The history of photography is over a century old -- in fact, it was 107 years ago that Oskar Barnack created the Ur-Leica, a camera that would later be known as the genesis of the 36x24 “full-frame” format. Since then, hundreds of companies across the world have, to varying degrees of success, produced everything from 35mm to 127 to an assortment of medium format sizes and finally to digital.
Episode 344 of the PetaPixel Photography Podcast.
Download MP3 - Subscribe via iTunes, Google Play, email or RSS!
Featured: Sports photographer, Jordan Johnson
Researchers from the University of Washington have developed a way to use smartphone photos to identify potentially harmful bacteria on skin and in the mouth. The method can visually identify microbes on the skin that contribute to acne as well as those that cause gingivitis and dental plaques.
Picture Instruments, a Germany-based software company known best for its plugins for Adobe Photoshop and Lightroom Classic, has released a new plugin that promises to create clean, detailed, ultra-sharp images with incredible depth by employing a technique used by the Hubble Space Telescope team.
In the morning hours of June 10th, a "ring of fire" solar eclipse greeted sky observers in the northeast United States, northern Canada, Europe, northern Asia, Russia and Greenland. While most photographers captured single photos of the eclipse, Göran Strand decided to show the entirety of the rare eclipse from his backyard in Östersund, Sweden.
Every day, the PetaPixel Instagram account is sharing excellent photography from our readers and those who inspire us. Here’s a look at some of our recent favorite posts and the photographers behind the lens.
Columbia University today announced the 2021 Pulitzer Prizes, awarded on the recommendation of the Pulitzer Prize Board. For the second -- and the organization hopes last -- year, the awards were announced remotely.
Comedian Bo Burnham has released a comical yet brutally pointed one-man music show that pokes fun at the Internet culture and has received praise from fans and celebrities who find it perfectly relatable and on-the-nose.
The world clamors for our attention and technology demands our hard-earned money, but what has happened to the quality of the experience and the investment in ourselves? Our time is now owned by social media, competitions, and the need to prove how good and well-received our images are, usually to the detriment of the images and our self-confidence.
Launched in 2001, the Pro90 IS was Canon’s flagship PowerShot and shared a similar external design to the earlier Pro70 from 1998 but greatly boosted its zoom capability from 2.5x to 10x. It became Canon’s first digital camera with optical image stabilization as well.
As 2020 brought a society-altering worldwide disruption, press photographers were able to document the monumental changes in every aspect of that "new normal." The Boston Press Photographers Association (BPPA) has shared the award-winning images from its annual 2020 Pictures of the Year Contest.
Zhong Yi (ZY) Optics has announced that the mirrorless Mitakon Speedmaster 50mm f/0.95 lens originally launched for Sony E-mount, Canon RF-mount, and Nikon Z-mount (and later came to Leica M-mount) is now available for Leica L-mount. It is the first-ever f/0.95 lens that has been produced for L-mount.
Venus Optics has launched a version of the Laowa 7.5mm f/2 for Micro Four Thirds (MFT) that includes a chip that provides metadata in EXIF as well as allows aperture control digitally through the camera.
Minutiae coins itself as the "anti-social" social app. It challenges conventional design by restricting users to just one minute of usage per day and anonymizes shares in an attempt to encourage users to "embrace the boring and mundane."
Camera accessory manufacturer Fotodiox has published a video that explains how to make a digital camera obscura that can be used for both video and photo capture made from a box, a magnifying glass, and frosted plastic.
Gitzo's crowdsourced Legende tripod and backpack series has hit another snag: the company has delayed shipping the product for another three months to address "aesthetic" damage. What's worse, the company's poor communication has led to a deluge of dissatisfied comments and demands for refunds.
Photographer Zev Hoover was shooting the solar eclipse early this morning when a bird happened to fly through the frame. He then decided to create this unusual image showing the trail of the dark silhouetted bird against the partial annular eclipse.
NASA has shared the first two images from Juno's June 7th, 2021 flyby of Ganymede that shows dark and bright terrain and long structural features possibly linked to tectonic faults on the surface of Jupiter's giant moon.
A reporter from a Univision affiliate in Arizona has accused police of illegally seizing his phone and threatening to access its contents by "brute force" during an incident in April.
An Ohio wedding photographer recently found herself working the "best maternity session ever" when one of the couple's horses decided to join in on the shoot, smile for the camera, and crack everyone up.
A professional sports photographer has shared a unique behind-the-scenes look of what it's like to shoot an NBA game -- specifically the Boston Celtics -- and details preparations, how he chooses equipment, and how a game-day unfolds.
Samsung has announced that it is beginning mass production of what it claims has the smallest pixels in the industry: 0.64μm-pixels. The 50-megapixel sensor is called the ISOCELL JN1 and is equipped with ISOCELL 2.0, Smart-ISO, and "Double Super PDAF."
Capturing photos in black and white is quite a challenging task. It is certainly one of the most complicated fields of landscape photography. One needs to be very careful about the circumstances where the photos will actually look good in black and white.
A new report alleges that not only is Facebook working on its first smartwatch, but it will also come equipped with two cameras, with at least one capable of being detached from the wrist to more easily function as a photo and video capture device.
South Korean designer Paeng Minwook has invented a forehead-mounted camera that is meant to criticize the modern-day smartphone user who spends an inordinate amount of time looking down at their phones and not at possible obstacles in their path.
Analogico by ADEL has launched a compact and fully automatic programmable film processor called the Dev.a. This $4,290 tabletop film processor targeted at photographers in a range of environments, from a pro lab with high capacity to a casual home user.
How does the powerful Sony Alpha 1 stack up against the less expensive Canon EOS R5 when it comes to video performance? LensProToGo has shared a video comparison that puts the two cameras against one another in an 8K shootout.
If you watched the news or were connected to the internet the first week of June, chances are good that you have seen a video of a drone crashing into an erupting volcano. Well, that drone was mine and it got completely disintegrated. In my latest video, I share what it is like to fly a drone around a volcano and what you have to look out for.
All of my recent motivation in photography has come from the desire to see actualized publications of my projects, in the wake of the wonderfully positive response to my recent Bulgaria zine and USA Digest.
As a professional photographer, I use a lot of different cameras. At any given time, I can use really expensive full-frame cameras combined with the best glass money can buy, to mid-range cameras with kit lenses, all the way down to even compact cameras that fit in my pocket.
Sony today has announced an initiative that will see it invest a million dollars across a set of underserved and underrepresented communities by funding the efforts of nonprofits within them. The program is part of Sony’s social justice efforts and funded via its Global Social Justice Fund.
Plan your work and work your plan. That’s what... someone important once told me? Anyhow, in my opinion, planning out your Milky Way shots is absolutely one of the best ways to increase the likelihood you will be shooting bangers.
GuruShots, the "World's Greatest Photo Game," has announced the winners of its "Beach Days" challenge, which received thousands of entries and over 53.4 million votes. The "Top Photographer" winner of the contest is amuhlh of the United States (whose photo is seen above).
Portrait photographer Jerry Ghionis has published a detailed video that gives advice on how to pose men in front of a camera in such a way as to create more relaxed and natural-looking portraits that accentuate the subject and bring out their features.
OM Digital Solutions has announced the Olympus M.Zuiko Digital ED 8-25mm f/4 Pro Lens for Micro Four Thirds (MFT). This 35mm equivalent 16-50mm lens promises to cover a wide range of shooting scenarios with its versatile wide-angle up to "normal" focal range.
OM Digital has announced the first camera to come to market since the company was spun off from Olympus, but it's not coming to North America. The PEN E-P7 is only going to be available in Europe and Japan and the company currently has no plans to make it available elsewhere.
Today marks three years since the world lost one of its most interesting and likable public personalities. Anthony Bourdain was one of those unique souls that found a way to inspire people from all walks of life: Foodies, filmmakers, photographers, and casual travelers alike.
A wedding venue in Gloucestershire, United Kingdom has just published an incredibly ambitious, scripted, single-shot first-person view drone video that takes viewers on a 500-meter journey through the full grounds of its picturesque rural location.
Most social media platforms shroud the idea of "the algorithm" in mystery. Instagram appears to be breaking that mold as it has published a detailed blog that explains what its algorithm is and how it ranks feeds, Stories, Explore, and Reels.
Polaroid has collaborated with the Keith Haring Foundation to feature a custom Polaroid Now camera and i-Type instant film that is decorated with Haring's signature motifs.
I’ve been swimming in this industry since the spring of 1997, ultimately on both sides of the lens. I have witnessed titans rise and fall with the decimation of film in favor of digital pixels. I’ve taken part in the tidal wave of new and incredible talent from around the world thanks to affordable cameras and computers.