Speaking for wildlife and landscape photographers, we all seem to be interested in the fast glass (especially if it's longer than 600mm or wider than 24mm), better battery life, more frames per second, higher resolution, and a weather-sealed robust body that can take a licking. But, when the weather turns cold, there's something we can't shoot without: gloves.
When an idea goes beyond what is possible, sometimes you need to create your own reality. Learn how the photographer for and NHL team got below the ice for a fresh perspective and created some very cool portraits.
Watch this insightful video on some of the in's and out's about directing in the music video world. In this video producers talk about markets, budgets, and how a little creativity can go a long way. To help them fund more videos visit
As professionals, we are expected to deliver a quality product to our clients. No matter what you are photographing or filming, it’s no secret that tight deadlines, difficult clients, and a wide variety of other issues can cause major stress in our lives. It can be taxing both physically and mentally and affect us in our day-to-day lives, relationships, and work. To be successful, these stresses need to be overcome and dealt with properly so that they do not bring us down. Here are a few tips to help to deal with the issues that may affect us.
With the new year now well underway, I took some time this week to ponder my motivations for doing photography in the first place. I think it is healthy to every now and again stop and evaluate where you are, what you’re doing, and whether or not it is worth spending your precious time on. Maybe there are some nuggets of useful information from this exercise that will prove useful for you. If nothing else, perhaps it’ll nudge you to reflect on your own photographic journey and help you get to where you want to go.
If you don't know Jerry Uelsmann or Maggie Taylor you should. Jerry creates works of art blending multiple photos together using enlargers while Maggie uses a scanner to create her art. All of jerry's work is shot on film and processed and manipulated in the darkroom which truly makes his work so unique. Being husband and wife these two are some of the biggest names in the modern art world. This documentary tells Jerry and Maggie's story of how they became artists and the impact of their work in photography.
Howdy everyone and welcome to the Wednesday Rundown. 8 Bit Digital TV sent in a great video on how to key a green screen in After Effects. They do a great job showing the best way to approach this. Also check out the behind the scenes of The World Underneath, and see the amazing work from Graham Eaton. If you have a great and informative video you want to see in the Wednesday Rundown please shoot me an email jerrit@fstoppers.com .
Drones have enhanced viewer experiences in a wide range of media, from documentaries to sports coverage. That they have had a massive impact on the film and photography world is undeniable, but have they revolutionized photography?
Medium format Phase One shooters have a new lens to lust over, as today Phase One and Schneider lenses announced the availability of the Schneider Kreuznach 40-80mm f/4.0-5.6 leaf shutter zoom lens. This is the second zoom lens designed for the Phase One 645 camera platform. It is the latest in the close collboratioin partnership between the two companies.
Some of the best advice I've heard from successful photographers has been to develop as many means of making money with your photography so you can sustain your income down the road. While pet photography might not be the first area you might consider, Vicki Taufer is here to tell us why it's a great area to supplement your wedding, family, and portrait businesses. This Thursday through Saturday (July 26-28), creativeLIVE will stream Vicki's online workshop for free as she shares the ins and outs of a successful pet business.
I don’t hold back words for gear that has fancy specs but is not built to be a workhorse for high-volume photographers shooting under various conditions. With all the impressive technology attached to the SanDisk PRO-CINEMA CF Express card, I set out to see if it was not only as fast and high-powered as it touts but also if it was built with the durability that I expect when I’m investing in gear.
Probably the worst-kept secret on the Internet in the last few days, the Nikon D7500, was officially announced on Wednesday. There’s a lot of D500 DNA in the D7500, which is not a bad thing, since that’s Nikon’s flagship DX body, and this model sits right below in the midrange of the lineup.
The latest list of inductees to the 2016 class of the International Photography Hall of Fame reads like a who's who of top tier photographers and industry pioneers. Gracing the list are the likes of Annie Leibovitz, Sebastiao Salgado, Ken Burns, Tom and John Knoll, Ernst Haas, and Steve Jobs. Wait, what? Steve Jobs?
Deciding if you should go to photography school takes more than looking at its perks. First, you will have to realize who you are, where you are coming from, and where you want to go. Looking at the outrageous amount of money you will have to spend in order to attend university, the answer should be based first and foremost on what your needs are and what the school can offer you in order to satisfy those needs. Our society is pushing the belief that college education is intrinsic to a successful career, but modern facilities and prestigious professors won’t be justified as long as they are not essential in achieving your personal goal. Once you realized that, the decision is actually not that difficult.
The Slanted Lens is back with another amazing lighting tutorial. This time they venture onto a 1700's Naval ship, the U.S.S. Constitution in Boston, MA. The portraits include an early Naval captain and his shipmates loading cannons. This tutorial specifically goes through how to light creatively during the nighttime hours where lighting might be more difficult for some.
After the brutal beat down that Instagram received when it changed it's Terms of Service, some questioned if the company would be able to survive the deep decline of users that were jumping ship. A few weeks later and Instagram is finally responding to some of these accusations releasing their user numbers and surprisingly they are actually witnessing growth rather than decline. The company released numbers that shows at last count over 90 million users are actively using the service posting over 40 million photos a day.
If you are first starting in photography, this quote by the famous photographer Henri Cartier-Bresson might seem outrageous or overly harsh. But as someone who has taken at least 10,000 photos, I can tell you that there is a lot of truth to this, and more importantly, this idea can be freeing.
Back in December of 2009, photographer turned film maker Vincent Laforet teamed up with Canon and Vimeo to start a social experiment in story telling. The idea was to create an short 3 or 4 minute video that would end on a single still frame. Then by taking that final frame as a starting point of reference, other film makers could continue the story and add their own twists and turns into the developing scripts. Each segment would be judged by industry heavy weights like Philip Bloom, Shane Hurlbut, Russel Carpenter, among others, and a new chapter would begin. Over the next year, hundreds of chapters were written with 6 lucky directors winning spots in the final video that is currently being shown at Sundance. Below is a summary of the final project and the final video in its entirety is included in the full post. Hopefully this contest not only inspires you in your own photography but also encourages you to test the waters in film making.
Running your own business can be the most fulfilling and most frustrating thing someone can ever embark on. It's both draining and empowering at the same time; quite simply, it's the most toxic relationship you will ever be in, but you'll always be going back for more no matter how crazy people say you are.
If you're failing to get hired as a photographer, then maybe your first impression and initial communication could be the things that are letting you down.
John Carpenter. His name is synonymous with fear. The films he has made in the last 40 years has been the cause of both delight and terror in several generations. 'The Thing' used to have me scrambling under the covers at night during my childhood while 'Big Trouble in Little China' had me laughing at jokes I was still too young to understand. Follow Kyle Cassidy as he photographs John Carpenter in the author's music room for his series of fantasy and science fiction writers in their creative spaces called: Where I Write.
When I was a kid I thought I was stupid. No one could figure out why I couldn’t remember the colors of all the crayons. My teachers thought I had a learning disability. I remember having to pick up a crayon over and over to read the name so I knew what color it was.
Last week we had the pleasure of hosting over 100 photographers at our workshop at the Atlantis in the Bahamas. Our opening party was hosted at Fathoms where we set up a photobooth in front of "The Digg." The tank holds over 100 venomous Indo-Pacific Ocean Lionfish, 500 piranhas, iridescent jellyfish and six-foot Moray Eels. It turned out to be one of the most entertaining backdrops with a revolving window of fish!
Last week Lee Morris and I embarked on something I like to call "The Puerto Rican landscape challenge." The goal of this series is to not only showcase some of the most beautiful locations on the island of Puerto Rico, but to also find out, once and for all, who is the better landscape photographer. Today is the beginning of this ultimate challenge.
Ring lights have been around for a while, but recently they haven’t been as trendy as they used to. Except in the YouTube beauty industry where many influencers rely on these, day in and day out, to create their content. I recently tried the Angler Circo LED Ring Light to see how good it was.
Blackmagic Design today released Camera v1.9.3, a firmware update that adds histogram, audio meters and media time remaining indicators to the Blackmagic Cinema Camera and Pocket Cinema Camera. These features were also recently added to the Production Camera.
Cleaning up the haloing when creating selections can take some time, and even when your image is complete and you can still see some remaining it can be quite annoying. In this tutorial, I'm going to show you a seldom-used but effective way of cleaning the masks.