July 2012

DL Cade

Canon May Eventually Replace 50mm f/1.4 With A 50mm f/1.8 IS

Some rumors are more far-fetched than others, and while this may be one of those it's still worth mentioning. According to Canon Rumors, some preliminary talk has come down the wire that Canon might be replacing the current EF 50mm f/1.4 with a smaller form factor 50mm f/1.8 IS.

DL Cade

Stunning Photo Set Shows The Beauty of The World’s Largest Particle Accelerator

A few days ago the people over at CERN -- the guys behind the biggest particle accelerator in the world, the Large Hadron Collider (LHC) -- made what has been called "the biggest advance in knowledge about the cosmos for over 30 years," they discovered the long-sought-after Higgs Boson.

Of course particle physics doesn't always pique the interest of us photographically inclined peoples, but what does is a gorgeous photo set, like this one from The Atlantic which celebrates the particle accelerator that helped make the discovery (in truth it did all the heavy lifting). The set goes a long way in showing that ever elusive "beauty in the machine."

DL Cade

Portrait Project Seeks to Document Every Human Skin Tone

Any sort of portrait photographer is intimately familiar with the huge variety of skin tones represented by us homo sapiens, but until now nobody had thought to document them all. That's the mammoth task that Brazilian artist and photographer Angelica Dass has taken upon herself with her portrait project Humanae.

DL Cade

Iconify: The Modern Portfolio, Reimagined

One of the most important things a photographer must do is advertise and sell their services. All professionals have a good grasp on how to take great photos and edit them in post to make them look even better, but fewer have the time, expertise, or funds to put together a quality portfolio that will catch a client's eye and bring them business. That's where the Iconify platform comes in.

DL Cade

Professional Photogs Find a New Niche as Vacation Photographers

It's true that many (if not most) people these days think that a smartphone plus a decent camera app equals enough equipment to create great photography. Sure, they'll hire a professional to do their wedding, but when it comes to less momentous occasions -- like that trip to the Caribbean -- they tend to take the photographic reins in their own hands. According to The Wall Street Journal, however, more and more people are deciding to hand the vacation reins over to a professional photog.

Corrie White

How To Shoot Liquid Flow Photographs

In this tutorial I will share how I shoot "liquid flow" photos -- smoke-like abstracts done by dropping cream colored with food dye into a small tank of water, then rotated 180 degrees.

DL Cade

Seventeen Makes No-Photoshop Pledge In Response to Teen’s Campaign

A few months ago 14-year-old Julia Bluhm caused quite a stir when she managed to collect over 80,000 total signatures in an attempt to get Seventeen Magazine to put one completely un-Photoshopped spread in each issue. Her argument was that the magazine's readers have a sensitive body image, and constantly seeing unrealistically thin and perfect software-enhanced models wasn't helping the matter.

Initially it seemed as if the magazine was going to do nothing more than meet with Bluhm and reassure her that she had nothing to worry about. But now, a few months later, Seventeen has finally stepped up to the plate and offered Bluhm and her supporters a peace treaty -- specifically: a Body Peace Treaty.

Ming Thein

Some Thoughts on Digital Camera Lifespan

This small mountain of gear leads to two very frightening thoughts. Firstly, there’s no ending in sight; one keeps accumulating more and more equipment in order to keep pushing the edge of what’s possible both from a compositional and artistic standpoint, as well as from an image quality standpoint. You’ve either got to have a great day job and very deep pockets, or some good recurring clients.

The second thought is around obsolescence. In the film days, the camera body and lenses lasted a long time; you invested in glass, got a decent body – one that fulfilled your personal needs as a photographer – and then picked the right film for the job.

DL Cade

Get To Know Your Nikon Better With Tips and Techniques from Nikon’s Digitutor

There's a lot of resources out there for people who want to get to know their SLR just that much better -- ranging from books to about a gazillion (that's a technical term) YouTube tutorials -- but not a lot of people seem to know about Nikon's own Digitutor website. The Nikon Digitutor offers helpful flash tutorials about all of the different aspects of your Nikon camera.

Michael Zhang

Trippy Portraits Shot at a Photo Illusion Museum

World travel bloggers Michael Powell and Jürgen Horn recently visited the The Trick Eye Museum in South Korea, where visitors can snap humorous and mind-bending pictures of themselves interacting with various painted rooms.

DL Cade

Kodak Gallery Officially Offline, Some Accounts May Take Months to Transfer

Most people already know that one of the ways Kodak tried to dig itself out of its sizable financial hole was to sell the Kodak Gallery to Shutterfly, and the service officially shut down just a few short days ago. Most Kodak Gallery users probably won't be too upset with the move, but unfortunately, it looks like even the 2-million active users (the Kodak Gallery had a total of about 75-million) will have to go a few weeks without access to their photos as their accounts are transferred over.

Jessica Lum

Nikon Expected to Announce New 800mm Lens, the Longest in Lineup

Based on some patents filed by Nikon, the company is expected to announce an updated 800mm lens, which will be the largest lens in the current lineup, according to Nikon Rumors. As of now, the 600mm f/4G ED VR is the longest lens Nikon is offering, though Sigma and Canon both have 800mm f/5.6 lenses in their lineups.

Jessica Lum

Botched Fireworks Display Makes For Glorious Photos of Fireballs

The 4th of July fireworks show in San Diego malfunctioned yesterday, resulting in an entire show's 20-minutes worth of fireworks released in 15 seconds that the Port of San Diego attributed to a corrupted computer file.

But for some prepared photographers, the display resulted in some singular photos of the large fireballs.

Jessica Lum

Getty Images Auction Draw Bids of $4 Billion

Photo agency Getty Images is on the auction block, in a second round of bids that are climbing towards $4 billion for a potential sale. Investment firm KKR & Co. and private equity investment firm TPG are on the list of at least five interested bidders, the Wall Street Journal reports.

John-Paul Danko

Are Joe Klamar’s US Olympic Portraits Intentionally “Bad”?

Update: Klamar has responded to the criticism. The photographs aren't 'anti-establishment'. They were simply the result of being unprepared.

I came across a series of supposedly bad US Olympic portraits taken by photographer Joe Klamar via a post on my Facebook page. I just had to take a look to see if they could really be as bad as reported.

Jessica Lum

An Unexpected ‘Kiss’ in Canon Rebel T4i EXIF Data

If you've noticed an unexpected "Kiss" in your Canon Rebel T4i EXIF data, there's no need to panic (or blush!).

In certain applications that show EXIF data, the camera name may show up as the EOS Kiss X6i -- the Japanese market name of the same camera model. Additionally the Camera Settings / Remote Shooting screens of EOS Utility (EU) also shows “EOS Kiss X6i," according to a Canon product advisory.

David Jackson

Want Versus Need: Pitting the Canon D30 Against the 1D Mark IV

On the heels of my guest blog post over at Tiffinbox, I wanted to showcase a little camera comparison I used to illustrate my points on gear acquisition. We are all at fault for lusting after the latest and greatest gear available to us on the market. I know I have, but that lust comes with a price tag and a trade-off.

Having dusted off my very first DSLR (Canon D30), I put it to the test against my current Canon 1D Mark IV. In doing so, I made some startling and not-so-startling discoveries (as one could only imagine)...

Michael Zhang

Photo Frame in the Shape of Sunglasses

Check out this unique picture frame by Urban Outfitters. The Sunglasses Photo Frame is a "kooky oversized sunglasses picture frame" that shows your 3.5x2.75 photos through the two lenses. The temple arms work as a stand for the frame.

Jessica Lum

Repurpose Empty Film Roll Canisters as Invitation Holders

If you've got spent, empty film cassettes lying around collecting dust, Photojojo has a crafty idea for the mindful re-user: make them into rolled invitation or stationery holders.

It's quite simple: cut and decorate 1.375″ x 11″ strip of paper, pop the top off the film cassette (you can use a bottle opener) and tape the inside end of the strip to the film spool. Wind the paper into the cassette and leave a tab for the recipient to unfurl the message.

Jessica Lum

Reuters to Use Robotic DSLR Cameras for Olympic Coverage

Sports photographers use a variety of techniques and gear to shoot from different angles that are less accessible to the photographers during action: wirelessly triggered cameras mounted behind backboards, perched on overhead catwalks, clamped on the ground. Reuters photographers Fabrizio Bensch and Pawel Kopczynski decided to take the technology of remote photography to another level for the upcoming 2012 Summer Olympics with robotic cameras.

Michael Zhang

Cloned Twin Photos of China’s One-Child Policy Children

"Two of Us" is a project started in 2009 by Chinese photographer Fan Shi Shan. It involves cloned photographs of people who grew up as only children due to China's one-child policy. Fan writes,

The One-child Policy in China restricts the number of children a married urban couple can have to one. In fact, nearly every Chinese born after 1980 in urban, including myself, is only child with no siblings. The policy is enforced at provincial level through fines and other punishments, leaving a result of over 100 million only child in China.