DigitalRev has posted a followup to the destruction tests video they published last week. After abusing two entry-level DSLR cameras in all sorts of random ways (e.g. dropping down an escalator, using them as stilts and hammers, pouring hot liquids on them, etc...), many of us were left wondering to what degree the cameras were still functional. This video answers those questions.
Check out this Fujifilm vending machine found in Japan by Lee Miller of The Other East. The thing sells 35mm and APS film, as well as disposable camera for snagging memories on the go.
Pearls Before Swine has an interesting theory regarding why young women seem to always know when they're being photographed, stick their heads together, and bust into picture perfect smiles.
"Attempts to Fly" is a series of photographs by Conan Thai in which he freezes people as they leap into the air, resulting in photographs that could be mistaken for alien abduction photos. It's a pretty fun idea that you can try with your friends. Bonus points for shots where you can capture jumpers at impossible heights, as Thai does in some of his photos.
Gary Fong, the dude and company behind the LightSphere, has come up with a simple adapter you can use to attach your iPhone 4 or iPhone 3GS to a tripod. Unlike existing tripod adapters that utilize special cases or suction cups, Gary Fong's adapter allows you to simply slide your phone in -- assuming you don't use any kind of case that changes the dimensions of your phone.
Google added a neat feature called "Face Movies" to its Picasa photo software last week. This feature uses facial recognition technology to help you create a movie slideshow where a person's face is aligned in each photograph. An example of something you can do with this feature is to create a slideshow of your child growing up (like in the example Face Movie above).
What is a variable neutral density filter? …
Thanks to everyone who entered our giveaway for the accessory we launched earlier this week: the Photographers Rights Gray Card Set. We received 166 comment entries and 139 Twitter entries for 305 entries overall. Using random.org, the randomly selected winners are: …
Check out this Nikon D200 birthday cake that Josh Weisberg (the guy who sparked the Canon lens mug craze) received from his friend Mia. Apparently everything you see on the cake is edible, including the printed labels, which are made of edible ink. Everything else solid-looking is made of sugar.
Editor's note: This walkthrough was originally published on Clint Decker's Flickr account. We found it pretty informative and asked him to share it here.
New York-based photographer Navid Baraty has a series of incredibly beautiful rain photographs made in San Francisco and Japan. We first came across the photograph above, titled "Rain Dance", in Pictory's "San Francisco" showcase. It was taken in San Francisco's Union Square with a Nikon D700. There's just something about the composition and lighting that blew us away.
In addition to the new 60D, Canon also made its lens lineup longer today with the announcement of four new L lenses and two new extenders. The lenses are the EF 8-15mm f/4L Fisheye, EF 70-300mm f/4-5.6L IS, EF 300mm f/2.8L IS II, and EF 400mm f/2.8L IS II. The extenders are the Extender EF 1.4x III and Extender EF 2x III.
Turns out the leaked photos of the Canon 60D we posted a couple weeks ago were of the real thing. Canon just announced this camera this morning, and the rumored specs were spot on as well: an 18-megapixel camera with an articulating LCD screen and heavy emphasis on video recording.
If you tried to visit the Nikon Rumors site this morning, you've probably gotten an error message. According to the Google information, 47 pages from the site were tested over the last three months, and one page resulted in malicious software downloaded and installed without user consent. It appears that the site was flagged for that content yesterday. Yikes.
Expensive camera equipment getting destroyed seems to be a reoccurring theme this month here on PetaPixel. Early in the month there was the story of the 7D getting burned up in an exploding car, and earlier this week we shared a DigitalRev video of DSLRs getting abused tested for durability.
Here's an interesting peek at how Annie Leibovitz goes about shooting a portrait. This was for a Louis Vuitton advertisement a while back featuring Sean Connery.
Here's an interesting clip of a color film test done by Kodak in 1922, years before color movies started appearing. This is 13 years before the first full-length color film appeared, and 7 years before the first Oscar was awarded. You can read more about this clip on the Kodak blog.
The main thing with in flight hover fly photos is not to try, by that I mean if you go out to take one you will end up normally chasing a hoverfly all over the place with little chance of success. I only take them when an opportunity arises.
Flickr user joey_joey_joey wanted to customize his iPhone 4 in a unique way, so he decided to make it look like a Leica M9. This is one of the neatest looking cell phones I've seen.
Sony dropped quite an announcement today with its new pellicle mirror DSLRs, but Canon doesn't want us to forget that they have announcements coming up as well.
Here's a stunning time-lapse video by Dan Eckert shot in the California and Arizona deserts. Aside from the fact that seeing the night sky spin in time-lapse is usually pretty darn cool, Eckert employs some interesting techniques that we haven't come across before.
Notice anything strange about the photograph above? It shows the Myers family taking a photograph together outside the Capital building in Madison, Wisconsin. Look a little closer, and you'll see that their Canon G7 caught something unusual.
HBO posted this interesting behind-the-scenes video that gives a glimpse into the kind of special effects that went into filming the popular miniseries John Adams. It's pretty crazy how they construct entire realities around the actors using CGI.
We here at PetaPixel are pleased to announce the new Photographers Rights Gray Card Set, a nifty accessory that can help you remember your rights and educate others if you're ever confronted while shooting.
The rumors that have been circulating in recent weeks were spot on: Sony has just announced four new DSLR cameras: the A33, A55, A560, and A580. As expected, the A33 and A55 are the world's first pellicle mirror DSLRs, and have the features and specs we posted just yesterday: phase-detect autofocus while recording HD video or shooting 7fps or 10fps respectively.
The above is supposedly a leaked photo of the not-yet-announced Sony A33 and its pellicle mirror, the first of its kind on a DSLR. Rumor has it that the camera will officially be announced early tomorrow morning.
Here's a screenshot photo.net member Brett Cole posted to a forum thread showing how you can order $3 million worth of gear from B&H with three clicks.
This is a 17 minute video showing Kai over at DigitalRev (the same guy that painted a Nikon D90 pink) putting a Canon 400D and Nikon D70 through various torture tests. The tests include stabbing them with knives, dropping them down escalators, smashing them with elevator doors, using them as stilts, and more.
We've all heard of trickery that goes into many kinds of photography to make something look more appealing to consumers, whether it's a Big Mac at McDonalds or the swimming pool at a motel. Sometimes the discrepancy isn't worth complaining about, but this wasn't the case for David Ng (currently a guest blogger over at Boing Boing) when he purchased the Banzai Wild Waves Water Park. He took a photograph of the box art and then a photograph of his two children standing next to the actual …
A while back we shared a video in a post titled "The Cliche of Enhancing Images in Movies" that compiled clips from movies and TV shows in which "photo experts" did absurd and impossible "enhancements" to photos and videos in order to solve mysteries. The above clip from British sitcom Red Dwarf pokes fun at this cliche, and takes it to the extreme. Enjoy.
Some wedding photographers offer a package that includes an iPad pre-loaded with images from that special day.
This adorable Pico projector concept which comes hot on the heels of Nikon's more standard-looking S1100pj projector camera. The Pico, envisioned by René Wooram Lee, combines form and function in its anthropomorphic design: its blue "eye" is a projector lens and its greenish "eye" is the camera lens. The center smile is actually a microphone. The two feet not only double as a stand for the pico projector cam, but they also cover a mini-USB port and what looks like an audio jack. Brilliant!
Put your detective hats on -- there's a photo mystery going on over at Boing Boing. Luke Mandle sent in the above photograph of his little boy, Boing Boing published it asking readers to explain it, and how there's a fine and informative debate in the comments.
We're not exactly sure how practical this bag is, but it's definitely among the more unique camera bags we've come across. The Leopard Print Camera Bag by fashion webzine Luxirare is a camera bag/purse hybrid that houses a Nikon D90, a cell phone, and some credit cards, and allows you to shoot without removing the camera from the bag.
A recent fad in advertising is to use 3D projection mapping on buildings at night to create jaw-dropping effects. The above video shows an ad Samsung ran on a historic building in Amsterdam to promote the Samsung 3D LED TV. A perfect representation of the building is first projected onto the actual building, and then mind-blowing things begin to happen.
Here's a bit of camera/culture trivia for this beautiful Friday: Did you know that Japanese culture and many East Asian cultures dislike the number 4? Check out the above screenshot from the Wikipedia page on the Canon PowerShot G line of cameras. Notice how Canon never released a PowerShot G4.
Believe it or not, the above photograph was made with an iPhone 4. jurilog created a tiny astrophotography kit using a small telescope you can buy online for ¥9,800 (~$115) and a miniature tripod mount.
A day after photos of the upcoming Sony A33 and A55 DSLR cameras (rumored to have pellicle mirrors) were leaked, photos and specs of what appear to be the upcoming A560 and A580 cameras have also sprung up. Like the photos leaked yesterday, the front view of the two cameras show exactly the same body with only the model number Photoshopped. Not sure why this is.
Last week we featured a stunning time-lapse video that unfortunately failed to capture Perseid meteor shower well because of too much air traffic in the area. Landscape photographer Henry Jun Wah Lee attempted the same kind of video in Joshua Tree National Park. Even though there's still quite a bit of air traffic, you can clearly see quite a few shooting stars that light up the sky.
It looks like someone hit the "publish" button too early over at CNET Asia, accidentally spilling the beans on the upcoming Canon PowerShot G12. The 10-megapixel camera's main selling points seem to be features that are also included in the PowerShot cameras announced today by Canon: 1080p 720p HD video recording and a special High Dynamic Range (HDR) scene mode that snaps three bracketed photos for you and combines them into a single photo.
Canon isn't going to have Nikon have all the announcement fun today. They've unveiled three new PowerShot compact cameras: the S95, the SD4500 IS, and the SX130 IS. The cameras will cost $400, $250, and $350 (respectively), and all offer HD video recording.
After an eternity of rumors and leaks, Nikon has just officially announced the D3100, an entry-level DX format DSLR replacement to the D3000. The main selling point is 1080p video recording at 24fps in h.264 with continuous autofocus, a new feature for DSLR cameras. The 14.2 megapixel camera has 11 autofocus points, a 3-inch LCD screen, an ISO range of 100 to 3200 (can be expanded to 12,800), and 3 FPS shooting. The camera will be out in September at the price of $699, bundled with a 18-55mm VR …
A Venezuelan court ordered newspaper El Nacional not to print violent images after the paper published a controversial image of dead bodies piled up in a Caracas morgue.
This music video by YouTube celebrity Joe Penna (AKA MysteryGuitarMan) shows him dancing in various locations while the world around him moves in slow motion. What's even cooler is that he also published a behind-the-scenes video showing how you can do the same thing. Check it out!
Yesterday, Canon announced a rather strange and unexciting Canon 7D "upgrade." It's not exactly an upgrade either -- all of the camera specs for the new Canon 7D Studio Version are unchanged. For $1829 for the body only ($130 more than the current 7D), photographers can have several "locked levels" of the camera. Pay even more and you get a barcode scanning kit and a wireless transfer unit, the WFT-E5A.
Alleged photographs of the upcoming Sony Alpha A33 and A55 DSLR cameras have popped up in an overseas forum. The images look legitimate, though the A55 and A33 front views are identical images that had the model number Photoshopped. Not sure why that is.
The cute photo above of a surprise photo booth proposal is making its arounds around the Internets right now. Angela writes on her blog, …
Jolayne Attwood (jolayne on Flickr) was at the International Photography Fair in Bièvres earlier this year when she came across this gigantic Instamatic 133 camera. There's no covert street photography or shooting from the hip with this baby.
About a year after launching the first mainstream stereoscopic digital camera, the FinePix Real 3D W1, Fujifilm has just announced its successor: the FinePix Real 3D W3. This new camera boasts 720p video recording, allowing you to film your own low-budget version of Avatar at home. The camera has two 10-megapixel sensors spaced 2.9 inches apart, and a special 3D screen that allows you to view your photos and videos in 3D without special glasses. Of course, when you're sick of playing James …
Photoshop CS5's Content Aware Fill feature was quite a hit when it came out earlier this year, but what about free alternatives? Webinpaint is a web-based photo app that aims to do just that. You simply open up an image, paint over the area you'd like removed, and click the "Inpaint" button for the app to do its removal magic.
