing 1,000 words once a week is no easy feat, I figure it's only appropriate to write about this very topic as I sit here in recovery from a creative collapse.

We have all been there at one point or another. The thought of picking up a camera and having to take more pictures seems less than appealing. Shooting the same thing over and over, dealing with frustrating clients, or simply not getting the results you had hoped for. All these things can take a toll on your mental state and will eventually translate into feelings of disdain towards your passion. It might feel like you need a miracle to find your passion again, but here are four things which have worked for me, and maybe they can work for you as well!

We see mass evidence of poor goal setting once a year without fail. New Years comes around and people resolve to change their lives in one fashion or another. Why is it that statistically only about 10% of resolutions are ever actually completed? Are the goals impossible? Probably not, most of us don't set goals we know we can't achieve.

Chances are you’ve all seen this iconic photo of Che Guevara at some point. But do you know who took it? Magnum, still arguably the most esteemed photographic collective in the world, announced the sad news last week that one of it’s longest serving members, Rene Burri, passed away aged 81. This post celebrates the life and work of Burri, and sheds a little light on what made him such a special photographer.

Although there have been countless articles written on the subject of Frequency Separation - including several here on Fstoppers - the current state of retouching has me somewhat concerned about its use. Its widespread adoption, use and overuse has brought us to the point where frequency separation is fast becoming the number one culprit for poorly retouched and cringe worthy work. While I’m not convinced that we need to ban it outright, I do feel that the way we approach it needs to fundamentally change.

We’re sitting on the precipice of game-changing year for photographers. 2015 is going to be the year of medium-format. Ricoh (formally Pentax) dropped a bomb this year with a sub-$9,000 medium format camera. There are even rumors about Sony and Mamiya teaming up for a medium format rangefinder of some kind. Yes folks, the competition is heating up, and this version of “king of the hill” is already getting nasty.

Instagram just celebrated four years since launching in the app store bringing inspiration and encouragement to many creatives in that time, especially photographers. If you were not aware, each weekend they host something called the Weekend Hashtag Project or WHP for short, choosing a specific topic for followers to shoot within that theme all for a chance to be featured that next Monday on their blog and to be seen by millions of viewers.

People often think that modeling is just about looks. This misconception turns a beautiful person into just a body with no skills. Modeling is not about having the perfect "looks." The key to successfully modeling is the mindset. With just one thought, a photographer can take his or her models to the next level.

I live just a few miles outside of New York City, so when 911 happened, my world was rocked harder than most in the world. After getting my daily dose of hate mail this week about taking pictures at the 911 Memorial at Liberty State Park in Jersey City, I thought I'd write about it.

The process by which small businesses develop is changing. Thanks to the "lean movement" people are realizing that the same strategies governing large companies simply don't work with startups. Make no mistake, you are a startup.

If you're familiar with Fstoppers, you've certainly have heard of Pratik Naik before. As a contributor to Fstoppers for years now, Pratik has been able to share his own retouching secrets that help make him one of the biggest names in the retouching community. Following his recent trip to Seattle to host a Creative Live series - one of the most watched to date, I was able to meet up with him and talk about his upcoming projects and his path as a world class retoucher.

No one is more critical of my work than me and I know a lot of photographers share the same sentiment. I took some time this week to reflect on this ongoing frustration and negativity, and really think about what’s behind it and why we do this to ourselves.

If you aren't using some sort of software to sync audio, you're sitting in your edit bay manually matching audio to video queues, be that sounds, video hints or timecodes. But what if you could just dump all your camera footage from an interview and all the audio from your recorder into one program and hit one button to sync them all quickly and accurately? You can with Red Giant Pluraleyes, and it's nearly perfect.

I have seen absolutely beautiful things happen in the photo industry. I've seen strangers become best friends, I've seen grand ideas being brought to life, and I've seen photographers grow from beginners to mentors. I've seen so many things that make me proud to be a part of such an amazing community. The sad news is that I've also seen the uglier side of it. I've seen jealousy turn into bad-mouthing, I've seen photographers knowingly leave out key techniques from classes or talks, and I've seen new photographers become discouraged and disheartened by the cold shoulders of the more popular photographers in the industry.