Community Photos

I’m baffled by how often I encounter photographers who tell me they have been shooting for years but still haven’t created their portfolio because their work isn't good enough. After a bit of convincing, I can usually prompt them into sending me a few shots to take a look at, only to find out their work is more than ready to be displayed. 

Let me tell you: there’s nothing quite like a new camera and a change of scenery to recharge the old creative batteries, especially after a long British winter. I just came back last Sunday from a fantastic three-week trip to Hong Kong, Australia, and New Zealand and therefore, had plenty of time to intensively test the new Pen-F by Olympus, which I've had since mid-February

It's no secret the impact humans have had on Earth and its other inhabitants. We often see the changed landscapes brought forth by human life and modern society as signs of triumph and accomplishment, but with these come the lost homes of those animals that once inhabited the land upon which society now sits.

Just like ever camera owner is a photographer, every person who owns an abundance of MAC products is a makeup artist. At least that is how it seems on Instagram these days. There are now more makeup artists on social media than ever, and finding the right ones to follow can be tricky. Following the best makeup artists can make a portrait photographer better.

Professional photographers understand the quality of imagery that can come from a camera phone will never contend with the pictures and video you can capture with your DSLR. Phones will likely always have an innate handicap with sensor size, which leaves it's images lacking.

The Fstoppers community is brimming with creative vision and talent. Every day, we comb through your work, looking for images to feature as the Photo of the Day or simply to admire your creativity and technical prowess.

Most photographers get into the field to pursue their passion; it's when they start to plan the business aspects that they hit the road bumps. Most experienced photographers will tell you that you can't expect to get booked simply because you have good pictures. The only way to become relevant in your niche is to consistently stay in front of your audience.

The Fstoppers community is brimming with creative vision and talent. Every day, we comb through your work, looking for images to feature as the Photo of the Day or simply to admire your creativity and technical prowess.

Glamour photography, fine art nude photography, lingerie photography, swimwear photography — all of the above involve nudity. Sex sells — no explanation needed here. Or, at the very least, it will get you more likes on your page or your Instagram account. Is the sexiness in itself a problem? This is a recurrent debate.

For the last several weeks, the Fstoppers team has been working with Joey Wright in Curaçao filming a new original tutorial on swimwear photography. While we were filming, we used some of our time with Joey to offer feedback to a variety of images submitted by the Fstoppers community. We chose 20 images to critique.

About two years ago, in the spirit of adventure and creativity, I decided I was going to try and photograph the ocean with artificial lighting. I had an image in my head of all the things I’ve seen in daylight hours, with the stark contrast of an illuminated wave against a dark backdrop. A run-of-the-mill day down at the beach certainly wasn’t going to do either.

In this video, Daniel Norton of Adorama takes you into his studio, showing you how to set up for three different lighting scenarios, with the ability to change from one to another at the flip of a switch. This is great for if you have extremely limited time with models or actors and need alternate looks or options between them. 

Our friends over at Viewbug are at it again!

For the majority of people, the day after Christmas is usually filled with farewells to extended family members, house cleaning, writing thank you cards, and crashing on the couch to watch the final games of the football season.

When looking for new creative ideas, it seems like everything has already been done by someone. But there are still people, like Jay Philbrick, that manage to create pictures never seen or even never thought of before. 

The mobile phone has changed photography forever; the smartphone’s camera is the most used feature for the majority of users. Not only have they become the most convenient way to take photos, they’ve also become damn good at taking them, as shown in the annual iPhone Photography Awards.  

As a photographer and an artist, one of the most rewarding accomplishments you’ll have is when you see your work featured in some type of way, whether it is in a magazine, an art gallery, an advertisement, etc.

When an opportunity presents itself, be prepared. That’s what Syracuse photographer, Jody Grenier, found himself in three weeks ago. Every morning Grenier stops by one of the iconic locations in Syracuse, Clinton Sqaure; always looking for a photo op if it arises. At 5:30 AM on November 30, he had his camera at his side for a special capture. 

I have been following and reporting on Vincent Laforet's "AIR" series since its first round was released. I came across an early printing of the book itself in the waiting area of San Francisco's Storehouse startup while I was about to take on another interview. I knew Storehouse and Laforet had a good working relationship, and I knew the images so well.

An annual award that TIME magazine started three years ago has chosen it's official 2015 winner. Stacy Kranitz is an Instagram photographer who is most famous for her work in the Appalachia area. The poverty stricken, drug and alcohol filled area is certainly an eye opening subject. But why her in particular?  

Ever since the middle of high school, I've been immensely interested in "the process." You know, that middle bit between point A and point B that nobody but the artist ever sees. I've always loved peeking behind the scenes to see where something started and what kind of work and thought went into creating the finished product.

I love math. So do the folks at MIT. They've created a remarkable algorithm that can analyze a photo, assigning it a memorability score and analyzing exactly which parts of it are most memorable. And now, you can try it for yourself. 

The beauty of art… there are no rules, no curriculum, no set path that you must follow in order achieve what you aspire to be. While the freedom to learn as you wish at your own pace is great, a little guidance and direction didn't hurt anyone. In this article, I’ll explain further.

Not long ago, I released a review of Sigma's newest Art-series lens, the 20mm f/1.4 Art. Unfortunately, Northern California skies have had bit of a tough time clearing up despite numerous requests from astrophotographers below, patiently waiting for news of this lens' nighttime, Milky Way performance.

When the terrorist organization, ISIS, isn't busy terrorizing people, they are apparently busy stealing photographer's artwork. In this day and age, it's not uncommon to have your work stolen. Heck, it's pretty common. But having the bane of the earth stealing your work has to be a new experience. That's not the end of the story though. It gets worse.

Last time I wrote an article for Fstoppers was almost a year ago when I had just picked up a Hasselblad V-system medium format film camera for the first time. If you remember my first post, I taught myself to shoot 120 film while traveling in Europe. I reported my findings as best as someone with only a month of practical experience could.

Hey, you creeper, yeah, we see you. You're just here, lurking to read some articles, and we can respect that. Well, did you know that we have a whole community here, filled with professionals and hobbyists alike? We want you to be a part of it! 

Recently, I had the opportunity to have a conversation with photographer Noah Abrams. I talked with him about his work, some ongoing projects, and his day to day life. Noah grew up skateboarding in Columbus, Ohio.

Dave Sandford is a professional sports photographer from Ontario, whose roots in photography keep him coming back to bodies of water, capturing images that move him personally. What he found close to home in the shallow water of Lake Erie turned out to be some of the most dramatic waves he’d ever seen, and Dave came away with an incredible series of images to share. 

If you don't know Sigma's Art series lenses yet, you're missing out. Their well established 24mm, 35mm, 50mm, and zoom options in the Art lineup shine, but it's hard to believe it took this long for a wide-angle 20mm f/1.4 Art to make it out into the real world. But the moment I began shooting with this beauty is the moment of the past didn't matter anymore.

Last week, we asked the Fstoppers community to submit their best pictures of food to be reviewed by the Fstoppers team for our next episode of "Critique the Community." To change things up a little for this episode, we had a local commercial photographer, Andy Hagedon, join us to give some fresh perspective. A total of twenty images were selected to be reviewed.

What's your response when you're told that you're beautiful? Eighteen year-old photographer and student, Shea Glover, decided to "film what I thought was beautiful." Without intending to, she has conducted an amazing social experiment on the effect of simple positivity and a compliment. The reactions are perfect! 

First to roll out some of the most popular images of 2015 is Flickr's Top 25 from their community. Flickr also shared some interesting data on what are the most popular devices and cameras used on their photo sharing application. 

The Syrp Genie caught everyone's attention with its contemporary design and advanced automation features that made it a time-lapse photographer's best tool in the field.

No stranger to unique and challenging photography pursuits, Ben VonWong's latest adventure sent him across the Western United States in search of summer thunderstorms, with an entourage of assistants, filmmakers, and models helping along the way.

Once in a while, despite our due diligence and training, we all end up in circumstances where we must handle a difficult situation. As a model with a wide range of experience, I have a large network of professional photographer friends and have seen first-hand how unprofessional my fellow models can be.

Since being founded in 2010, ONA has made a huge splash in the photographic community with their high end camera bags. I used The Berlin II for Leica bag everyday for the last month and these are my thoughts.  

When I was younger, my dad took a class on photography at a local community college. To this day, he says that the biggest thing he learned from the class was that to take interesting pictures, you have to go to interesting places. I suppose that if you are a travel, landscape, or nature photographer, that is true.

Maternity photos can be difficult. Shooting them isn’t different than an engagement shoot or senior portrait session, but the challenge is avoiding clichés. The typical husband’s hand on his wife’s stomach shot or the husband’s beer-belly imitating his pregnant wife’s are far too overused.

That’s right, I said it: If you aren’t sharing content on Instagram, you are shutting the door on a world of potential opportunities! With over 200 million users, this social network has the power to become one of your most important means of promoting your photography business. 

In an all-time low for humankind, this one can clearly be filed under "Phenomena Against Humanity." I truly regret to inform you that, in a fit of absolute male narcissism, people are finding beautiful landscape views, dropping their pants, and positioning their cameras "just so" in order to capture the bottom of their man-junk hanging in the frame.

A new photo has surfaced of the famed western outlaw Billy the Kid, purchased for about $2 in a junk shop in California, that could easily be worth upward of $5 million. The lucky man behind the photo purchase is Randy Guijarro who picked it up in a store around Fresno, California in 2010.

As some of the world's biggest auction houses gear up to offer photographic pieces this week, statistics show that photographs are consistently lesser valued than their artistic counterparts. Take a look at why photographs have yet to find the same financial footing as other works of art. 

Over the past few years and into the future, our Photo of the Day feature continues to be a cornerstone of Fstoppers. Featured on the front page as well as being published out over our Twitter and Instagram accounts, Photo of the Day’s goal is to give enthusiastic attention to the creative talent found throughout the Fstoppers Community.

No doubt you are familiar with some of Lewis Wickes Hine's work. He is the guys who took the iconic photographs of the workers who constructed the Empire State Building in New York City. But what you may not know is that he first shot for the National Child Labor Committee, documenting the child workforce of America during the industrial revolution.

NASA recently released beautiful color photos of Pluto's moon, Charon, taken by the New Horizons spacecraft just before its closest approach on July 14 of this year. The photo shows an extraterrestrial object with a complex and storied history. 

It’s been almost 3 years since I moved to London to pursue photography as a career. I’ve learnt that there are many misconceptions about those who take photos for a living - so here I’m setting the record straight about what day-to-day life is really like for a portrait photographer in one of the world’s biggest cities.  

Lifestyle Photographers Pty. Ltd. have found themselves in hot water with the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission (ACCC.) Lifestyle Photographers Pty. Ltd. could face up to $1.1 million in fines if the allegations of targeting and tricking Aboriginal consumers into paying up to $10,000 for family photos hold up. 

Submissions for a new episode of "Critique the Community" are now open! Between now and the end of the day on September 23rd, you have a chance to submit PRODUCT images to be critiqued by the Fstoppers team. For this episode, we will be giving feedback to 20 pictures. To qualify you must follow the submission rules below.