Articles from Christopher Malcolm

The Fuji GFX 100 is an amazing camera. But one simple fix could greatly improve its usefulness in my workflow.

As a year unlike any other slowly rolls into the history books, we near that magic time when we sweep out the old and bring in the new.

The holiday season, and the rash of sales that goes with it, always inspires a simple question: “what purchases would make an improvement to my photography business?” But, the more pertinent question, far less often asked, is: “do I really need to make any purchases at all?”

Sometimes gear grows on you. And sometimes a piece of equipment’s effectiveness is less about specs and more about combinations.

Tis the season to not only reflect on your photographic year just passed, but also to do some planning for the future.

Just got a new box in the mail with a rather awesome surprise; a loaner Nikon Z 6II. I will have the camera for a couple months to fully put through its paces, but wanted to share some initial thoughts.

The end of the year is always a time to both make one final push to close the business year strongly and to reflect on the current state of affairs. As a photographer, it’s also a good time to look back on where you stand as an artist and where you still want to go.

Today, I’ll share with you a brief review, not of a camera, but of the life of a professional photographer.

It was the best of times, it was the worst of times. Okay, not really, but choosing a camera these days when that same camera can change so much from year to year can make buying decisions all the more difficult.

Every time I think about how much 2020 has fundamentally changed my life and my profession, I am reminded that, while dramatic, this is hardly the only period of change I’ve experienced in the business. So today, I thought I’d have a look back at just some of the changes that have impacted my own career since I first started making money as a professional photographer.

Today, I’d like to review, well, reviews. Since gear and gear reviews are something all of us, including myself, spend a bit too much time obsessing over, it’s worth taking a step back to think about what they do and do not have to offer.

Most gear chatter online tends to center around the endless and ultimately useless debate about which camera bodies are the best on the market and will transform you overnight into a photographic superhero combining the skills of Ansel Adams, Annie Leibovitz, and James Nachtwey into one without ever having to practice or learn your craft. But with all the focus on sensors and capture devices, we often pay far too little attention to each image's first port of entry: the lens.

As all medium format shooters know, moving fast with larger sensor cameras can be a challenge compared to their full frame counterparts. So, I recently tried out the Fuji GFX GF 45mm-100mm f/4 R LM OIS WR to see if it would speed my workflow and unlock additional potential in my Fuji GFX system.

With the onset of the pandemic and slowdown in production, income from stock photography has become an increasingly important source of revenue for many photographers. Getty Images and iStock have recently announced a new program to provide grants to emerging photographers interested in entering the stock photography market.

Let’s assume for a moment Nikon was a genie and could grant me one wish. Aside from wishing for 1,000 more wishes, here is what I would ask for.

Today, we will have a brief battle between the two most compact prime lenses for the Fuji GFX system.

In today’s article, I’ll talk about a surprising new/old addition to my lens collection.

For the sake of a little fun, rather than drone on about gear for yet another week, in today’s article, I’m going to talk about socks. And yes, I promise it relates to photography.

As a seemingly endless quarantine has made my daily afternoon walkabouts a mental necessity, I decided to go small and rent a Fuji X-T30 for a week to see if it could potentially save my back and my wallet.

In today’s article, I thought it might be helpful to those just getting into the business to take you through my real-time thought process when bidding on commercial assignments, from the initial query email to whether or not I take a job. Over the years, I’ve made a lot of good decisions and a lot of bad decisions, and hopefully, you can learn from my journey.

It’s a question that everyone who picks up a camera asks at some point. But how do you know if a career in photography is right for you?

Knowing when to buy and when to borrow can make a big difference to the bottom line of your photography business.

A trio of questions to keep in mind as you are trying to put your best work forward.

In my never ending quest to state the obvious things that we all tend to forget, today I will talk about another simple truth. To get what you want, you first have to know what you want.

A brief look back at just some of the many ways my own mind has played tricks on me along my journey from hobbyist to working professional.

With a bevy of camera announcements (and rumored announcements) setting the internet on fire over the last couple of weeks, I thought it might be fun to offer a review of a different sort.

With camera companies rolling out mouth-watering specs at a breakneck pace, sometimes, it’s hard to know just when to pounce on a good deal.

With a holiday where people are expected to gather in large groups taking place during a global pandemic, I went a different way for my Fourth of July weekend.

As I delve more into lens options for the Nikon Z system, I’ve found a small feature that pays big dividends.

While we all like numbers, sheer specs are rarely the best way to decide which photography gear will be best for you.

Production safety might not be the most exciting aspect of your photography career, but these days, like it or not, it’s one of the most important.

With the heavy reality that many of us live in these days, allow me a brief moment to simply luxuriate in the completely pointless, utterly fun, and pleasantly diverting task of looking back at the best attributes of some of my past camera purchases.

In the midst of a mirrorless wave, the release of Nikon’s latest DSLR, the D780, has gone largely under the radar. But, for some photographers, it might just be what the doctor ordered.

An impractical and thoroughly illogical reflection on our emotional connection to our favorite inanimate objects.

One of the most used cards in our newfound world of quarantine Bingo is the “clean out the garage” card. After doing my third round of this particular task yesterday afternoon, I found something new.