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Articles written by Alex Cooke

How to Take Sharp Handheld Macro Photos
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Although sharpness is important in just about every genre, it is a particularly strong priority in macro photography. However, it is particularly challenging in macro work, especially when you are not working in a studio where you have complete control over the placement or stabilization of your subject. If you want to shoot on the go without setting up a tripod every time, check out this fantastic video tutorial that will show you some helpful tips for getting sharp images even when shooting handheld.

How to Properly Back Up Your Photos and Avoid Disaster
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One of the most important habits every photographer or filmmaker should develop is a strong backup strategy that guarantees the safety of your files in the event of a hard drive failure or natural disaster. If you have not created yours yet, check out this helpful video tutorial that will show you how to properly ensure the safety of all your files.

A Portrait Photographer's Basic Editing Workflow
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As much as lighting, posing, composition, and settings matter for creating a good portrait image, they are only half of what it takes to create a successful final result. You also need a strong post-processing workflow. If you are new to portrait work, check out this great video tutorial that will show you a basic editing workflow for creating polished final images.

Should You Delete Old Instagram Posts or Hide Like Counts?
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Most photographers have had an Instagram account for several years now, and as such, they have each accumulated likely hundreds of even thousands of posts. Most people will simply leave their old posts up, but for professional creatives, there is an argument to be made for removing older entries. So, should you remove those old posts? Should you hide like counts on your images? This interesting video podcast discusses these questions.

A Helpful Tip for Improving Your Landscape Photography
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Landscape photography is a unique genre that takes a combination of technical skill, creative vision, perseverance, and often, a bit of luck. If you find yourself struggling to create worthwhile images lately, check out this great video tutorial that will give you some helpful advice sure to put you back on the right track.

Can This Ultra-Cheap 85mm Lens Give You the Results You Need?
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An 85mm lens with a wide maximum aperture is one of the most desirable options out there, especially for portrait photographers, who prize the focal length and narrow depth of field. However, such lenses can easily cost well over $2,000 for a good option. At less than $200, the Meike 85mm f/1.8 is highly intriguing, but can it offer the results you need at such a low price? This excellent video review takes a look at the lens and the sort of performance and image quality you can expect from it in practice.

How to Turn a Bland Raw File Into an Interesting Photograph
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If you are a new photographer and you just started shooting in raw, you have probably noticed that the files look rather flat and bland, especially compared to JPEG files. Don't worry, though, that is exactly what is supposed to happen. If you are wondering how to turn a raw file into an eye-catching finished image, check out this fantastic video tutorial that will show you how to edit a raw file from start to finish using Photoshop.

3 Reasons You Might Be Frustrated With Your Photography
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Photography can be a frustrating thing. It takes a combination of technical skills, creative vision, and often, a bit of luck, and any one of them going awry can throw off the entire process and final result. If you are feeling a bit frustrated by the whole thing lately, check out this great video that features an experienced photographer discussing three reasons why you might be experiencing that irritation and what you can do to remedy the situation.

How to Take Long Exposure Landscape Photos
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One of the most popular techniques in landscape photography is the long exposure, which allows you to really add your creative take on a scene. However, it takes more than just using a longer shutter speed to create a compelling final result. This helpful video tutorial will show you how to create a long exposure photograph.

Valuable Creative Insights and Tips for Mobile Photos and Video: We Interview David Ma
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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.

You Can Create Great Landscape Photos in Any Conditions
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Of course, it would be great if the weather would cooperate every time we went out to take photos, but that simply is not going to happen, and if you avoid creating images whenever the conditions are not ideal, you are going to lead a frustrating career as a photographer. This great video tutorial is an important reminder that even in terrible conditions, you can create compelling images.

Fstoppers Photographer of the Month (July 2022): Robyn Damianos
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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.

A Review of the Voigtlander Nokton 21mm f/1.4 Lens
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Voigtlander is known for making all-metal manual focus lenses that offer durable construction and sharp and contrasty images. The Nokton 21mm f/1.4 Aspherical lens is another in that tradition, and it offers a unique focal length paired with a very wide maximum aperture. This great video review takes a look at the lens and the sort of performance and image quality you can expect from it in practice.

A Review of the Canon EOS R7 Mirrorless Camera
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Canon's 7D series of DSLRs were some of the company's most popular cameras, as they borrowed many features from the company's more expensive full frame bodies and put them all in small and more affordable packages. And so, the announcement of the EOS R7, the mirrorless successor to the 7D line, has generated a lot of excitement. With a range of new features and improvements, it looks to be quite the camera. This great video review takes a look at the sort of performance and image quality you can expect from it in use.

One of the Most Unknown But Useful Tools in Lightroom
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Lightroom has become quite an impressively capable editing program, able to tackle many advanced post-processing tasks that used to be reserved exclusively for Photoshop. As such, it can easy to overlook some of its tools. This excellent video tutorial will show you a lesser-known tool, what it does, and how to use it to create more precise edits.

Everything You Need to Know About Photoshop's Content-Aware Fill
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Content-Aware fill is one of the most useful innovations in the history of Photoshop, allowing you to convincingly replace a wide variety of things in an image quickly and easily without having to do a lot of manual cloning and blending. It is not perfect, though, but with a bit of know-how, you can get a lot more from it. This helpful video tutorial will show you everything you need to know about the Content-Aware tool and how to customize it to your needs.

How to Balance Flash and Ambient Light
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Knowing how to balance flash and ambient light is one of the most crucial skills a portrait photographer can have, as it will give you the ability to shoot in just about any environment with full creative and technical control. If you are newer to working with artificial lighting and want to learn this skill, check out this fantastic video tutorial that will show you how to balance flash and ambient light for better images.