May 2011

Michael Zhang

P.90: The Rolls Royce of Pinhole Cameras

The P.90 is a limited edition pinhole camera by Kurt Mottweiler, an Oregon-based builder of wooden cameras. It's constructed using Cherry wood and brass, has a tripod adapter on the bottom, and is loaded with 120 roll film.

Michael Zhang

Hollywood Blvd Superheroes at Home

The superheroes that line Hollywood Boulevard for tourist pictures may have a tiny taste of stardom while on the job, but what are their lives like when they put down their masks and capes? For his project "Super Heroes", photographer Gregg Segal followed a number of superheroes home to document their not-so-super lives when not on the job.

Michael Zhang

Long Exposure Night Photos of Airplanes Taking Off and Landing

Sit around long enough near an airport and you can shoot photos like these -- stacked long-exposure images that make airplanes look like fireflies streaking around the night sky. Flickr user Terence Chang visits various locations around the Bay Area to capture these photographs of San Francisco International Airport.

Michael Zhang

Special Back Transforms Nikon F2 SLR into Instant Camera

See the big box hanging out from under this Nikon F2 film SLR? It's called the Speed Magny, a special back that transforms the camera into an instant film camera. Instead of loading the camera with film, you take off the back of the camera and attach the 4lb contraption that's loaded with Polaroid pack film. Light entering the camera is directed onto the instant film below using lenses and mirrors, giving you a neat way to capture instant film photos at the expense of 5 stops of light.

Michael Zhang

Boy Scout Photography Merit Badge Requirements Through the Years

Merit badges are earned by Boy Scouts to show that they've become experienced in a particular area of study after completing a list of requirements. The photography merit badge was created exactly 100 years ago in 1911, and its requirements have been revised through the years as photographic technologies continue to change and evolve. We've compiled some of the badge's requirements through the years -- see if you would be worthy of any of them with your current know-how.

Michael Zhang

Freelensing for On-the-Go Macro Shots

Here's another quick tutorial by Destin, the guy who helped popularize using chickens as a cheap Steadicam alternative. It was made on an airplane flight when he wanted to shoot some photographs of the ice forming outside his window. If you're ever in a situation where you want to shoot a macro photo but don't have a macro lens, try flipping your lens around for a cheap and easy macro photography solution.

Michael Zhang

How Police Officers See DSLR Cameras

Apparently this is what some police officers see when they look at a camera, which explains the horror stories of photographers being harassed by law enforcement for having cameras and making pictures.

Michael Zhang

One-Third of the SanDisk Memory Cards on Earth are Counterfeit

Did you know that a third of the SanDisk memory cards being used on Earth are actually fake? A SanDisk engineer recently shared this startling fact with a reader over at The Online Photographer:

[...] at any given time, approximately a third of the SanDisk memory cards (made by Toshiba) being used out there in the world are counterfeit. As in, not SanDisk memory cards at all—some other kind of cards dressed up as lookalikes.

Thirty percent, was the number quoted. A third, more or less.

To make sure you're getting the real thing, always purchase your memory cards from reputable dealers.

Michael Zhang

Interview with Jonathan Blaustein of “The Value of a Dollar”

Jonathan Blaustein is the photographer behind the project "The Value of a Dollar", which went viral on the Internet in 2010 and then was subsequently acquired by the State of New Mexico and the Library of Congress. Visit his website here.

PetaPixel: Could you tell us a little about yourself and your background?

Jonathan Blaustein: I'm a photographer, writer, and professor based in Taos, New Mexico, originally from New Jersey (who isn't?). In addition to my career as a photographer, I'm also a correspondent for the photo industry blog A Photo Editor. My family and I live in a little horse pasture at the base of the Sangre de Cristo mountains, far from everywhere. I'm pretty fortunate, as Northern New Mexico has a really vibrant photography scene, and of course our light is legendary. As far as my background goes, I first studied History and Economics at Duke University, but returned to school to study photography, and I have an MFA in Photography from Pratt Institute in Brooklyn. I've been a practicing artist for the last 15 years, and my work has been exhibited in galleries, alternative spaces and museums around the United States.

Michael Zhang

World’s Largest Camera Big Enough to Hold an Airplane

What you see above is the inside of the world's largest pinhole camera measuring 45x160x80 feet. It's an abandoned airplane hangar in Irvine, California that was converted over the course of two months into a gigantic pinhole camera. 24,000 square feet of plastic, 1,300 gallons of foam filler, 1.52 miles of tape, and 40 cans of spray paint went into darkening the hangar.

Michael Zhang

Polaroid Land Camera 1000 Cake

Spanish blog Duduá organized a fantasy cake contest in Barcelona at the end of April, and found amongst the many creative cakes was this sweet (pun intended) Polaroid Land Camera 1000 cake with an instant photo popping out the bottom.

Michael Zhang

Flickr Designer Writes Blog Post Publicly Criticizing the Site’s Usability

There have been a number of stories lately reporting that a large number of Flickr users are leaving the site for new photo-sharing services that are cropping up, including Instagram and 500px. Earlier his week, a designer at Flickr named Timoni West wrote a post on her blog that publicly criticized Flickr's usability. More specifically, she calls the "Your contacts" page (the one that shows your contacts' photos) the "most important page on Flickr", pointing out the problems with the page and offering redesign ideas that would address them.