Fstoppers Original Articles

Taking your cityscape photos during blue hour is always a safe bet if you don't get spectacular light at sunrise or sunset. A deep blue sky provides the perfect color contrast to the incandescent lights in the city and will help you create a pleasing result. But what if you are lucky with light and weather? Do you take a photo while the colors pop in the sky or with the city lights during blue hour? Luckily, you can get both by applying a technique called time blending. In this article, I show you how.

My career as an elitist prime glass snob has come to an end after real-world professional work using an unexpected lens choice showed me the error of my ways.

Here are a few thoughts from getting to spend a couple months with a powerful if pint-sized cinema camera from one of the industry’s leading brands.

Editing software from Skylum has gone through a lot of changes over the past few years, and with its new software Luminar Neo, there's still lots of room for evolution in what the software can do for its users. HDR Merge was recently added as an expansion for the software, and this is one feature that had been asked for by its users for some time. Another feature that has been requested in forums quite frequently is the ability to stitch panoramas.

When I was new to studio portrait photography, for some reason, I found the beauty dish to be one of the more intimidating modifiers to master. Perhaps it had to do with the unique shape and setup, but for whatever reason, I avoided trying one out for a long time. In reality, using a beauty dish is not as challenging as it may seem, and in this article, I will detail three basic ways to use one as well as provide sample images.

Spiraling costs are hitting photographers hard. Here are more ways to save money and do photography on a shoestring.

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.

Sony produced what could be described as a game-changer of a camera with its current flagship, the Sony a1. Although this camera offers a plethora of new features that most reviews have raved about. One of its most remarkable features has gone a little under the radar. This feature is the increase in the flash sync speed to 1/400th of a second shutter speed.

A new player in the photography industry, ClickASnap, offers YouTube-like payments for creators who simply upload their images. The business model is simple: take everything that’s good about photo-sharing platforms and make it better by adding features photographers long wanted.

A drone allows you to take photographs to the next level. There is only one downside for most drones I know of. The camera can’t be tilted for vertical shots. That doesn’t mean you can’t shoot vertical images. The solution is a panorama.

Are you not into abstract photography? It’s one of those things you’ll either love or hate. But it's important, and there is much more to it than you might know.

If you’ve ever dived into a food photography shoot hoping to wing it, things probably went a little awry because there are so many moving parts to food photography. In this post, I’ll share my best tips for a no-fuss, no-stress food photography shoot to help you achieve the vision in your mind.

I love shooting landscape photos at the beach. It’s an ever-changing landscape dominated by the sea and its waves. You might think shooting photos at such a location is easy, but you have to know a few things before you go there. It's all about safety.

The 2022 MacBook Air is a major departure from models of the past, with a complete redesign, a bigger screen, new color options, and a lot more. Is it the laptop for you? Read on for my review.

Telephoto lenses are very useful in landscape photography, but the fact that they are commonly heavier and/or bulkier can sometimes be concerning. How do you know which one is worth carrying around?

Photographers have three choices when selling photographs. They can be commissioned to shoot for a client, aim for the mass market, or choose to sell fewer, high-quality, collectible images with narrower interest. There are good reasons why you should consider the last option.

David Ma is a director and filmmaker whose cinematic photos and videos of food have caught the attention of both the culinary and creative worlds, earning him a spot in Adweek's Top 100 Creatives of 2021. In this interview, we learn his valuable creative insights, advice for filmmakers and photographers, and how creating content on the go allows him to be more productive, build stronger client relationships, and make more compelling content.

The Fstoppers community is brimming with creative vision and talent. Every day, we comb through your work, looking for images to feature as the Photo of the Day or simply to admire your creativity and technical prowess. In 2022, we're featuring a new photographer every month, whose portfolio represents both stellar photographic achievement and a high level of involvement within the Fstoppers community.

As photographers, we often are bogged down in what gear to buy, what lens to choose, what has better specs, and so on. To everyone's satisfaction or disappointment, these things will only make a marginal difference in most cases. As a photographer, you need to have more skills than gear. I am here to tell you the five most important ones.

And while we're on the subject of which is better, iPhones are far superior to Android devices, the iPad is objectively the best tablet available, and digital imaging is far superior to analog film in every way imaginable.

Have you been feeling the heat this summer? Taking photos out in the sunshine can be a challenge. However, it can be made a lot easier with the right preparation. Here are five of my photography hot weather essentials.

I subscribe to Premiere Pro and own Final Cut X and Da Vinci Resolve. I’ve been weighing up which one to focus on in order to become a better editor and video professional. I’ve considered the ease of use when editing and exporting, the support and community of each, and the market demand.

Reduction of single-use plastic is increasingly on the minds of conscientious consumers, and the practice of shooting with physical film in preference to digital does bring with it considerations in the area. But fear not, Ikigai Film Lab is here to recycle, reuse, and repurpose, to put our anxiety at ease and help us keep shooting with a clearer conscience.

Looking back at my early portraits often makes me cringe. I’m not even afraid to admit it now. It was always a goal of mine to be a competent portrait photographer, but I was incredibly shy and didn’t know how to engage with the people in front of my lens. I was always somehow dissatisfied with my results, as I could never seem to connect with my subjects on a level deep enough for them to let their guard down.

Imagine being tasked with photographing press events featuring some of the most famous people in the world, on a regular basis. Are you confident that you can come away with photographs as strong or better than those of your peers? Can you find the small, personal moments taking place in the chaos to create images that are unique? Christy Bowe is a photographer who has successfully accomplished these tasks for the past three decades.

If someone gave you $1,000 and told you to buy a camera and lens combo, what would you do? Yes, it is hard to get a good kit for relatively little money. Yet, there are some hidden gems that are great to kickstart your career and offer an improvement over existing gear.

One of the most exciting topics for me to cover during my time as a professional newspaper journalist was fires and firefighting, and the potential for great images is there for anyone who approaches the matter with a little preparation and knowledge.

Whether you're brand new or have many years experience, printing your work can be the most satisfying part of photography. Something you might not realize is how much your work might change after you make that first print.

Those who wish to practice their off-camera flash technique or simply, wish to create a successful concept shoot to boost their portfolio, should strongly consider practicing the arrangement with themselves as the subject.

Fujifilm gets a pretty bad rap these days from the film photography community. So, it’s easy to forget that from the 1980s to the early 2000s, Fujifilm produced some of the best cameras ever made: medium format, point and shoots, the extraordinary Xpan, and a sack full of other interesting goodies.

We've all heard of the stereotype of "the starving artist," but a new study from the UK put concrete numbers on this portrayal, showing that graduates with a degree in photography truly do (on average) become starving artists. Adding insult to injury, the study reveals that photographers are not only on the list, they are ranked the worst for post-graduates making low income. Ouch.

We all have genres that we usually shoot, but sometimes, we want to dabble in photography outside our comfort zone. It is possible to start getting great photos in other areas without them becoming a full-time occupation or costing a fortune in the extra kit. Here's how to do that with wildlife photography.

There are different breeds of wildlife photographers. At the top of the food chain is Photographicus Obsessius. They study individual species, so they know all their behaviors and can call them by their Latin names. They get up at 2 a.m., drive fifty miles or more,...

I love a good quote to put things in perspective when I'm having a crisis of confidence in my creative output, or feeling like a project or goal is taking too long to reach. There are many lessons you, and I, as photographers can learn in these 5 quotes from famous artists, entrepreneurs, and sports stars. Get ready for a boost of inspiration and a mindset shift!

Some tools are just too powerful to not have in your tool bag as a photographer, and the plate composite technique is one such method.

Do you have a Canon EOS R5? In that case, you’re probably aware of the overheating issues when filming. It isn’t of any concern if you’ll never use the video function. But what if an overheating warning occurs while photographing? I experienced that situation, and I have the solution.

While bringing color to your images is best done manually, LUTs accelerate things. Here’s how I customize LUTs to get the best of both worlds in a pinch.

Did you know that Canon introduced the world to eye control focus back in 1992? In this retrospective, I will discuss the Canon EOS A2E, the world’s first camera that allowed the user to select a focusing point by simply looking at it.

If you’re starting out in product photography and you’re not working with a props stylist, it can feel overwhelming when it comes to building out a props collection. Here are my go-to props for laying the foundations of a versatile collection so that you can save money and space and speed up your workflow.

I take photos to get them printed to either hang them in my apartment or sell them to customers. And while it's important for me that those prints appear sharp and detailed, it's crucial to get a correct representation of the colors and contrasts. To achieve this, a process called soft proofing should be used during print preparation whenever possible, and in this article, I show you how to do it.

A new toy brings more joy into my photo workflow.

We all love a great landscape under an amazing sky. Clouds, sunlight, sunrays, and colors are often preferred over a simple and dull sky. But sometimes, nature doesn’t show us the things we like to see, something that can be frustrating if we can’t go back a second time. Is there a solution?

Photography is blessed and cursed with both scientific and artistic rules. We always hear that we should keep or break them, but there is much more to it than that.

The industry has been putting out some really hard-to-resist gear these last few years. Ever since Sony released the a7 mirrorless line, it’s been a tsunami of gear upgrade options that seem too good to pass by. Whether it’s the new tack-sharp, image-stabilized Canon RF lenses, the 61-megapixel Sony a7R IV, or the new "creator-ready" Nikon Z 30, it’s not just a case of “Shiny Object Syndrome”: these developments in technology really do reflect in the quality of the work creatives can produce. That’s where MPB comes in.

We see patterns everywhere. Related to rhythm and texture, they are powerful tools in photography for a host of reasons.

It’s safe to say Nikon’s Z 9 is the company’s most advanced flagship camera yet. Here, you can read into some of the unheard stories from the camera’s development process. This is the behind-the-scenes story of the Z 9 from those who made it.

Seascapes have always been one of my favorite subjects to photograph. For most of my travels, I visit and photograph at least one spectacular coastline, and in this article, I share the five most photogenic beaches I have photographed so far.

Do you ever find yourself repeating yourself over and over again to prospective clients in your workflow? If so, here are the templates I’ve created that both anticipate my clients’ questions and save me valuable time in my product photography business.

With long days and shorter nights, summer is a good time to consider getting into solar astrophotography. The Sun is also heading toward the active phase of its 11-year sunspot cycle and promises to make the Sun more interesting than the featureless cueball look of the sunspot cycle minimum. Solar astronomers use the count of visible sunspots as a measure of the solar activity, and sunspot cycle #25, as counted by astronomers, looks like it will be peaking sometime around 2024.

In the final part of my four-part series, I want to focus on the one person who can make or break your photography business: you.

A bit of panic leads to a fun diversion. Today, we pose a hypothetical question.