Did you know that the White House was completely gutted and rebuilt on the inside between 1949 and 1952? After decades of poor maintenance, the building was in danger of collapsing in 1948, which forced President Harry Truman to move out and commission a complete gutting and rebuilding of the building's insides.
The U.S. National Archives has been publishing photographs showing the gutted White House to its Flickr photostream.
A few months back we shared the news that, assuming Instagram's trademark lawyers didn't get ahold of it first, the Socialmatic camera would indeed be making an appearance IRL. And now, none other than Polaroid has stepped up to place its name on the Instagram icon turned physical camera.
A number of users over in the GoPro forums and beyond are reporting a serious problem with the GoPro Hero3. Namely, those who have been putting up the money to buy 64GB microSD cards (the largest the Hero3 will take) are finding that the GoPro is actually frying the cards after only a few days of use.
Belgian photographer Filip Bunkens recently did an engagement photo shoot with a couple named Mattias and Adinda, who proposed that it be 1920s-themed. Last Sunday morning they gathered at a local jazz bar for the session.
In February of 1993, 10-year-olds Jon Venables and Robert Thompson kidnapped and murdered two-year-old James Bulger. The two were eventually caught, and became the youngest convicted murderers in modern English history.
Their life sentences were cut short, however, when they were released in 2001 under the protection of new identities and a court order that prohibited the publication of any info that could reveal who they were. Now a full 12 years after their release, UK Attorney General Dominic Grieve is finally getting a chance to enforce that court order.
When the new Google Chromebook Pixel was announced a week ago, one of the new apps announced alongside it was for managing photographs. Photography played a bit part in the laptop's design: it has a 12.85-inch, 4.3 million pixel touchscreen (the highest pixel density of any laptop) that has a strange aspect ratio of 3:2 -- the aspect ratio of classic 35mm film.
Photographer Ed Pingol was sick of battling carpal tunnel every time he needed to cull or edit photos in Lightroom. So instead, he developed the Cullinator, a software app for Mac that pairs perfectly with an attachable gaming controller to keep you editing and culling ergonomically for hours without fatigue.
Memphis, Tennessee-based photographer and X-ray technician Blake Billings has a set of images showing what various cameras look like when photographed with an X-ray machine. What you see above is a Nikon D60 DSLR.
When Malik Bendjelloul -- director of the Academy Award-winning documentary 'Searching for Sugar Man' -- ran out of money just a few necessary shots away from completing his film, he wasn't sure what he was going to do. He had decided to shoot the film on a Super 8 film camera, but the cost of film had taken a larger toll on his budget than he had expected.
That's when he stumbled onto the $2 iPhone app that saved his film and, to some extent, is the reason Bendjelloul now has an Oscar sitting on his mantle.
It's an unfortunate truth in the world of concert photography that some bands refuse to issue press passes to "small time" local music photographers. The Killers are one such band.
Remember that slow-motion wildlife footage that consisted entirely of still photos animated with parallax? French photographer Sebastien Laban does the same thing, except with his wedding photographs.
In the video above, all the apparently 3D scenes you see are actually the result of using some After Effects magic on ordinary 2D photographs.
I need the ability to wirelessly take photos, but my Fujifilm X100 did not have a conventional shutter release -- it has the old fashioned ”cable” release.
After playing around and buying some cheap cable releases off eBay, I was able to build a working wireless shutter using an Arduino, servo, and a cheap wireless shutter for a Canon DSLR.
Photographs printed onto wood are hangable, durable, and sustainable. The technique I use at Wood Craft Photos involves printing the image onto a special film, preparing a wood panel with custom gel medium, and then combining, leaving the wood grain in the light colored areas of the image showing through.
Here's a step-by-step tutorial on how you can use this process yourself for beautiful wood prints.
In February 2012, Adobe launched a photo editing app for Android and iOS tablets called Photoshop Touch. The software price priced at $10, and offers many of Photoshop's core features in a touch-based interface.
Now, one year later, Adobe is expanding the reach of PS Touch even more: the company announced today that the app is now available for Android and iOS smartphones (and the iPod touch).
When Samsung debuted its single lens 3D technology, the company put the magic in the lens. By using two shutters, the lens is able to capture left and right eye views of the scene that the camera then translates into three-dimensions. Panasonic's response is to put the magic in a CMOS sensor also creates a three-dimensional image, but in a very different way.
Jack Daly, a photographer at the University of Portsmouth in the UK, is working on a portrait project titled People with Passions. Each photograph in the series features a person posing with the objects of their passion (e.g. things associated with their interests, pursuits, and pastimes).
Yesterday, Instagram announced that it had reached an impressive 100 million users, but the Instagram news making headlines today is only concerned with a select few of those.
That's because those select few, including the AP's David Guttenfelder and Jean Lee, have begun uploading the first ever Instagram photos from inside North Korea -- giving us an intimate glimpse at daily life inside the very closed off country.
A couple of months ago we introduced you to Cycloramic, an app that used your iPhone 5's vibrations to take hands-free panoramic video. At the time the app could only shoot video, but after many requests (including our own) the Cycloramic team has released the much-anticipated V2.0, complete with Guided and Handsfree Panoramic Photo modes.
Waterproof housings for your DSLR typically come in two varieties: cheap bags that leave you wanting more in way of results, or extremely expensive cases that leave your bank account wanting more in way of funds. Outex hits a happy medium, providing much higher quality results than your typical bag housing for between $250 and $400 depending on your camera.
New Hampshire House of Representatives member Neal Kurk (R) recently backed a bill that plans to ban almost all aerial photography in the state by classifying it as a class A misdemeanor. The bill, HB 619-FN, seems to be aimed at protecting people's privacy; however, the fact that it specifically excludes government officials from the ban has raised concerns regarding just that.
There have been several controversies surrounding award-winning photography of late. First there was photographer Harry Fisch, who had his Nat Geo Photo Contest award stripped for cloning out a bag. Then Magnum photographer Paolo Pellegrin's ethics were called into question when he was accused of misrepresenting the subject of his award-winning photo.
And now another controversy has come to our attention, this one revolving around the photo above, taken by Washington Post staff photographer Tracy Woodward. The above photo was the version that was submitted to and won the White House News Photographers Association's (WHNPA) 'Eyes of History' stills photo contest, but not before it was significantly manipulated in Photoshop.
London-based photographer Martin Stavars has a beautiful series of photographs titled, "Portraits of Trees." For each of the photographs, he set his infrared camera up in front of a large tree and opened up the shutter for anywhere between four to ten minutes.
Want to estimate proper exposures without a light meter and don't mind doing some simple arithmetic? Check out this wonderful Exposure Time Tables pocket reference that was published Zeiss Ikon.
Warning: This post contains strong and disturbing photos of euthanasia and animal suffering.
Every year in North Carolina, over 250,000 animals are euthanized because there is no one willing to adopt them and care for them. This averages to nearly 700 animals killed daily. NC-based photographer Mary Shannon Johnstone has been on a mission to draw public awareness to the issue of animal overpopulation. Her gut-wrenching project, titled "Breeding Ignorance," offers an brutally honest look at the conditions inside animal shelters and the tragedy of beautiful (and often healthy) animals being put down.
Australia-based photographer Glen Ryan has been working on a long-running infrared project called Invisible Landscapes. He recently created the gorgeous time-lapse video above featuring the limestone landscapes near Wee Jasper in New South Wales for an exhibition at the Karst Country exhibition. The black-and-white infrared images make the clouds overhead pop out of the dark sky in the background.
Up. That’s all you need to say. Last November, we took on a project with Wired UK magazine to photograph Richard Branson’s latest venture in attempting to conquer the final frontier: space. We spent the good part of a week in the deserts of New Mexico and California, photographing the spaces and places, the infrastructure, the people, and ultimately Sir Richard himself.
Think it's difficult to juggle multiple aspects of your photography business? If you want to see an example of a highly motivated creative individual, check out what American filmmaker Shane Carruth has been up to in the film industry.
In 2004, Carruth released the indie sci-fi movie Primer. It had a ridiculously low budget of $7,000, and went on to gross over half a million dollars and gather a large cult following.
International fashion magazine Numero is raising some eyebrows with its choice of photography for an editorial titled, "African Queen." The piece features 16-year-old Ondria Hardin -- a caucasian model -- with heavily darkened skin.
Launched in 1992 and discontinued in 1996, Nikon's Nikonos RS was considered one of the best underwater photography solutions back in the 90s. The cameras and the 50mm f/2.8 macro, 28mm, 13mm fisheye, and 20-35mm lenses still sell for relatively high prices these days. Unfortunately for Nikon enthusiasts, the RS mount lenses were not compatible with F mount cameras... until now.
Underwater photographer Andrej Belic spent over a decade dreaming of using an RS lens on his Nikon DSLR, and over the past year he was able to get the combo working.
Here's a fascinating video about the 1980 eruption of Mount St. Helens, which was preceded by one of the largest landslides in recorded history. Amateur photographer Keith Ronnholm had set up camp that day at Bear Meadows, roughly 10 miles northeast of the mountain.
NYC-based street photographer Brandon Stanton's work has attracted quite a few eyes since he launched his Humans of New York photo project in 2010. Among those eyes were marketing folk at the clothing company DKNY.
Stanton and DKNY had a copyright infringement scuffle yesterday that resulted in DKNY donating $25,000 to the YMCA.
A couple were visiting a vista point near the Golden Gate Bridge in San Francisco this past Valentine's Day when they came across a black camera bag that had apparently been misplaced. After the owner didn't turn up to recover it, they looked inside and found a wallet with Chinese currency, credit cards, an "expensive-looking" camera and lens... and $11,000 in cash.
3D printing is becoming cheaper and more accessible, so photographers no longer need to rely on camera gear manufacturers for simple plastic gear items such diffusers and other light modifiers. Eric Chu over at MAKE recently noticed a photo intern using a piece of paper as a cheap flash bounce. Seeing that the makeshift bounce didn't ever last more than a few days, Chu wanted to offer a better solution... so he decided to produce one himself.
Last year we shared a clever "real world Instagram filter" concept called InstaCRT, which took submitted photos and rephotographed them on a real CRT monitor to capture a CRT look. Seeing the success of that project, Ray-Ban has decided to use the same idea in a clever bit of marketing to promote its Ambermatic sunglasses.
To show people what the world looks like through sunglasses fitted with Ambermatic lenses, the company launched an iOS camera app called Ray-Ban Ambermatic. It can apply a yellow tint to your photos using a real pair of Ambermatic glasses.
A serious car crash at the NASCAR Nationwide Series Drive4COPD 300 this past Saturday caused debris to go flying into the stands, sending a number of spectators to the hospital -- some with very serious injuries. A fan named Tyler Andersen was in the area where the accident happened, and had his camera recording video as the whole thing unfolded. After the incident made national headlines, Anderson posted the 1m16s video above to YouTube (warning: it doesn't show any injuries, but it's a bit disturbing).
NASCAR wasn't too pleased with the video, and sent YouTube a DMCA takedown request, claiming that it was a case of copyright infringement. YouTube complied and took down the video, sparking cries of "censorship."
When Fujifilm announced its latest wave of X-Series cameras earlier this year, the company stated that the big area they're focusing on is "speed". The new X20 and X100s feature extremely speedy autofocus, burst speed, and startup time. The 's' in X100s may officially stand for "speed," but it could just as well stand for "silent" or "stealth". Both cameras feature extremely silent shutters that won't attract attention while you're snapping away.
The video above by nycphotog2006 shows how silent the X20 is even while the leaf shutter is fluttering at a staggering 12fps.
Enjoy playing around with Arduino and want to try your hand at making your own digital camera? Photographer Coralie Gourguechon has come up with a DIY digital camera called Craft Camera that consists of a simple cardboard body and Arduino guts.
"Lights Edge" is a series of beautiful pictures by photographer Kevin Cooley that show beams of light rising up from various winter landscapes. They're simple long-exposure photographs that aren't the result of any digital trickery. Instead, Cooley simply opened up his 4x5 camera and launched military-grade emergency flare into the night sky.
Lenses and sensors weren't the only camera components miniaturized and dumbed down when digital photography jumped over into the world of smartphones: flashes did too. In order to fit everything into a tiny package, smartphone makers have largely opted for LED flashes in their phones rather than the bigger and bulkier xenon flashtubes found in proper digital cameras (a notable exception is the Nokia PureView 808). That may soon change.
Scientists in Singapore have developed a new capacitor that may lead to more powerful xenon flash units replacing the LED flashes found in consumer smartphones.
Last week we featured some Sears catalog ads for camera kits from back in 1900, and shared …