Creating new ideas in the lighting industry isn't an easy thing. Even if you have a great new idea, getting people to accept that new concept is a long and tedious process. That said, I'm always excited to see innovation. New company SpinLight 360 is about to release a new line of products that look a little unusual.
As long as the protests are being documented, what does it matter if the people taking the photographs that we see in our newspapers are white?
The industry has been waiting for Canon to launch a truly professional mirrorless full-frame camera, and there’s a chance that it might be announced as soon as February. The specifications being rumored would certainly make an impact.
Although I like photographing people, I never dared to step into the world of street photography. But recently I have tried it a few times, with mixed results. I would like to share my experiences and give some tips for those who like to try this for the first time also.
In a way, your journey as a photographer will start out with personal projects. Everything that you shoot for those first few months or years are things that you choose to shoot for fun. Personal projects help you to learn, experiment, and grow as an artist. Actually organizing and creating a series, however, takes a little bit of planning. From brainstorming to gallery showings, I’m going to help you put together a game plan for your next personal project.
The new RED Hydrogen One phone has some new and unique display features that got a lot of interest nine months ago. Now RED has taken their new mobile phone to the media to showcase what it can do. Although we aren't allowed to see the screen (it doesn't display well on videos) we can get an idea of what RED is envisioning for the future of capturing video.
I like beer. I like film. I like beer and film together, especially when you can process film with beer!
It’s amazing what mid or entry-level hardware can deliver when you pair it with great software. The best software will be able to make up for some of the weaknesses and exploit every ounce of its strengths – ideally with relative ease. That's what we'll see here with Capture One's Luma Range tool.
Photographer Thomas Leuthard just published a second free book about street photography called "Collecting Souls… What Street Photography means to me". That and "Going Candid... An Unorthodox Approach To Street Photography" can be downloaded here as PDF documents. Truth is I haven't looked at these books yet... I need you guys to check them out and tell me if they're worth the time to read or not. :P
Another year has come and gone, and as such the time has come to reflect on the road ahead. With the New Year just a few days away, now is the best time to do some soul searching and adopt some resolutions that will help improve your photography going forward. This road is often a challenging one, based on the forever hunt for ever greater photographs. With the goal of always improving our craft in mind, these New Years resolution suggestions will help get you out to an amazing start in 2018.
Product photography is quite technical. Having the right gear is not enough. You also need creative ideas. Learn from my mistakes to shoot better product photographs.
Working as a behind-the-scenes or “stills” photographer is an entirely different experience to most usual photography jobs. As photographers we naturally tend to take charge of the creative direction, and are used to getting our own way. Working BTS requires you to work within different dynamics, not least of which involves being surrounded by other creatives, each with their own opinions and ideas. Here are some of the best and worst things you can expect whilst shooting behind-the-scenes.
Implementing gels into your photography is a really simple and effective way to make sure your images really stand out from the rest of the crowd. There are a ton of different ways to use gels to create some absolutely stunning imagery, but in this post I am just going to show you a few ways that you can use them to add color to your background to produce really dynamic portraits.
From national magazines to local papers, media outlets of all sizes like to cover restaurants. If you are a photographer who shoots editorial assignments, there is a good chance that you have been assigned to cover a dish at a restaurant. Over the last couple of years, I have photographed hundreds of dishes at restaurants ranging from white table cloth fine dining establishments to hole in the wall hidden treasures. Here are some tips that might help you with shooting a dish for an editorial client.
Layer masks are one of the most useful tools in Photoshop, allowing the user to apply adjustments to an image selectively. Masking, however, can be one of the most frustrating aspects of post-production, sometimes requiring lots of intricate work. One tool in Photoshop that can make your masking life easier is also one of the most overlooked: Apply Image.
It's been over a year since Profoto interviewed Martin Wonnacott about his amazing beverage photography. Now the man dubbed "the master of liquids" has released a behind the scenes video of his work for us all to drool over and try to dissect. There isn't anything to guide you through it either, just press pause a lot. Martin definitely knows how to make a
Stock photography is an industry that enables many photographers to make a good living. Though some photographers focus their entire career around creating stock imagery, almost every photographer has the ability to supplement their income with images they've already taken.
Publishing high definition pictures on the web always seemed to be an issue. Both in terms of speed and quality. Full-resolution files could never really be enjoyed through the Internet without having to compromise either on the quality or the experience for the viewer. But that is about to be a thing of the past! A solution finally exists, and it solves pretty much all the problems we used to have on the web and our 20-plus-megapixel pictures.
The perfect black and white conversion technique will vary from photographer to photographer and rightfully so, because there’s truly no perfect technique. it’s subjective. However, there are three key areas that many photographers will overlook before exporting their files that directly influence how their final image will look.
If you’re anything like me, you’ve spent hours browsing sites like B&H Photo Video comparing different tripods, tripod heads, and their features. You may also take it a step further by watching reviews until your eyes burn before you decide to finally make that decisive click and add one to your shopping cart. It’s an understandable practice if you ask me. Perhaps you’re in the market for the best travel tripod money can buy. If that’s the case, you’d be hard pressed to find a better option than the Gitzo GT1545T Series 1 Traveler Carbon Fiber Tripod.
In 2014, Gulf Photo Plus celebrates their 10th year as one of the premiere photography workshops in the world. Lee and I experienced the event in Dubai last year for the first time, and it was one of the best experiences of my life. Together with Joe Grimes, Zack Arias, Gregory Heisler, Lindsay Adler, David Hobby, and Joe McNally, GPP is raising the bar to produce an event you do not want to miss.
Today, Apple announced a hefty refresh of the MacBook Pro. The top end now comes with up to six cores, 32 GB of RAM, and up to 4 TB of SSD storage. The price of that storage might make you fall over, but these are updates for which power users have been waiting for for far too long.
It's all in the details. Adding elements like wind is a great option to add more life and emotion into your photographs. Studio photography and natural light photography can be very different genres. In the studio, you’re in total control of your environment and surroundings, and having an industrial fan that plugs into a wall is pretty standard in most studios. Unfortunately with natural light, you’re at the mercy of Mother Nature. But that’s OK; with this inexpensive tool you will add a little “studio flair” to your natural light portraits.
The untimely passing of Robin Williams at the still-young age of 63 sent shock waves around the world last week. Based on the outpouring of love for "Mork" on social media, it was evident that no matter your age, Robin was most likely a fixture in your upbringing. His acting brilliance ranged from the side splitting comedy "Mrs. Doubtfire" to the chillingly dramatic roles in "Good Will Hunting" and "Dead Poets Society." Robin could do it all on screen, but could be even more entertaining off screen, when he wasn't tied down to a script. He would often explode into comedic rants that would include character after character, all seemingly without stopping to take a breath. There was no doubt that the man was brilliant.
The other week, I wrote that I was excited about Phase One's newest gear announcements for a multitude of reasons. Well, thanks to my friends at Digital Transitions and Phase One, I was lucky enough to do a photoshoot with the BRAND NEW Phase One XF body, the updated IQ350 50 megapixel CMOS medium format back, and their newest 35mm leaf shutter lens. As an owner of their previous generation 645DF+ body and IQ140 back, I was incredibly impressed by the notable technology advancements in their newest gear. Read below to see why.
Eduard Zhikharev, lead motion designer at Transparent House in San Francisco, created a interesting conceptual series Shining, a body of work that depicts glowing figures from street scenes that his wife Olga Tsybulina had photographed one day. I reached out to Eduard after running across the work on Behance and asked him about the series.
The Nikon Z 7II is a high-resolution full frame camera and the updated brother of the z7. Now 6 months on, how has the camera performed for me shooting landscapes? Faultless in my opinion. Well, except for one thing, but I'll speak about that later.
For Northern Hemisphere astrophotographers wanting to try getting into the deep sky (outside our solar system) targets, here are three suggestions to start the Winter season, with the bonus that a stock (unmodified) DSLR or mirrorless camera can be used.
Last year, Vogue China approached Mario Testino to be the sole photographer for their 100th issue, a task which the legendary fashion photographer took to with great relish. Recently, Testino released the making-of video that documents the work that went into this issue. This is not one of those annoying fashion videos that is over in thirty seconds after bombarding you with bad techno music and flashy editing. Instead, this feature offers some excellent insights into how Vogue develop their concepts, as well as behind-the-scenes footage offering glimpses of how each shoot was set up.
After a horrible decision to fire an entire photo staff on Thursday, the Chicago Sun-Times media writer Robert Feder, released a Facebook statement from a memo sent out by managing editor Craig Newman. It seems that in the next couple of days, editorial employees will be starting "iPhone Photography Basics."
