Even before the economic disaster of COVID, the camera industry was contracting. The software industry has adopted SaaS pricing, with Adobe Creative Cloud being the most recognizable example. That pricing model, or one like it, might be the next big change coming to camera hardware.
Retouching in photography has many forms. Everything from skin work to background manipulation. With the latest software abilities to retouch and manipulate an image, there is an endless source of possibilities to create. Even with all the tools available, there is a fine line and perhaps sometimes too much is too much.
After a lot of thought and contemplation, I switched from Canon to Nikon five years ago. Each camera system has a lot of pros and cons, but the real question is do I regret the switch?
Photos of newborns are precious, once-in-a-lifetime moments. Now, some new parents in Denver are wondering where their images are. Photographer Amy Barlow under the name A MoMent Photography studio based in Lakewood, Colo. recently ran a Groupon promotion for newborn photography and is being accused of taking the money and running, leaving several families complaining that their images have not been delivered.
Take a 3-minute break from whatever you're doing right now, and listen to this short recorded lecture of British philosopher and writer Alan Watts (1915-1973). This is a very inspirational, thought-provoking and interesting to anyone who ever wanted to work in the industry - Doesn't matter if its as a photographer, film maker, sound-man or a retoucher. Listen, and decide: 'What do you desire?'.
If you take a look back at Ikea's marketing catalog used to showcase their new products and looks for the season, there was a time where they decided to use images displaying only the products and Ikea-styled sets with no human intervention or interaction. At one stage these images were computer generated and rendered to make a simulated environment look as perfect and clinical as possible.
I've always found that photos that capture and freeze rain to be exceedingly interesting. Rain gives the photo depth and a moodier feel, but usually you have to wait for a storm to blow through your area, or invest in a rain machine. No longer. Benjamin Von Wong has figured out a way to create those wonderfully drenched and moody shots without even stepping outdoors.
One key to longevity in filmmaking or photography is to have regular clients that you enjoy working with. What’s even better is when you have enough work coming in from those top clients, so that you can actually pick and choose the projects you take on, and even go as far as to expand your business or pass work off to qualified associates for a modest finders fee. It takes a long time to get there, but being savvy about building a client base can help tremendously.
As a photographer, my skill set is constantly put to the test. In most cases, I’m handed an idea on a slab of wood and the mission is to hand that idea translated to a tangible artifact back to my client on a silver platter. It’s never an easy process, but it’s a part of my job.
Lightroom is full of powerful tools for all types of photography. None of them are as effective as radial filters to create dramatic results like these.
What urges you to travel, hike, and camp out for landscape photography? How do your emotions affect what you shoot and how the output turns out?
You've been out shooting for 12 hours, you've got 4 cards full of data, it's midnight, and you have another shoot first thing in the morning. Wouldn't it be nice to have a solution that allows you to pop all those cards in a reader at one time thereby getting your download done 4x faster than if you did it with one card reader. Now there is with the new Lexar Professional Workflow Reader Solution.
As Canon continues to push ahead with their professional lines, particularly in the full frame mirrorless world, it seems they're also going to be diving into a perhaps unexpected realm: cameras for younger people. Check out the models we might see in the coming months.
What inspires you to pick up your camera? For Ivan Agerton, it’s people – and for all the talk about convergence between the worlds of stills and motion, Ivan is doing it. His ‘stills from motion’ portraits are both a visually gorgeous treat with their sublime use of slow motion, and thought provoking in the connection with the subject Ivan has captured. Not just creating eye candy, Agerton is a fascinating character and provides a great example of the life we can all construct for ourselves – if you decide to take the plunge and go for it.
As photographers and retouchers, we are often required to travel. But travel eats up a lot of time and thus it is crucial to optimize one’s workflow. While gear is not everything in our industry, it still maintains a critical place, especially to help save time. Spending more and more time on the road, I recently had to take a look at my editing workflow and find new solutions to make it better and faster. In this article, I’ll share with you some of the accessories I use or have since discovered to cut my retouching and keep me sane.
In my experience, there are two kinds of great lenses. The first is the kind that gets the job done. These lenses are technically amazing and produce extremely high-quality images. The Sigma 35mm f/1.4 Art is one of those lenses. It produces sharp, high-contrast images time and time again. But it doesn’t really have character — a feeling — of its own. This brings me to the second category of great lenses. Every now and again a manufacturer produces something truly special, a lens with qualities that can't be measured on an MTF chart or in lab testing. Nikon's Nikkor 58mm f/1.4G is one of those lenses.
Photographing sand dunes can be a very productive photographic endeavor if you find a stretch of desert remote enough that not every inch of it is covered in footprints. In this article, I show you my favorite place to photograph dunes, and I give tips on how to get the most out of this sandy subject matter.
Real estate photography, while not the sexiest of photography genres, is quite accessible and a handy way to earn some cash, especially if your starting out. Many interior design and architectural photographers cut their teeth taking photos for estate agents and holiday home companies, but much of the high volume stuff looks way too flashy. In this article I'll show you a relatively easy way to get natural looking light without blown-out windows.
Two things converged for me recently: an increase in questions sent to me regarding my commercial photography and the unexpected popularity of my bite-sized Photoshop tutorials. Both occurrences are born from the same inquiry of understanding how certain things are achieved. I used to bother people constantly with questions on how I could attain a certain look in post-processing, or how an image is so sharp, and so on. From time to time, I still do. So, I'm going to do my best to make the answers to the most common questions readily available with this mini series.
Have you ever heard the argument that photography isn’t art, because everyone can do it? That’s bull. All forms of photography need artistic thinking to some extent.
Last week I published an open letter to Adobe Lightroom written from the perspective of photographers that use the web gallery feature in Lightroom. It generated a decent amount of feedback both positive and negative. Many people told me that this couldn't be done and that Adobe would never offer something like this. Then I read a comment from a reader that was doing exactly what I wanted. Problem solved!
With modern HDR-blending algorithms making exposure blending so quick and easy, manual exposure blending may seem like an outdated skill for landscape photographers. However, automated software doesn't always produce the cleanest results. In this article, we'll discuss a foolproof workflow for manual exposure blending that will give you total control over your images and ensure results of the highest quality. The good news is that this workflow doesn't require any third-party panels or difficult luminosity masking!
Here it is Canon faithful: the Canon 6D! We've been hearing a lot about what this camera could be, the rumored specs, and the possible pricing for the past couple months, and that all became real this morning. The Canon 6D is packed with a whole lot to love, 20.2 megapixel, ISO range from 100-25600, Digic 5+, 11-point AF, and a 3-inch LCD all at a price that we were anticipating yesterday: $2099 USD.
We have already seen Canon's mind-blowing lens roadmap for the RF mount, but now that the EOS R5 and R6 are here, what can we expect next in terms of cameras?
When it comes to all things headshots and manipulating human expression, the best guy to seek council from is Peter Hurley. Peter's career has spanned about 15 years now, and over those years he has gained a tremendous amount of knowledge. Last year with the help from our friends at Profoto, Lee and I were able to film a supplemental free chapter to Peter's Illuminating the Face Tutorial. In this video Peter takes us outside to show some of the techniques he uses out on location.
Becoming as a commercial photographer can't be defined with a formula. Each story is different but lots of stories share similar basic principles. They can be applied not only in the areas of photography and filmmaking, but also in other businesses.
Something I muttered to myself one cloudy afternoon on my garden ended up being a mantra I have had with me for over a decade.
Canon just announced that it will launch its RF 85mm f/1.2 DS lens, where the “DS” stands for “Defocus Smoothing.” What does that mean exactly, and on a piece of gear that carries a hefty price tag, why doesn’t the fancy marketing mention that the lens lets in less light as a result of this funky new coating?
With perhaps one of the most hotly anticipated updates, Canon has announced the 6D Mark II, the second version of their popular budget full-frame camera, which now has some intriguing new features. They've also announced the SL2, the second version of their smallest DSLR. Check out the improvements to each model!
I recently challenged Mike Kelley to a photography competition. We both had two and a half hours to photograph the iconic "Dome House" in Charleston, South Carolina. Today, you will get to vote on your favorite photographs and choose a winner.
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