Fstoppers Original Articles

There is a change happening in work culture. Bosses are more open to telecommuting and being a freelancer can be thought of as being the answer to a modern day working life. Here are some tools and comparisons to provide the best fit for you and the business stage you are in.

Recently a member of the Fstoppers Facebook group posted a confession with a simple question: Who else uses their left eye to look through the camera's viewfinder? I was shocked by the results.

When a client hands a portrait photographer their hard-earned money, they want to see a photograph of themselves they feel great about. Light is a key aspect in producing such a photo, but how is a photographer supposed to choose which lighting style works for their client?

So, you’ve been told time and time again that royalty free music is the way to go when it comes to selecting beats for your videos. But part of you can’t help but wonder about the alternatives.

Let's be honest, how often do we get perfect conditions where everything just simply falls in the right place?

Monitor color calibration is a desperately boring activity to undergo, let alone discuss. However, if you're a photographer who wants to get serious about their work, it's utterly paramount.

I've recently returned from Hokkaido, Japan, where I spent a week doing research for my 2019 photo tour.

You might think it’s rude, but there’s a time and a place that having a pair of buds in your ear can help you get the shot.

What does it take to document a 2,000-kilometer run deep in the scorching-hot Namibia desert for over four weeks straight? And how is it possible to edit, upload, and share videos and photographs completely off the grid? Just ask Travel, Lifestyle, and Adventure Photographer Ryan Richardson from Life Outside Studios for the answer.

There are quite a lot of complaints like: "Canon won't release a 4K video camera." At the end of the day, most photographers and filmmakers publish visuals online, and most viewers watch them on sub-2K mobile devices. Here's how much resolution you truly need.

While I'm pretty sure we said the theme was "macro" this week, I think everyone heard "bugs" instead. That's okay with me since Spring is finally here so let's check out the insanely insect-heavy list and find out this week's theme.

In the digital world it may almost seem as though selling albums or wall art would be a thing of the past. The majority of clients will want to post their session to social media and go about their day. As photographers, it is up to us to educate the client about the importance of having a physical piece of art as well as the right type of art for their home.

Let’s face it: a lot of times, when you see a kit of anything, it’s not a good deal. Often, the cost of the kit isn’t worth it. Last week, I talked about Canon’s Advanced Two Lens Kit and how I thought it wasn’t the best deal for those looking to up their photography game. This week, I’m taking a look at Canon’s other kit, the Portrait and Travel Two-lens Kit. Spoiler alert: It’s actually a pretty good deal.

Around two weeks ago, Lee and I made a bet over my image, "Atlas and the Sun." In a limited 50 print run the goal was to sell 49 in ten days and make Lee buy the last one to place above his desk.

We all have to start somewhere. Taking on that first job can be very intimidating, so here are some tips to make sure it goes as smoothly as possible.

Next time you sit down for an editing session, do your eyes and brain a favor and remember to zoom out more frequently. Don't forget that any given image is a whole piece, more than just details.

When you run a photography business, client leads are everything. However, if you can’t get potential leads to respond to you, your business can flounder. Here are a few reasons why potential clients may not be getting back to you after they initially reach out.

Here in NJ we are lucky enough to have four seasons: Fall, Winter, Spring, and Summer. Maybe I shouldn't say "lucky" because it would be nice to have warmer weather year-round but the seasons do make for taking great photos. Though it's the first week of spring, we were just slammed with another big snow-storm and hopefully the last.

The character of your portraits is conveyed by many different elements, but a crucial one is the eyes of your subject. In this short tutorial, I’ll show you how to make eyes pop without making them look fake.

Today I take a trip down memory lane to identify a few of the television commercials that, for me, have exceeded the level of infomercial pitch to touch the mantle of enveloping art. As with any "tops of all time list," these are thoughts are completely subjective, but I'll do my best to explain my thinking behind each choice and hopefully, my list will inspire you to start thinking of your own.

Photographers get your resumes and portfolios updated. A recent search lead to some interesting opportunities for the right people with varying degrees of experience.

There are simply no shortcuts to building a career as a freelance photographer. Making money out of something you love is really hard, but it absolutely can be done.

Photographers always find themselves obsessed with exciting toys like camera bodies and lenses but it is often the overlooked items that can make the biggest impact on a shoot. When packing your camera bag always try to find space for a few invaluable tools to common challenges during any shoot. Below you will find some of my favorite little lifesavers that join me every time I shoot.

The sky usually plays an important role in shaping the mood and tone of the pictures you make while photographing outdoors. If mother nature doesn't want to cooperate and give you a desirable sky while shooting, a stock image could help save the day.

Does true love really exist? In this heartwarming photo series, photos capture a 90-year-old couple who have just celebrated their 70th wedding anniversary together.

The internet and social media are littered with photographs of guitars. Some awe-inspiring, others not so much. So how does one breath life into a stringed instrument without strumming or picking the strings?

When it comes to shooting portraits, photographers almost always reach for an 85mm lens or even the 70 - 200 mm lens. As great as these two lenses are for portraits, they often fall short when trying to capture an environmental style photograph. In this video, I'm going to show you the most widely used lens in my camera bag and how shooting wide angle can sometimes create a better photograph than shooting telephoto.

If you want to preserve your photos, it is a great idea to make certain you have a backup system in place. As obvious as that sounds, there are still more than a few out there who live life on the edge, and have yet to be bothered with backing up their work. For those of you I offer this inexpensive, and mostly automated, Apple specific backup option you can put in place today.

First things first, personal work is incredibly important. Client work often pays the bills but the most fundamental personal development you’re going to experience is when you take your vision and execute it. I would say that applies to just about anyone and certainly to photographers.

In between my music and photography work, I have a lot of hard drives. But even so, I've never had one fail, until just two days ago. It went without warning: no crunching sounds, no notifications, just a red light.

When it comes to taking a great photo, many photographers argue that it starts and ends with great composition. I’m not sure I’m so black and white in my outlook, but good composition is hugely important without a doubt. And one of the most overlooked parts of great composition is adding foreground interest. Today I will discuss how foreground interest in your photos can really improve your end results, and what you can do to nail the foreground every time.

It seems like every time you open Instagram, someone is complaining about their post exposure or the algorithm on their profiles. Whether algorithm changes or some other inexplicable event have dropped their engagement, the reason they don't have a following yet is because Instagram is always holding them back. What we fail to realize is that this free platform that promotes our work really doesn’t owe us anything.

Photography agents are nothing new. They've been around for a long time, but since the advent of social media they seem like something we are all a lot more aware of; anyone who's anyone has an agent, right? However, there are a few misconceptions out there as to what an agent offers.

A thick blanket of white covers falling tree limbs in a beautiful landscape just calling for you to shoot your outdoor session. Navigating the labyrinth of paths to get the perfect scene is obtainable with a few from fellow photographers. Last week we discussed how to prepare for shoots in the desert and now we go to the opposite side of the spectrum with a winter wonderland shoot in the snow. A few suggestions will help the safety of your clients as well as getting those killer shots.

Your “About Me” page is one of the single most powerful ways to define your brand, stand out from your competition, and make potential clients feel they can’t NOT hire you. So why, then, are you neglecting it? Here’s how to write a killer “About Me” page to capture more clients.

As photographers and videographers, we tend to push our computers much harder than the average user. However, overlooking something as innocuous as household dust brought my computer to a halt.

Do you love photography and hate numbers? Are you afraid you don’t know what you don’t know when it comes to starting a business? Here are nine critical items to consider before starting your photography business.

The biggest hurdle faced by many budding portrait photographers is the need to find amazing subjects to collaborate with. Reaching out to and communicating with models can be intimidating, but it really shouldn't be, as it can very easily lead to a very rewarding collaborative shoot for both parties.

This week's top 10 list is sure to bring a smile to your face. We challenged our readers to show us photos displaying happiness, and the results should help to brighten your day.

The last five years has seen huge advances in the consumer videography market, and it’s all getting smaller. It's so much so that one can now carry a versatile, fully equipped, professional videography setup inside baggage small enough to carry onto a flight. Here’s how.

One minute you're in the middle of photographing one of the most beautiful landscapes you've ever seen. The next minute your camera is on the ground, broken.

I was on Instagram the other day when an ad for one of Canon’s two-lens kits popped up. The kits package together a couple of interesting options for photographers looking to step up from a kit lens, but the real question is: are the lenses a good value for photographers or should the money be spent elsewhere?

Despite a photographer’s best efforts, there will come a time when a client is unhappy with some part of their experience, whether it’s customer service or the finished images. Since it’s bound to happen, how should a photographer handle unhappy customers? The answer is: catch them before they can be disappointed.

On a multi-day assignment in Portland last week, I took advantage of my day off between assignments to experiment with the Sony a7R III and try it out in my normal workflow.

A free update to ON1 Photo RAW 2018 made sweeping improvements to performance and image quality and also introduced new features. From importing and cataloging to editing, layer-based compositing, and printing, the new Photo RAW 2018.1 is a powerhouse for every photographer's workflow.

Beauty photography can be a lot of fun to shoot, and that is what keeps me eager to keep progressing in my craft. But it does come with its own set of problems!

Once a year over a million people head to the tidal basin area of Washington D.C. in hopes of catching a glimpse of the thousands of beautiful cherry blossoms lining the streets. This year you may need to adjust your schedule to catch the peak bloom.

I’m a big believer that you don’t need expensive equipment and a complicated lighting set up to create beautiful images. Some of my favorite images were captured with a really simple lighting setup and with little or no lighting equipment at all. Sometimes too much emphasis is often put on equipment and we can easily get caught up in complicated lighting and expensive gear.

March Madness is almost here! For the players, that means a lot of press and hype both on and off the court. For photographers tasked with showing them off, it means doing our best to make it all run smoothly.

You may be familiar with portrait photography, but have you ever had the pleasure of experiencing the fine art form? If you haven’t, it’s time you did. Fine art portrait photography has exploded in the luxury portraiture photography market in recent years. The results are superbly evocative and make simply stunning wall art.