May 31, 2011

Photographer Adrian Onsen wanted to use the AI Servo autofocus mode on his Canon 40D in low-light situations, but found that the AF assist beam is only emitted once until focus is achieved rather than every time the camera needs to refocus. He then purchased a laser pointer from a dollar store, disassembled it to obtain a defocused beam of light, and attached it to the top of his camera. The hacked-together AF assist tool ended up working pretty well -- Onsen was able to shoot sharper photos at …

There's a well known photography joke that goes, "If you saw a man drowning and you could either save him or photograph the event, which lens would you use?" While it's certainly morbid and pretty absurd, there's plenty of examples of photographers having a "shoot first" mentality in a time of crisis. The rally racing photographer seen in this video provides one such example.

Flickr user Robert Hodgin purchased a cheap RC helicopter and shot these 30 second exposure photographs of him attempting to keep the helicopter from crashing. If you have RC helicopter skills, you might be able to create pretty neat light-painting photographs using this idea.

The iPhone 4 has become the primary camera for many of its owners, but it lacks many of the useful features found on actual compact cameras. iShuttr is a hard case that makes your iPhone operate more like a compact camera by adding a grip, a shutter button, zoom buttons, a larger flash, an external battery pack, and a tripod mount. The people behind the case are currently raising money for the project through Kickstarter: a $50 contribution will pre-order an iShuttr, which is set to retail for …

Reflector mounts (the things that attach a reflector to your bike) are so cheap that bike shops often give them away for free. Add a standard tripod screw, some washers, and some wing nuts, and you'll have a super cheap camera mount that you can attach to a bicycle (it's also a way to attach a camera to some random pole if you need to). You can also find a text version of this tutorial over on Instructables.

The AP published an article yesterday titled "How Much Longer Can Photographic Film Hold On?" that gives a pretty grim outlook for the future of film. About a decade ago, Americans were purchasing close to 1 billion rolls of film and 19.7 million film cameras every year. This year, only about 20 million rolls will be sold and film camera sales may fall below 100,000.

Do you have an efficient way of keeping track of which batteries or memory cards are fresh and ready to use? Flickr user Damon Hair uses Post-it Flags to tag charged batteries and formatted memory cards, letting him quickly swap out used ones when shooting without having to check them one at a time. For an even cheaper solution, you can try wrapping a small rubber band around them instead.