How to Battle Through Growing Pains as a Photographer
Growing as an artist isn’t always fun. But being the best artist you can be requires you to lean into the growing pains to reach your full potential.
Growing as an artist isn’t always fun. But being the best artist you can be requires you to lean into the growing pains to reach your full potential.
There's a lot more to creating unique and edgy content than keeping a camera fixed to your face. From eating scrumptious tacos and filming rock-busting, high-horsepower off-road race trucks in Baja, Mexico to cruising the scenic Rubicon Trail in the Sierra Nevada creating content for some of the motorsport industry's biggest names, it's all in a week's work if you're Matt Martelli, the creative director and CEO of one of the fastest growing media companies on the U.S. West Coast, Mad Media.
Landscape photography is largely dictated by the weather you experience out in the field. Many times, we don't get the conditions we hoped for, which can be especially challenging after investing time and money into a photography trip. These are five things you can do the next time you're in unfavorable conditions to walk away with great images regardless of the weather.
If you’re looking for a new location to shoot, consider checking out these destinations that might be right by you.
Shooting product photography can either be a tedious task or it can be a fun and rewarding one. Likewise, looking at product photographs can either be boring or it can enlightening. Using gels to modify the light in your product photographs can be an easy way to add some energy to your images.
I understand that the term "best" is mostly subjective and in many cases, it's entirely based on individual requirements. The recent releases from Datacolor boast some pretty cool new features, but, do they make them the best?
A decade seems like a bit of a milestone to me, from my first camera to working as a commercial food photographer. There have been lot of lessons learnt along the way.
The weather isn’t always pleasant for landscape photographers. Have you ever tried to take advantage of extreme weather conditions?
One of the many reasons I love this great color grading tool (as I've already written about) is that the creator, Oleg, is very good at listening to requests and creating or adding new features, while fixing minor bugs along the way in a much more responsive manner than what I've seen from the big companies. I'm happy to see the new 1.42 update released today.
Elinchrom has a pretty wide range of lights on offer, but their newest edition fills a gap in their lineup that users will be happy to see.
In this article, go behind the scenes of a recent shoot and see how I shot, lit, and edited this 1920s inspired shoot.
In 1991, NASA sent out a hacked Nikon F3 with a Kodak digital back out into space. The camera was called the Kodak Hawkeye II. I was born in 1993 and even in that time, this kind of technology was almost unheard of.
You’ve just wrapped up a shoot and excitement begins to swell in you as you prepare to review your pictures. You hope that just this once, you can walk away with deep satisfaction at the end result. However, to your dismay, just as you are preparing to review the pictures, you catch wind of a notification to view someone’s new Instagram post. That of which due to how polished it is, makes you look at your own work with despair. The spark you once felt for it is now gone.
I thought I had seen pretty much every type of water drop photo over the years, then I stumbled upon these. Markus Reugels is a floor installer in Marktsteinach, Germany as well as a part-time photographer. Markus has created a way to reflect images into water drops while capturing said drops in midair.
In the last few years, us earth-bound humans have been blessed with stunning still images and breathtaking timelapses that were taken in outerspace. Veteran astronaut-photographer Don Pettit was at the recent SXSW event, and spoke about the challenges of capturing images in space.
Hasselblad is making a comeback with another edition of Hasselblad Masters, a competition aimed at showcasing the world's best photography across diverse genres. Read on for details!
We all know the term, and as cringe-worthy as it can sound, it doesn't negate it's importance: networking. Along with "entrepreneur," the word "networking" gets thrown around a lot in today's millennial-run world full of social media highlight reels and "try-hard" antics. But networking, in the purest sense of the word, is an absolute necessity in our industry of creative entrepreneurship. There are opportunities around you that you will never be privy to unless you start cultivating genuine relationships with the creators in your extended circles. Not only that, but there is a vast pool of resources and knowledge that you could be tapping into.
North Face athlete. National Geographic Adventurer of the Year. Painter. Cinematographer. Filmmaker. Whether climbing first ascents or hanging off cliffs to film hallucinogenic honey hunters, Renan Ozturk's bio reads like that of five people. Fstoppers was lucky enough to interview this talented creative. Find out all about him and his process here.
At some point, all creatives fall into ruts where it’s difficult to imagine new concepts. Unfortunately, inspiration doesn't always present itself. Sometimes we have to create it. Below is a list of practices I follow.
A photographer in Ireland who was out for a stroll with a tripod at night was mistaken for a gunman by a passerby, who called the authorities. A manhunt ensued. And he had no idea.
After enough time in the broadcast industry, it's hard not to have a soft spot for Portabrace. They are incredibly well made. However, outside of generic television and news gathering, I would say that Think Tank, Lowepro, and Pelican are the top dogs. I never found a Portabrace bag suiting my needs entirely, nevermind that they can cost a small fortune — until now. I managed to pick up an amazing backpack for just $99 after instant savings from B&H.
Adobe’s Premiere Rush application, an all-in-one tool for shooting, editing, and sharing videos, has just received a significant update.
The photography megastore B&H has purchased 50 FlashDiscs from us as a "test run" and they just went on sale minutes ago. B&H will ship anywhere in the world (if you are wiling to pay the shipping costs) but shipping to Canada is particularly reasonable. Jump on this before they sell out in a few hours.
We all have our own motivation for the images we choose to make. Every photographer has that little voice, that driving force pushing you toward the goal, or that feeling in your gut when you really nailed it.
Maybe that works to your advantage now, but at some point, it’s likely to break loose and run wild…for better or for worse.
I’ve pondered posting this article since I started writing for Fstoppers over a year ago, but it never seemed right. I thought about sharing the story on Veteran’s Day, on Memorial Day, on either the anniversary of my friend’s birth or of his death. None of these timings ever seemed right. Maybe that’s because it was still so fresh in my heart. Maybe I felt like it was too personal to share. But I figure it’s a story that needs to be told, especially on the heels of President Trump’s signature on an order that aims to improve mental health options for our brothers and sisters returning home from the “playground of war.”
The Retouching Academy has announced a new contest, open to beginner and experienced enthusiast skill levels. Download the contest image file and submit your best retouch by May 15, 2018 for a chance to win some great prizes from Wacom, Capture One, and Retouching Academy.