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Photog Documents the Illegal Hunting of Songbirds Along the Mediterranean

AP Photographer David Guttenfelder is a conflict photographer. He's spent much of his photographic career capturing war through the lens of his camera. One thing he certainly never considered himself was a bird photographer.

But when he was sent on an assignment to illustrate a National Geographic piece on the illegal hunting of songbirds, he became one. And it slowly dawned on him that he wasn't just doing a documentary, environmental, or conservation piece -- this was simply another form of conflict photography.

BTS: Golden Hour Cover Shoot of Medal of Honor Recipient Col. Bud Day

Colonel George Everette "Bud" Day is a retired U.S. Air Force Command Pilot who served his country during the Vietnam war, enduring a stint as a POW and earning the Medal of Honor and the Air Force Cross.

When he was asked to be on the cover of Smithsonian's Air & Space magazine, it was portrait photographer Robert Seale who got the honor of photographing him, and for our sakes, he put together a behind-the-scenes video while he was at it.

Using Focus Stacked Photos to Create 3D Reconstructions

Creating a 3D scan of an object can be done several different ways. We've seen everything from long distance laser cameras and hacked Kinects used to great effect. Computer engineer Giancarlo Todone's take on creating a 3D reconstruction takes another approach: using focus stacking.

Trippy Mirrored Hyperlapse Videos Shot on Japanese Monorail Systems

Mirroring your time-lapse footage can yield a trippy, ethereal quality to an otherwise standard video. Riding on the Japanese monorail, for example, is nothing particularly special. Creating a hyperlapse of the experience, while cool, probably won't stand out.

A few users, however, have come up with some interesting takes on a monorail hyperlapse by mirroring the footage and taking you on a much stranger journey.

The Wrong Way to Adjust the Diopter on Your Camera’s Viewfinder

Most high-end cameras come with diopters that allow photographers to calibrate the viewfinder to match their eyesight. Adjusting the diopter is easy: simply stare through the camera while turning the little dial or knob found next to your viewfinder (the one with the +/-). Once the scene is sharp (assuming the lens is focused), you're done!

Apparently one of the dangers of diopter adjustment---for some camera owners at least---is accidentally stabbing your eyeball with your finger.

Community-Sourced Photos of New York City’s Diverse Signage

New York City offers a plethora of photographic opportunity. Massive architecture alongside a vibrant and diverse population makes for plenty of work for photographers of all types. But have you ever thought about the myriad signage and typography that New York has to offer?

Matthew Anderson and Daniel Hunninghake did, and so they created NYCType back in 2007 to highlight it. The site brings together photos of New York City's signage under once virtual roof.

BTS: Photographing Breathtaking Vistas in Venezuela with Philip Lee Harvey

On November 18, 1933, aviator Jimmie Angel became the first American to catch a glimpse of the tallest waterfall in the world -- a natural wonder that would eventually be named for him. Four years later, he returned to Venezuela and Angel Falls, crash landing on top of one of the flat-topped mountains in the area and having to hike 11 days with little food or water to the nearest village.

Photographer Philip Lee Harvey wanted to see these places for himself, and so he followed in Angel's footsteps, photographing the breathtaking sights along the way. The behind-the-scenes video above shows you how that adventure went down.

Taiwanese Coffee Machines Print Photos of Customers Onto Lattes

Latte art is something that's often the subject of photographs, but have you ever seen an latte artwork that is a photograph?

A coffee business over in Taiwan recently came up with the idea of providing a unique product to customers by having photographs of their faces printed directly onto the foam of the coffee they're ordering!

What the Upcoming Fujifilm X-M1 Looks Like Next to Other X Series Cameras

Fujifilm's upcoming "entry-level" X-M1 X Series mirrorless camera was outed today after photographs of the camera were leaked onto the Web. We now know what the camera will look like, but many of the camera's specs and features are still unknown. The size and weight of the camera haven't been revealed yet, but it's actually possible to determine the relative size of the camera to other X Series mirrorless cameras using just the leaked photos.

Impossible Instant Lab Shipping August 29th for $299

When The Impossible Project announced its Impossible Instant Lab back in September 2012, it turned to Kickstarter to raise $250,000 to fund the project. After the Internet got wind of the smartphone-to-instant-photo printing device, the fundraising campaign blew past its goal and ended up with a total of $559,232 from 2,509 supporters.

Today the company announced that the Impossible Instant Lab will be hitting store shelves on August 29th, 2013 for a retail price of $299.

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Centenarians: Portraits of People Over One Hundred Years Old

It all started with a photograph she took of her grandmother, Cecil Peterson, then 101 years of age. From that point, California-based Sally Peterson had transformed taking a picture of one centenarian into a full-fledged project after asking a nearby nursing home if there were any centenarians living there.

What is it About Photographs That Makes People Click?

Why is it that some photographs go viral online while others are left by the digital wayside? Are there certain elements in photos that make them more "sharable" to Internet users?

Curalate, a company that creates social media analytics software, decided to tackle this question by analyzing the photographs published by brands to Pinterest.

Jeff Widener: The Photographer Behind the Iconic ‘Tank Man’ Photo

Chances are that in your lifetime, you've seen the iconic "Tank Man" photograph. The year was 1989. A man standing alone before a line of tanks on Chang'an Avenue near Tiananmen Square. It's a picture that's inspired people all over the world. It's also been heavily suppressed in the very country it was taken.

Jeff Widener is the man behind the photograph, which he says was a "lucky shot". What the world doesn't know, however, is that Widener is so much more than the photographer behind one iconic image. He's spent years in Asia chronicling the stories and struggles of people.

AMMO: Cross Section Photos of Bullets

In October of 2012, LA-based photographer Sabine Pearlman found herself ensconced in a Swiss WWII bunker photographing 900 different "specimens" of cross sectioned ammunition. Her resulting photo series, AMMO, shows the beauty and craftsmanship that went into creating these destructive little pieces of engineering.

Satire: Work for Free and Eat!

Hey, professional and aspiring photographers! Are you tired of responding to attractive assignment offers only to find later that compensation for the work consists only of "valuable exposure" for your work? And then you have to explain that you can't feed your family on exposure?

Well fret no more. with the new Exposure Helper™, you can feed your family on exposure, allowing you to accept all the free assignments you want!

Leaked Photos of Fujifilm’s X-M1 Entry-Level Mirrorless Camera Appear

Rumors emerged last month that Fujifilm would be announcing an entry-level X Series mirrorless camera this summer. Looks like those rumors were spot on.

Photographs of an upcoming Fujifilm X-M1 mirrorless camera leaked today, showing a sleek and minimalist camera that looks like a stripped down version of existing X Series cameras.

Creative Stop Motion Instagram Skit Made from 1,600 Photos

Instagram announced the ability to shoot video earlier today, but before they did, two friends embarked on a project to make the best video they could while adhering to Instagram's previous photo-only limitations. The result was a 1,600 photo stop motion video dubbed Instagrammimation that has gotten a lot of praise from viewers.

Using Romeo and Juliet to Illustrate the Pitfalls of JPEG Compression

It's common knowledge that JPEG compression leads to a loss of data, but it's difficult to really visualize the extent of that loss in a photo. A keen eye will be able to tell a difference, but it's still hard to quantify it.

Tom Scott wanted to bring the reality home to those who don't already understand it. So he took the pitfalls of JPEG compression and transferred them from the world of photos, to the world of Shakespeare.

I’m Teri Campbell, and Here’s a Tour of My Food Photography Studio

Younger photographers may not understand it, or even feel the same way, but for photographers of my generation, your studio was not just a place to take photographs -- it was a reflection of you. It told the world who you were. If you didn't have one, then you weren't really a photographer!

Abstract Photos Created by Repeating Everyday Household Items

To imitate photographer Nick Albertson's work, you'll need a camera, household items purchased in bulk, and an eye for the beautiful and abstract. Take a look at Albertson's project titled "Work in Progress," and you'll find photographs of things such as rubber bands, straws, and napkins. They don't look like your everyday objects, though: Albertson turns them into works of art by carefully arranging them into repeating patterns.

Get Naked With Me: Group Boudoir Shots Are Now a Trendy Thing

Call it female empowerment; call it friendship; call it bonding... Whatever you call it, the newest trend in boudoir photography involves “getting your boudoir on” with your friends. Yes, according to the Today Show, groups of women are now stripping down to next to nothing with their besties for professional group boudoir photos.

Facebook Rolls Out Update, Allows Users to Insert Photos into Comments

Some estimates suggest that there are somewhere in the vicinity of 208,300 photos uploaded to Facebook every day. Of those, exactly zero are uploaded as part of comment threads. Up until now, Facebook users fond of replying to their friends statuses with photos were forced to insert a link. The newest update out of the Facebook camp suggests that this will no longer be an issue.

Hey Kids! Wanna Be a Pro Photographer? Here’s How!

There has been a lot of talk recently about how best to succeed as a professional photographer, now that "everybody is a photographer." A recent post here by Alex Ignacio emphasized how important it is to “specialize and focus” -- Ignacio believes that if we don’t, we’ll “perish”.

As someone who trains aspiring commercial photographers, I agree that some doors may shut if you don’t specialize, but many more will open if you’re versatile.

Beautiful Studio Portraits of Birds in Flight

Photographer Paul Nelson spends the majority of his time shooting commercial work for big name clients like MAC Cosmetics or Target. But when the flow of work began to slow to a trickle over the past couple of years, he embarked on a personal project that he hoped would remind him why he loved photography.

Thus was born Aviary. Shot in partnership with Springbook Nature Center, the photo series captures beautiful studio-style portraits of birds taking flight as they're released back into the wild.

A ‘Tiny Planet’ Photo Shot from the Top of the World’s Tallest Building

Remember that amazing 360-degree panorama captured from the top of the Burj Khalifa that we shared back in January? Photographer Gerald Donovan created that stitched panorama to show what Earth looks like from the world's tallest manmade point.

If you want to see what an actual "tiny world" photo looks like when captured from that same spot, look no further than the photograph above.

Adobe Photoshop CC Has Apparently Been Cracked One Day After Launch

It truly is a cat and mouse game between software developers and software pirates. It's been that way for years. So when a company like Adobe decides to change up their entire business model to subscription-based to curb the piracy of their professional-grade product suite, you would expect it to take a fair amount of time before the pirates managed to find a workaround.

Perhaps not the case, at least according to a torrent link uploaded today to The Pirate Bay (one of the largest torrent-tracking sites on the Internet). Just one day following the official launch of Photoshop CC, the software has apparently been cracked and available for downloading illegally.

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$25 Could Soon Buy You a Photograph of Your Face in Space

Up until now, the use of multibillion-dollar orbiting satellites has been extremely limited to space agencies and companies that, well, require satellites. But here's a radical idea that could change the future of man-made satellites as we know them.

It's a Kickstarter project called ARKYD, and it's intended to be the first publicly accessible space telescope ever.

Eye-Popping Photographs of the National Pyrotechnic Festival in Mexico

The municipality of Tultepec in Mexico produces about half of all of the country's fireworks. Every year, more than 100,000 people flock to the area for a nine day event called the National Pyrotechnic Festival. There are activities common to a fair (e.g. food, music, dancing), but the biggest reason people attend is to experience the dazzling firework displays.

Photographer Thomas Prior traveled from New York to attend one of these festivals, and ended up capturing a collection of beautiful photographs showing people partying from within explosions.

What an Atomic Bomb Explosion Looks Like from Above and Below

On November 5, 1951, a 31 kiloton atomic bomb was dropped in the Nevada Test Site from a B-45 Tornado bomber. A camera in the air was documenting the test, and captured the video above showing what a large nuclear explosion looks like when looking down at it from above. Notice how the camera begins to shake when the shockwave of the blast reaches it.

A Visualization of the Work that Went Into Making Magic Lantern What it is Today

In the past month and a half, Magic Lantern has seemingly made the impossible possible by bringing high definition RAW video to several Canon cameras and turning the cinema camera world upside down. With how fast these most recent updates have come out, it's easy to forget how much work has gone into Magic Lantern over the years.

A1ex from Magic Lantern's main development team wanted to remind us, and so he created this video representation of the work that the team has had put in to go from humble beginnings to the hack's current level of awesomeness.

Photographer Captures Incredible Aerial Shots While Paragliding

Alexandre Buisse is a professional mountain photographer who also has a huge passion for paragliding. Beautiful things happen when those two interests come together. Buisse has captured some remarkable aerial photographs of landscapes in France and Italy while soaring high above the ground.

PicoImages Hopes to Shake Up the Stock Industry Through Crowdsourcing

Most stock photography websites and agencies work the same way: photographers upload their work, set prices, and let clients browse for what it is they're looking for. If the client wants a photo of a family on the beach, they'd better hope someone came through. And on the other end, the photographer has to hope that they're putting work out there that people will actually want to use.

Advertising creatives Cassandra Nguyen and Grazina Snipas' new website PicoImages does away with that model, replacing it with more of a "stock photography to order" sort of system.

DIY: 35mm Film Slide Business Cards

Want to make some business cards for your photography business that stand out from among traditional cards? Try making some in the style of 35mm film slides. Last week we shared photographer Lars Swanson's beautiful slide cards, and this week we have a step-by-step look at how you can make something similar.

Gloomy Portraits of Zoo Animals Living In their Manmade Worlds

When people take pictures of captive animals in zoos, oftentimes their goal is to shoot the images in a way that makes the animals appear to be in the wild. Photographer Daniel Zakharov does no such thing. Rather than make the glass, bars, and concrete disappear off to the sides of the frame, Zakharov intentionally captures the fact that the animals are found in unnatural environments.

The Captive Airship: George Lawrence’s Panoramic Kite Photography Rig

George Lawrence was a commercial photographer with a knack for engineering and business. Born in Illinois in February of 1868, his career reached its zenith in the early 1900s when he took to the skies, creating incredible aerial panoramas using an invention of his called the 'Captive Airship.'

The Magic of Firmware: Canon EOS M AF Speed Boost Seen in Videos

Earlier this month, Canon announced that there's a firmware update for the Canon EOS M on the way that will boost the mirrorless camera's sluggish autofocusing speeds by up to 2.3x. Given that AF slowness is one of the biggest gripes EOS M owners have with the camera, the news was likely music to many a EO M owner's ear.

If you want to see what this 2.3x looks like in real life, Korean photographer Daero Lee has published a number of comparison videos showing updated and non-updated EOS Ms focusing on things.

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These Privacy Glasses Use Infrared Light to Hide Your Face from Cameras

In this day and age, you're likely to have a hard time walking down the street and not seeing a camera somewhere. If it isn't held by the shutter-happy tourist in short shorts, it's the CCTV camera mounted at the entrance of the local subway station.

How does one maintain anonymity? Staying in? No! You put on fabulous privacy-protecting glasses under development by Japan's National Institute of Informatics.

Photographer Captures the ISS Looking Like the USS Enterprise

Dumitrana, Romania-based astrophotographer Maximilian Teodorescu recently got his hands on an 1800mm f/12 Maksutov telescope and decided to put it through its paces this past weekend. He decided to test out the imaging quality by using it to photograph the International Space Station passing in front of the moon in broad daylight. The beautiful photograph above is what he ended up capturing.

Interview with Jim Mortram of Small Town Inertia

I first heard of Jim Mortram and his project ‘Small Town Inertia’ in the ‘Ones to Watch’ section of the British Journal of Photography. At first, I was happy that someone from my homeland, Norfolk, was making an impact in the photographic world. But of all projects I’d seen in BJP, Small Town Inertia was the only that gripped me.