Search Results for: grids

The Ultimate Guide to Softboxes: The Anatomy of Light Shaping Tools

Softboxes are among the most popular light shaping tools. Few photographers have never shot with softboxes, and more often than not a softbox is a go-to modifier for beginners. In this article, I will break down the anatomy of a softbox, from physics to possible applications for it. Read on to become a master of using softboxes.

Review: set.a.light 3D Makes Learning and Seeing Light a Piece of Cake

Lighting is one of the most complex topics in photography. There are literally hundreds of light shaping tools and countless scenarios they apply to. No wonder many photographers are reluctant to learn lighting, despite it being one of the core skills any photographer should have.

Why You Should Upgrade Your Speedlight to a Studio Strobe

I’d argue that nearly all of us owned a speedlight at some point before we owned a studio strobe. When we’re looking to dip our toes into supplemental lighting, strobes seem like a big investment. It just makes sense to pick up a cheap speedlight to play with, right?

Great Reads in Photography: March 21, 2021

Every Sunday, we bring together a collection of easy-reading articles from analytical to how-to to photo-features in no particular order that did not make our regular daily coverage. Enjoy!

30 Lightroom Tips and Tricks for Faster Photo Editing

Landscape photographer Christian Möhrle of The Phlog Photography recently put together a handy compilation of his favorite tips and tricks for Adobe Lightroom Classic. Chances are good you'll find at least one or two (and probably several more) little workflow tips that you didn't know about.

Shooting Hockey Player Portraits from Below, Through Plexiglass

Ever since joining the San Jose Sharks two years ago, I’ve looked for different ways to photograph hockey and showcase our athletes. There was one specific photo that I had been thinking about for a while. The concept would be to create a photo from below the ice, as if looking up at a Sharks player inside SAP Center.

There is No ‘Formula’ for Good Photo Composition

It’s very easy to get stuck in grooves in photography, to find something that makes sense or comes from a position of authority; once habits are formed around ideas about genre, style, or technique, it can be very difficult to break out of those constraints.

21 Portrait Photography Lessons from 21 Great Photographers

My portrait photography education didn’t happen in a classroom, library, or workshop. Most of what I learned came from studying my heroes’ work, trying to figure out why I loved their pictures, and then putting my own twist on them.

New Lithium-Sulfur Battery Could Quadruple Camera Battery Life

Researchers at Australia's Monash University have developed what they're calling "the world’s most efficient lithium-sulphur (Li-S) battery," an ultra-high-capacity design that could quadruple camera battery life and run a smartphone for 5 consecutive days without a charge.

Imitating Hazy Backgrounds with Diffusion Gels

Shooting in a studio has its advantages. But although being warm, dry and convenient are greatly appreciated, shooting between the same four walls can get a little boring if you’re constantly using them as backgrounds for your shots.

Concise Photography Advice for Friends and Family

"Do you have any advice on how to take good photos?" Because I don't make a secret of my interest in photography, it's not uncommon for people around me to assume that I'm the right person to answer this seemingly innocuous question.

Street Photography Compositions with the Ricoh GR III

At first glance, all we see is a dinky point-n-shoot camera; not much to it. It slips inside my front pocket, I mean, how powerful can it be? Well, photographers shouldn’t be fooled by its size and minimalism; like many of our subjects in the street. The Ricoh GR III is called a “wolf in sheep’s clothing” for a reason.

Slow-Shutter High-Speed Action Photography

With so many ways to be creative in photography, I get really excited with many ideas for a photograph. One area I find very interesting is sports action photography, but with a twist. It's great to capture that split-second moment and have that frame frozen, but I wanted to explore capturing the motion and freezing the action all in one go.

The Problem of Viewing Photos on Digital Displays

In the good old days of analog photography, print aspect ratio was ultimately determined by the paper size. In other words, if you printed an 8x10-inch, you had to crop your negative to a 4:5 aspect ratio. For slide film, the image aspect ratio was determined by the film format, for instance, 3:2 for 35mm film.

Creating a Photo of a Radical Vegan Zombie Activist

It has been said that meat consumption should decrease by 90% in the West if we want to avoid dangerous climate warming. And because all of us should be involved to achieve this goal, I of course decided to invite zombies to join in the effort of combating climate change.

Stop Using Tape to Attach Your Gels: How to Use Magnets Instead

If you’re like me and you’ve tried to attach gels to your lights in the past, you’ve likely resorted to using one of the many types of sticky tapes available. When I used to manage a studio, I would see all manner of tapes being used to attach gels to hot modifiers.

Photography: AI Everywhere

There are two major trends in photography today. The first is the ever-increasing numbers of photos being made. I can't even be bothered to look up how many billions of photos are being uploaded to Instickrbook every minute or every day or every year. It's a lot. This is usually talked about in terms of how many photos there are, and how we are drowning in them.

Photographing Perfume Packaging Using Everyday Objects

As a still life photographer, I spend a lot of time in my studio experimenting with different types of products. In a recent shoot, I did just this by photographing a perfume box. But instead of photographing the packing by itself, I used everyday objects to create the scene.

Here’s an Intro to Three-Point Lighting for Portraits

Here's a 9-minute introduction to the three-point lighting setup! If you haven’t seen our video about portrait lighting, we go over five portrait lighting positions and what type of emotion you can get from those positions. So this is a follow up to that lesson and I recommend you watch it before diving into this one!

Sony Unveils the World’s First 48MP Smartphone Sensor

Sony has just announced a new CMOS sensor for smartphones that captures 48-megapixel photos -- the highest pixel count in the industry. The sensor is the world's first to feature an ultra-small pixel size of just 0.8μm, which is what allows it to stuff 48-megapixels onto a 1/2-inch sensor.

A Sketch History of Early Color Photography

I ran across yet another case of Holy Cow Look At These Russian Photos, in which the photographs of Sergey Prokudin-Gorsky were showcased. In 1902, Prokudin-Gorsky learned the method of shooting three negatives (color separations) and then projecting them in registration through filters to produce projected color images.

The Death of DSLRs is Near

Two decades ago, DSLRs were introduced to replace film cameras. With only a few megapixels, very short battery life, and an overall low quality, it was only natural that most photographers were very skeptical at first. It took a few generations until digital cameras were fully accepted and analog photography was left to the enthusiasts rather than the professionals.

Instagram May Soon Break Its Classic Grid (and All Your 3×3 Mosaics)

Instagram has long featured a 3x3 grid of photos across its platform, allowing photographers to get creative and create larger photo mosaics by uploading the individual pieces as separate photos in the correct order. If you've spent a considerable amount of time and effort building these mosaics yourself, here's some bad news: it looks like Instagram may soon break that classic grid (and your mosaics).

5 Classic Portrait Lighting Mistakes You May Be Making

In this article, I am going to highlight 5 key things that I see portrait photographers doing that I consider to be "in need of improvement." And although there are no hard-and-fast rules to photography, try to think of it as being similar to an instrument being slightly out of tune or a meal that's perhaps a little too salty. These are glaringly obvious errors to the well-informed but may not be so obvious to those who are just starting out.

The Masterful Photo Compositions of Henri Cartier-Bresson

Ever wonder what it is that makes Henri Cartier-Bresson's "decisive moment" photos "work"? Photographer Tavis Leaf Glover put out a two-part video series in which he explores Cartier-Bresson's famous photos and shows how they conform to various ideas and principles of composition.

A Review of the Fujifilm EF-X500 Flash

In 2016, I joined team Fuji after being extremely impressed with the X-T2 body. I had been watching mirrorless technology for a while, but this was the first time a system had everything I wanted in a camera body.

How to Create Foreground Bokeh with Water Drops on Glass

This foreground bokeh look is actually a setup I played around with a few times many years ago. I thought it would be a good, fun setup to share, as you can get some interesting results whilst playing around the much-loved bokeh.

How to Keep Your Gelled Backgrounds Perfectly Lit in Studio Portraits

In a recent article, I spoke about the best ways to perfectly light your background with colored gels. We covered the best things to keep in mind if strong and vibrant colors across your backdrop are your objective. It turns out that gelling your background is actually relatively simple -- it's keeping those strong vibrant colors that's actually the tricky part.

Lighting Through a Window: People in Still Life in the Style of 1600s Dutch Painters

A few months ago I was working on putting together a still life shoot with a fantastic stylist and a friend of mine, Kiki Tse. She had come up with this beautiful idea for a shoot: to represent a person in a still life context by the use of some of their personal effects.

To know someone's possessions; to see a navigational chart from their grandad; an amulet with a photo of their late sister without ever seeing a face to attach this narrative to invites the viewer to form their own account devoid of judgement of background, race, age or physical appearance.