One thing I love about the Fstoppers Facebook Group is seeing all the amazing work our readers publish. Taylor Tupy is a pretty awesome fashion and editorial photographer based out of Minneapolis. In this video he shared on Facebook, Taylor brought in gulf coast white sand into the studio to produce an awesome effect.
The contest for our tutorial How To Become A Commercial Wedding Photographer just came to a close an hour ago, and the final 3 winners have been randomly picked. These three lucky readers will get a pre release copy of the Digital Download as well as a free copy of our new light modifier as soon as it is released sometime this year. Read on to see the winners
UPDATE: CONTEST ENDS TOMORROW! After 2 full years, it is finally done!
Some deals are just so good that you will drop everything you are doing (or planning) just to take advantage of some savings. Let me tell you how Lee and I both just bought Nikon D800 cameras for $2,200. Yesterday our friend Pye Jirsa published an article on SLR Lounge about how their local Staples did not honor a national coupon for 30% off all cameras purchased in store.
Let's face it, learning new software can be a pain in the ass sometimes. As photographers we have to juggle between Photoshop, Lightroom, our camera's proprietary software, and countless other editing software tools. Most of us learn just enough to get the job done but in the process we probably fail to get the most out of each program.
A few weeks ago I posted an interesting behind the scenes video of cheetahs running at full speed while being filmed with the 1200 fps Phantom camera. The camera setup is pretty crazy if you haven't watched the BTS video already. Here is the final slow motion footage of five different cheetahs running along side the dollied camera.
If you were asked to film the world's fastest animal running in slow motion, what would you do? Director Hans Weise and cinematographer Greg Wilson teamed up with National Geographic to produce some stunning footage of a cheetah running at full speed.
Most of our readers should be familiar with Brain Farm. Basically they have been taking cinematography to the next level when it comes to action sports; think of them as the planet earth of extreme footage. Chase Jarvis recently invited executive producer Chad Jackson and pro snowboarder Travis Rice over to his Seattle studio to talk about the release of The Art of Flight.
As most of you are aware, the lower section of Manhattan is still without power. Luckily our friends at Adorama have setup a charging station to help juice up your portable electronics. In this video Mark Wallace encourages everyone to spread the word since most of those residents won't be active online.
Let's face it, as much as we want to believe great photographs are created "in camera", every single image you see published has been manipulated in Photoshop in some way. When it comes to producing attention grabbing photos, having a strong grasp on post production goes a long way.
Some of the most interesting and exciting video footage often comes out of car commercials. The current ad for Cadillac's new 2013 ATS features some pretty awesome footage of the luxury sports sedan speeding down the winding roads of Morocco's Atlas Mountain. This stretch of road overlooking the Dades Gorge is one of the most dangerous roads in the world.
Right now the hottest spot on the globe for photography is in New York City at Photo Plus. Our good friends at creativeLIVE have set up an unbelievable opportunity for photographers to learn from eight of the industry's leading photographers all for FREE. Catch creativeLIVE's free event Photographers Ignite live right now.
For over a year and a half now, David Reynolds has been filming his "budget" series of short films called The Underwater Realm. Each week he and his team release a behind the scenes video on how they overcome some technical aspect of filming (previous Fstoppers posts here).
One skill set any photographer needs to master is how to pose people in ways that don't look awkward. Doug Gordon has been teaching his "flow posing system" to photographers across the country for years. Now, starting today Oct 11th through Oct 13th, Doug is hosting The Doug Gordon Photography Project over at creativeLIVE.
In a world filled with portable speedlights and 3200 watt power packs, photographers might overlook another critical feature of their studio lights: flash duration. Basically flash duration is the time your strobe light contributes to the exposure of your photograph (flash actually can act as "constant light").
Around this time last year, I was asked to shoot a wedding for a young couple getting married in Charleston. I came to find out that the groom's father was none other than Nikon advertising photographer Mark Alberhasky.
Stanley Kubrick was one of the most acclaimed producers and directors in American cinematography (the Shining is one of my all time favorites). Back in 1975, Stanley directed the three hour masterpiece Barry Lyndon. From a photography standpoint, the film is most noted for Stanley's use of Mitchell BNC cameras mounted with NASA Zeiss f/0.7 50mm lenses.
There was once a photographer who said the best camera is the one you have with you. Today that camera is probably the one built into your smart phone. But just how well does that old saying hold up when you compare say an iPhone 5 to a Nikon D3s or Hasselblad H4D? The guys over at Bammo have put all three cameras through the paces and the results might shock you.
One of the most difficult things about being a full time photographer is learning how to properly market yourself and your business. New York Times Best Seller authors Sarah Petty and Erin Verbeck are masters at small business marketing and company branding.
One of the best upgrades you can make for your computer is installing a solid state hard drive. However, the increase in performance can quickly become hindered as your photo and video production software fills up your drives with temporary files and thumbnails. With the help of WinDirStat you can easily track folders hiding these temp files and take back control over your drives.
A few weeks ago you may remember Ikea's attack on product photography. Today news has spread that the Saudi Arabia franchise has photoshopped all females out from catalogs distributed throughout the Islamic nation. Women aren't the only ones being censored, however, as even glasses of wine have been transformed into less offensive "festive cups".
We've posted about how to photograph steel wool burning before in the past, but watching the process in action is a bit more exciting. Instead of taking photographs with extended shutters, film maker Joey Shanks decided to video the burning metal and edit everything into a motion graphics piece.
If you've ever had to photograph a large group of people, you probably understand how difficult it can be to capture every single person looking great. Imagine if that group photo was made up of 12 of the worlds richest Billionaires! That's what photographer Michael Prince did when he had to photograph the cover of Forbes Magazine during the 400 Summit on Philanthropy back in June.
As a Nikon user, I remember a time when I envied everything Canon. A few years ago, Canon had the best DSLR video, their cameras were the fastest, and they were the absolute kings of high ISO. Today DxOMark has released their review of the new Nikon D600, and to everyone's surprise it has the 3rd best overall DSLR sensor in the land (beats the D4).
Giuliano Bekor is an amazing commercial and advertising photographer based out of Los Angeles. Recently he traveled down to Australia to produce a short editorial film for the clothing company Merchant 1948. The concept involves a set of short films based around the idea of models finding a ton of cash and avoiding the police by flying away in vintage airplanes.
If there was one thing that people are unanimously saying about Nikon's new D600 "budget" full frame camera, it's that the price is entirely too high. No matter which blog you read, it seems everyone cannot believe the MSRP of $2,099.95. But are these claims valid? Does Nikon's smallest full frame DSLR really lack the features that professionals desire?
Each week creativeLIVE has unbelievable live content that you can stream for free. Starting today through Sept 15th, creativeLIVE will host one of Fstoppers' most featured photographers Matthew Jordan Smith. Matthew is an acclaimed fashion photographer, and he has brought along America's Next Top Model winner Yoanna House to talk about everything that goes on in the fashion industry.
As many of you have seen over the last 5 days, Fstoppers.com has had a few hiccups. We had a malware scare earlier last week and our site has been in an out of blacklisting with Google and a few antivirus software companies.
One question most aspiring photographers ask is "should I get a degree in photography before starting my business?" Maybe a better question is does going to college actually prepare you for a career in photography? A recent article published by Kiplinger suggests that Film and Photography students (as well as graphic designers) are ill prepared in finding paying jobs upon graduation.
People often ask me "what is the most difficult part of shooting weddings?" One challenge I face at every wedding is having to pose the bride and groom in less than flattering sunlight or in a less than perfect location. Wedding photographer Roberto Valenzuela is tackling this very issue during his creativeLIVE workshop.
One problem photographers face when focusing on objects extremely close to the camera's lens is the depth of field can become quite shallow. Even if you shoot at f22, your lens simply can't keep everything from 1 foot to infinity sharp and in focus.
Adorama TV has been mixing up their youtube channel lately, and this week features the TTL acrobatics of Joe McNally. Joe walks you through a typical street portrait as he accentuates the natural ambient light with a single speedlight gelled red. The more useful tip Joe gives is how to control the spill of your large softlight with an "egg crate" or softbox grid.
As photographers, we are always sculpting our images with light. But if you've seen any of the light painting posts here on Fstoppers, then you know just how complex the art of light painting can get. Photographer Ben Willmore has been using small constant lights in his images for years, and now he's offering a free online workshop for anyone wanting to learn the craft.
One thing I love about the Gopro Hero 2 cameras is that normal, everyday people can record amazing footage that has never been seen before. Such is the case with Mark Peters who thought he was just going to film some albacore tuna during his fishing trip. Little did Mark know what his GoPro would capture inside his homemade underwater torpedo.
Earlier in the year, Fstoppers showed you how Sports Illustrated photographers photograph a superbowl. Just as the 2012 Olympics in London have come to a close, Reuters has released a behind the scenes video on how their photographers take images during the world's most celebrated sporting event.
