You buy a camera as a purely functional object: you want to produce images, and it is the tool of choice. Yet, as photographers, we become brand loyal partisans, identifying with the manufacturer. So, who has the best logo?

Eventually, as we progress in our commercial photography careers, we will become a part of sizable shoots with producers attached. Your first shoot with an experienced producer will feel like flying first class for the first time; you will never want to go back.

As a photographer, I spend a lot of time taking photos, editing, blogging, and posting them on social media. However, are these photos just meant to be viewed for the 24-hour period (or less) that they're displayed on social media, only to disappear forever? Personally, I believe it’s important to create and share something tangible and special in this digital age of noise and instant gratification. That's why I've started to print my photos, and below are some reasons why you should too.

I’ve always been jealous of people who know where they’re headed. They’re like greyhounds chasing a rabbit, absolutely certain of what they were put on this earth to do, and doggedly (pun intended) pursuing their purpose. When I first picked up a camera, I took photographs of everything. Bees, power lines, babies, weddings, families, anything I could point a lens at became my subject. It didn’t take long before I had people asking me to photograph them, and soon enough I was dragging families through shrubs and fields looking for that perfect outdoor shot.

The square Instagram App icon has become very well known to most of us. What if it was real? The team over at ADR studios rendered what it would look like if the icon became a real camera. Would it be something that you would buy if it was a possibility?

Have you ever considered how significantly confidence can affect your photography? Creative people are often a largely unconfident group. At any given time we might be dealing with the fear of missing an important moment, anxiously thinking about an upcoming session, running the worst possible scenarios through our minds, or delivering our photos to a client and dreading that email that says how much they hate them. We are still in the process of improving, constantly comparing our work to others, and because of the number of negative thoughts we have, we often feel like frauds.

Dream jobs are made where individuals labor in love, and passions are fostered. It is where “working” is hardly the right descriptor for they day-to-day. Seeing people who truly love their work and work for their passion is rare. I want to tell those stories, and I found one worth telling at a place where they produce the tools that make the lives of creative professionals possible- tools that often at first we never knew we needed, but now would find it impossible to live without.

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.

A lot can be said for the power of social media. In fact, many of today’s most successful photographers owe a lot to the beasts that we lovingly refer to as Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, etc. But are these platforms that we all invest so much of our time into the final nails in the coffin of a professional photograph industry that was built less on savvy social media skill and the latest filter packs and more on actual relationships, constancy, and hard work?

According to ThePhoblographer, Calumet Photo was recently bought out by C&A Marketing and is set to become operational again in the very near future. Currently, C&A is looking in to how they can re-activate the online web services and possibly opening up some of the actual stores. Rentals, repairs, sales, and much more should be making a comeback from Calumet Photo.

People will tell you there are no shortcuts, but that is only true if you think a shortcut is a magic "Masterpiece" mode in your camera or a special action in Photoshop.

Drones are great, but they also pose a huge threat to general safety and national security if in the hands of the wrong people. The Secret Service has even said they don't yet have an effective method of defending against drones, although they recently began testing drone flights in their own backyard to defend against them. While some turn to strictly technological methods of bringing drones to the ground, the Dutch police are evaluating the effectiveness of a new program that trains eagles to grab drones from the sky with their talons.

The biggest downside to using a gimbal is losing basic controls of the camera. Sure, you can use a monitor, but you can't actually control the camera. Could your phone fix this problem?

Call it a personal project or way of finding the calm again in photographs, lately I've been shooting a portrait style “sad flower” collection and I love it. Check out the how and why and if it tickles your fancy you can give it a try too.