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Sony: E-mount Can Take f/0.63 Lenses

At its a6400 announcement event back in January, Sony also gathered press together for a presentation in which it aimed to debunk some of the things being said about its E mount in recent days. One of the interesting facts shared is that the E-mount supports a maximum aperture of f/0.63.

Three Seconds of Pleasant Geometry

Back in the day, a compelling photograph could be taken in a fraction of a second and considered for years, even decades. The small world of street photography was dominated by photographers such as Henri Cartier-Bresson, who said, “Photography is the simultaneous recognition, in a fraction of a second, of the significance of an event.”

The Joy of Shooting Double Exposures on Film

One of the many marvelous photography techniques provided by analog photography is the double (or multiple) exposure of film directly on camera. I've always been fascinated by the possibility of handling the negative from the moment of shooting, and this factor was the key one for me when it came the time to chose a camera.

Why Your Photography Business Is Failing

The biggest and most common mistake I see in photographers in all genres is that they aren’t honest with themselves. They love the idea of being a photographer -- the romantic side of it all. Sounds cool, right? But they hate the work part, the hustle, the grind, the guts of what it takes to run any successful small business.

Colourise.sg Uses AI to Colorize B&W Photos

Want to turn some old black-and-white photos into color photos? There's an amazing new website called Colourise.sg that'll get the job done for you. It uses deep learning AI to create remarkably realistic results in just seconds with zero work on your part.

The Problem with Camera Phones (That Nobody Talks About)

Once upon a time, the biggest problem with camera phones was the camera itself. One of the world's first camera phones, the J-SH04, was released in 2000. Boy have we come a long way, right? It could shoot tiny 0.11-megapixels images. It went up from there.

Shooting Street Portraits with a Go Go Gadget Octobox

My name is Brendan Burkett, and I believe I have created an original device and street photography method. What I have done is attach a softbox to my back for ultimate portability. This allows me to get street portraits with a very unique light.

Flickr Unveils a New Login That Ditches Yahoo’s System

After being acquired by Yahoo in 2005, Flickr became bound to its new owner's authorization system, meaning all users needed to have a Yahoo account just to use Flickr. Flickr has just announced a new login system that finally frees the service from Yahoo.

Review: Topaz Sharpen AI is Amazing

I got an email notifying me of the release of Topaz Sharpen AI, a program that enhances details and fixes out-of-focus/blurred shots. I initially expected that it was something similar to Adobe Enhance Details, which slightly enhanced the details of some specific shots and didn’t work for many other images. Topaz provided a demo fully-functional for 30 days, so I decided to give it a try.

The Lesson from Costco’s Photo Lab

I received a letter from Costco that the location I frequent for my 8 pounds of ground beef and jumbo bottle of vodka is closing their photo department. Why? Because in spite of more pictures being taken now than in any time in the history of photography, people are simply not printing their snapshots and, because of this rapid decline in printing volume, it makes no financial sense to keep the photo department open.

A Pro Photographer’s Review of the Leica M10-D

Could you and would you shoot with a digital camera without an LCD screen that costs and arm and a leg? I spent two days in Singapore wandering the streets with the Leica M10-D and here are my thoughts.

Lessons in Fearlessness from Morocco

I’ve been feeling for a while now that something has been lacking from my street photography. I seem to have settled into a “style” or “way of seeing” that features themes of solitude and isolation, monotone color palettes, and generally bland scenes – in line with my descriptions of “New-Wave Street Photography”.

Ep. 314: Flippin’ Your Lid for No Good Reason – and more


Episode 314 of the PetaPixel Photography Podcast.
Download MP3 -  Subscribe via iTunes, Google Play, email or RSS!
Featured: USA Today Photojournalist, Jack Gruber

Costco Closing (Some) In-Store Photo Depts., Cites Plummeting Printing

Costco's wholesale warehouse stores used to be an ultra-affordable place to get film developed, as it charged less than $2 a roll while competitors often charged several times as much. But film processing started disappearing from Costco locations a few years ago (to the dismay of many). Now the entire in-store photo departments may be the next to go.

People Call My Photos Fake… But They’re Not

The idea of this article came from a recent photo series I saw on BoredPanda about viral photos people thought were real but were fake. It reminded me of some of my photos people always call fake.

6 Tips for Photographers from a Vogue Model

I’ve been working as a model for over four years now, which I love, but there’s plenty of room for improvement in the way that models are treated in the industry and I feel like this is a good place to start. I love collaborating with photographers on creative shoots and editorials, and mostly I find the people that I work with respectful and kind, but there’s always the one or two who aren't!

Leica Unveils the Summicron 35mm f/2 ASPH L-Mount Lens

Leica has announced the new APO-Summicron-SL 35mm f/2 ASPH prime lens for the L-Mount, which is found on Leica's SL mirrorless camera as well as all cameras that are launched as part of the L-Mount Alliance between Leica, Panasonic, and Sigma.

3 Reasons to Create Your Own Lightroom Presets

When I first began dabbling in the world of landscape photography, I was enticed by the instant gratification of purchasing Lightroom presets. I was originally drawn in by the fact that I could instantly download these presets and I could instantly import them into Lightroom and instantly “improve” my own photos.

Turning a Car Parking Monitor Into a $25 DIY External DSLR Screen

I was often disappointed by my Canon 5D Mark II not having a flipping or better yet a detachable monitor. Instances of this happened when I placed the camera on a fully extended tripod and had the camera pointed downwards to make a photograph of something on the floor. Getting one’s eye above the view screen was sometimes impossible.

Why is Street Photography So Contentious?

As a street photographer, I accept that I have a bias towards the kind of work and criticisms I prefer to seek out as an audience to the work of others - although there are examples of landscape or portraiture that I do enjoy it is street photography and photojournalism that take up the majority of my interest. 

Oppo Bringing 10x Zoom Smartphone Camera to Market

Oppo is teasing an innovative new smartphone camera system it has created: one that offers a 10x optical "lossless" zoom. The latest reports say the module is already in mass production and the first phone packing it will be out within months.

The Winning Shots from Underwater Photographer of the Year 2019

Underwater Photographer of the Year has just announced the winners of its 2019 photo contest. Photographer Richard Barnden of the UK won both Underwater Photographer of the Year 2019 and British Underwater Photographer of the Year 2019 for his photo titled "The Gauntlet" (shown above).

Ice Crystals Captured in a Wet Plate Portrait

New York photographer Justin Borucki has been documenting his city with a pop-up tintype studio out of the back of his car. While shooting a portrait for a client recently, Borucki unexpectedly captured a beautiful leaf-like pattern across the photo due to the frigid wind chill causing ice crystals to form.

This Astronaut Shot Racetracks from Space with a Nikon DSLR

NASA astronaut Drew Feustel grew up in Detroit and is an avid car and racing enthusiast. So much so that while commanding the International Space Station in 2018, Feustel photographed racetracks from space with a Nikon DSLR before watching the race itself in his free time.

7 Easy Portrait Lighting Setups

Here’s a simple breakdown of 7 different lighting techniques you can implement next time you shoot portraits with studio lighting. For these examples, we used continuous lights to better illustrate it, but you can strobes as well, of course.

Here are the Winners of Apple’s ‘Shot on iPhone’ Photo Contest

Apple's "Shot on iPhone" photo contest sparked some controversy back in January over whether it would pay winning photographers to use their photos in ads, but the company quickly clarified that licensing fees would be paid. Well, the contest has ended, and Apple has just unveiled the winning iPhone photos.

Shooting Overhead Action Photos of Tennessee Basketball

If you've followed Tennessee basketball, chances are you've seen one of those really cool overhead photos. That top-down, bird's eye view is something you don't see every day, and only very few have access to capturing this unique angle.

This Site Ranks the Attractiveness of AI-Generated Faces

NVIDIA's mind-blowing AI that generates faces of people who don't exist recently led to an unofficial website called thispersondoesnotexist.com that lets anyone generate a new random face in an instant. Creative director Mike Solomon has built upon the idea with a new website called Judge Fake People that experiments with letting the public rank the attractiveness of AI-generated faces.

We Are Known By What We Leave Behind

100 years from now, no one is going to care who I am. I know this. I don’t mean that in a bad way and I don’t say it in the hopes someone will contradict me and shower me with praise; this is not said as compliment bait.