September 2014

"Undulatus asperatus" is a cloud formation proposed in 2009 that roughly translates to "roughened or agitated waves." These dark and stormy clouds travel across the sky in ominous waves, but generally dissipate without an a storm forming.

Storm chaser Alex Schueth was recently in the right place at the right time with his DSLR, and managed to capture one of these formations in the mesmerizing time-lapse video seen above.

South Korea-based artist Seung-Hwan Oh creates some truly unusual portraits by unleashing little microbes and letting them eat away at his medium for months or even years. The project is called Impermanence, and it's a series of microbe-mauled portraits that hardly resemble what they were originally captured as.

It seems the secret to having an enthusiastic following on a major photo sharing site has very little to do with the quality of your pictures. Sure, you can't just post terrible snapshots of nothing, but as one Redditor found out, engaging with the community is actually far more important.

This piece of news might be concerning to those who already have or are looking to get their hands on Nikon’s new D750 camera. According to a report, the WiFi app built into the D750 automatically uses an unsecure connection to transfer images from your camera, which means anybody with a WiFi-capable device and some know-how could get their hands on your photos.

Earlier this year, we told you about the FLIR ONE, an iPhone case with a built-in thermal camera that made 'predator vision' available to all.

But if the FLIR ONE is just a bit too pricy for your blood, there's a new player in the thermal camera game you might want to take a look at. It's called the Seek thermal camera, and while it's not as impressive as the FLIR ONE, neither is its price.

We spend a lot of time over at Lensrentals getting dust out of lenses. Dust doesn’t affect an image, except in very rare circumstances, but people want their rental lenses to look nice and clean inside and out, and our inspectors check the inside of every lens with spotlights and send any dusty ones over to the repair department.

Perspective, gravity, up, down, all of them are mere suggestions in The Ocean Brothers: a mind-bending, surreal video by …

Here's a new reason you might want to consider picking up a Google Glass if you're a photographer: it can be used as a light meter.

A new app called Google Glass Light Meter is trying to pioneer a new way of metering light -- with a device strapped to your face instead of held in your hand.

This week, I had the chance to do my first-ever real photoshoot with an iPhone. Granted, I’ve shot tens of thousands of photos with my iPhone over the years and did a whole project in Haiti with my iPhone 4S… but I’ve never done a commercial portrait photoshoot, using an iPhone only.

Chris Keeney, a San Diego-based photographer, enlisted the services of the most unlikely of photographers to capture the artwork for his latest book, PetCam. As the name suggests, the book uses a handful of animals from all over the globe to capture first-pet perspective photographs of their daily activities.

After taking an unexpected hiatus, action camera manufacturer Contour is back and action with its first new action camera since 2012. It’s called the ROAM3, and while its design and capabilities aren’t vastly different than the cameras that came before it, it manages to pack in some new features for those who really want to put it through the ringer.

Here's a video that offers a look at the life and work of Joachim Schmid, a Berlin-based artist who is obsessed not with making photographs but with finding them.

For more than 30 years now he has been hunting for ordinary discarded photographs that catch his eye. Once discovered, these found images -- many of which were destined for landfills -- are compiled into collections that give them new purpose and meaning.

Joe Barone is a recent college grad who enjoys the process as much as the result. Inspired by his love for old objects, knack for tinkering with things and growing up in his parents’ hardware store, Barone brought the camera obscure into the 21st century recently with the help of an old scanner, a magnifying glass and duct tape... well, gold duct tape.

The result is a glorious steampunk-esque contraption that yields some rather impressive images.

The crushing blow came just 52 days before her wedding: Janine, a blushing bride-to-be, unexpectedly lost her fiancé. The grief was unimaginable, but she didn't let it conquer her. Instead, after taking some time to grieve, she got in touch with Matt Adcock at Del Sol Photography and asked him to help her move on and rediscover the beauty of the world around her.

What followed was an incredibly powerful 'trash the dress' photo shoot full of symbolism: a cleansing shoot that has helped Janine to make her peace with the past and embrace the possibility of a bright future.

The US Forest Service is under fire today after proposing a set of rules that would put strict restrictions on photographers and filmmakers who want to ply their trade in wilderness areas. The rules subject potential projects to an approval process with permits costing as much as $1,500 while fines for breaking the rules would run around $1,000.

The now-public iOS 8 brings about a number of updated features that give users more control than ever before, and one of the most talked-about ones is the ability for developers to integrate full manual control of the camera into their applications.

A number of major camera apps have already done that, but there’s a new app out that focuses on full manual controls and full manual controls alone: it’s called (go figure) Manual, and without any extra bells or whistles, it emphasizes giving you complete control over you iOS device’s camera without any other distractions.

There's no shortage of methods for creating the partially animated photographs we call cinemagraphs; however, if simplicity and minimal effort is what you’re looking for in cinemagraph creation, the above tutorial by Howard Pinsky is just what you’ve been looking for.

When it comes to the quantity of lights that one needs, opinions are often heavily polarized and a hotly contested debate often rages. There are those that are staunch supporters of one light while others claim that a handful of lights are needed before anything meaningful can be done. Ultimately neither group is right as there is no definable minimum or maximum number of lights that one should use.

Okay, so maybe it bends a little easier than it should, but there's one thing the naysayers will have to begrudgingly admire about the iPhone 6, and that's the camera. For proof, check out these side-by-side images that compare all 8 iPhone cameras, and then see why DxOMark ranked the iPhone the best smartphone camera they've ever tested.

As Photoshop CC continues to get more and more complex -- seriously, have you seen THE SIZE of some of the Photoshop books out there!? -- thanks to the myriad of new features Adobe continues to add, the company is moving its beginner-focused Elements offerings the other direction.

Released officially last night, Photoshop (and Premier for you video folks) Elements 13 is even easier-to-use, more intuitive, and yet more powerful than any of the previous iterations.

Sometimes, you just have to laugh to keep form crying, and that's what this fun video from Clint Decker of The Crossroads DSLR Photoclub tries to help you do by compiling all of the "s**t people say to photographers' that makes steam come out of our ears.

Swiss mountaineering brand Mammut frequently teams up with talented mountaineering photographer Robert Böesch to capture incredibly creative photographs that show off some of the Alps’ most renowned peaks alongside the Mammut gear that has often helped humans reach the summits of those peaks unharmed.

From the gorgeous Matterhorn image above -- captured for the company's 2015 ad campaigns -- to the many images you'll see below, each is a work of extreme coordination, patience, and photographic skill.

Photokina brought about a plethora of new gear from a number of companies, and easily overlooked among the larger announcements was a quirky new lens from Voigtlander: the 40mm f/2.8 Heliar M-mount lens. And the interesting thing about this new pancake lens is that even though it's an M-mount piece of glass, it’s not compatible with M-mount cameras.

When everything you’ve come to know and love in life gets turned upside down, sometimes the greatest remedy is to just escape into a photographic adventure. And that’s exactly what photographer Sebastiaan de With did after getting divorced and losing his job.

When Apple announced the iPhone 6 and 6+, one of the more interesting features added to the new devices was the ability to capture video at 240fps when shooting at 720 resolution.

Now, with many of the 10+ million devices preordered already in the hands of consumers, we've compiled our six favorite videos that showcase all 240 frames at work. From wine being poured majestically into a clear glass, to a dog not-so-majestically shaking off, you've got a few mesmerizing minutes ahead of you.

CineStill is a company whose sole goal has been to bring motion picture film into the world of still photography by adapting it to properly work inside 35mm cassettes. And despite having two 35mm varieties already, 800Tungsten and bwXX, the CineStill team is looking to up its offerings in a very exciting way.

CineStill is using the popular crowdfunding platform Kickstarter to bring 800Tungsten film into the world of medium format photography.

Canon perceived premium compact users to want a bright powerful zoom lens with relatively large sensor and a viewfinder in the PowerShot G1X Mk II and G16, but Sony proved astutely there was a huge demand for a quality compact that could slip into a pocket.

When Canon was busy building old-school destroyers, Sony designed a sleek modern frigate in the form of the RX100 with a 1” sensor. It took Canon two years to respond, but they finally launched a compact with but one purpose – to regain the throne of best compact from Sony.

There are a lot of reasons people use PayPal to pay for things online. It's convenient, it's (or at least it should be) secure, and the option is available on pretty much any site where you can buy things. But there are also cons, not the least of which being that pre-ordering things with PayPal can be a risky and dangerous game to play.

People often tell me that they find it difficult to take good portrait photos when they travel. Approaching strangers and asking to photograph them, usually with a language barrier, can be a daunting prospect. And how do you take a portrait that is creative and meaningful rather than just a simple snapshot of the person? I have developed approaches and techniques over the years to help become confident as a travel portrait photographer.

Photographer Ian Christmann was shooting a wedding this past weekend when an unusual photo opportunity arose. He managed to capture a magical portrait of the newlyweds standing in front of a herd of deer.