Photographing a human subject successfully has a lot to do with making a connection, making sure your model is feeling comfortable, and being respectful. In this 10-minute video, photographer Manny Ortiz teams up with his wife Diana (who is a model herself) to talk about the do’s and don’ts of working with models.
Last year, I bought a macro lens for the summer. Just a normal one with 1x magnification. I fell into a beautiful and mesmerizing world of minuscule flowers and bugs. I found that in macro photography, you don't have to travel to beautiful places to take beautiful photos -- you can just walk around in your backyard, and discover a whole new world.
The United Nations' own aviation agency, the International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO), is backing a move to develop a single, global database which would require all unmanned aircraft to be registered to it.
As Hurricane Irma barreled toward the Florida panhandle this past weekend, some people ignored warnings to flee or find shelter and decided to go out and shoot photos of the approaching storm instead. The short video above shows what happened to one man who did this at Florida's southernmost point.
Profoto has just announced the new Air Remote TTL-F. Fujifilm photographers will now be able to benefit from TTL (Through The Lens) and HSS (High-Speed Sync) capabilities with a number of Profoto flashes.
Episode 210 of the PetaPixel Photography Podcast.
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Featured: Lexar Brand Ambassador Prajit Ravindran
The night has fallen. I am alone, on top of a mountain, at an altitude of 3,000 meters (~9,800 feet). Fog is floating along through the valleys below, illuminated by the pale light of the moon. For a moment I feel like I've landed on a distant planet, lost in space. It's a privilege to be here, a refreshment of the soul.
Last year, I built a (very rudimentary) 16x20” ultra large format camera out of a bunch of plywood, a pane of glass and some cheap blackout material from the local fabric shop. I borrowed a 20” military aerial lens off a friend and took it on the road to Latvia in my campervan. The problem with it was that I only made one dark slide, and this wasn’t exactly light tight!
Need to take portraits and don’t have access to a lighting kit? No worries – this 4-minute video from Jay P. Morgan of The Slanted Lens will show you how you can turn a bathroom – or any room for that matter – into a softbox to create beautiful soft light.
Alongside its new X-E3 mirrorless camera and XF 80mm f/2.8 Macro lens, Fujifilm has also announced the development of a new RAW conversion program called "Fujifilm X Raw Studio." This software is different from others in that it's designed to offload work from your computer's CPU by using your camera's processor to convert RAW photos.
My father passed away a month ago, and his birthday was on August 31st. I'm letting that sink in. Death is never easy and for those that have lost a parent, it has a certain significance. The person who has been there your entire life is now gone. There are things that I am now thinking about that hardly, if ever, crossed my mind. The biggest being that I am mortal and I too will meet the same fate some day, and the other, related to photography, is the importance of the photograph.
If you've been thinking about starting a fine art photography collection, now may not be a bad time to start that investment. While most types of fine art are seeing prices plunge, photography is actually growing in clout among art collectors and investors.
As a landscape photographer, I love extreme wide angle lenses. I use my 16-35mm for 90% of my photos and I mostly use it at 16mm. When I give lectures about photography, I often hear people saying they have trouble with using extreme wide angle uses just because they are "so wide". But these lenses require a different approach than your kit lens to get the most out of them.
Focus stacking is a technique typically used in macro shots to achieve a large depth of field. It’s a relatively simple concept: take many images focused at slightly different distances and combine the sharp portions to a single image in post. This 6-minute video from landscape photographer Mark Denney will show you how to utilise the technique in landscape photography.
Instagif is a new camera that's what you would get if you crossed a Polaroid instant camera with those moving pictures from the Harry Potter universe. The brainchild of Abhishek Singh, the camera captures a GIF and instantly "prints" it out on a little cartridge.
The progression that is the discovery and appreciation of photography is a journey unique to the voyager. Whether the path is walked through a textbook, an online forum, or alone, there is no two that are alike.
Mastery of the pen tool enables complex vector shapes and selections that can be used for masking or extracting elements from an image. There is a bit of a learning curve to the tool, but this 30-minute video from Unmesh Dinda of PiXimperfect will teach you everything from the fundamentals to real-world use.
The 2017 World Beard And Mustache Championship was held this past weekend in Austin, Texas, and people from near and far flocked to the Austin Facial Hair Club to show off their glorious (and meticulously groomed) facial hair. Las Vegas-based photographer Greg Anderson was on hand to shoot portraits of some of the best contestants.
This short 2-minute video from photographer Svitlana Vronska demonstrates some clever lighting tricks you can use to add some creative flair to your images with an otherwise uninteresting backdrop.
Hasselblad has just unveiled a new discounted Field Kit that contains the X1D-50c medium format mirrorless camera, 3 XCD lenses, a Pelican case, and a collection of accessories.
Fujifilm announced today that a series of firmware updates are coming to X Series mirrorless cameras later this year. As rumors foretold, the X-Pro2 will be getting 4K video recording as part of its update.
Polaroid has a huge announcement scheduled for next week. The company's website now features a teaser for a September 13th reveal, and it sounds like Polaroid is going to make a splash by going back to its instant photography roots.
Pro lighting system maker Broncolor has unveiled the Litepipe P, which the company touts as a "real innovation in the market." The Litepipe P consists of just 5 components and is a lightweight light shaper that can be mounted and ready for use in just 60 seconds with no tools required.
Take a look at the video above. It's actually a string of still photos that shows how blazing fast the new Sony a9 is. The sequences were shot using the camera's 20fps burst mode for photos.
Adobe just announced that there's a powerful new Curvature Pen Tool coming to Photoshop CC later this year. The 1-minute video above is a sneak peek at how this upcoming tool works.
Born of a crowdfunding campaign, The Camera Hack is a short film produced by YouTuber and photographer Andyax.
Body camera footage has just been released after the shooting of an Ohio photojournalist by a deputy who mistook his tripod for a gun.
Are you planning an outdoor landscape photo adventure? This video from landscape photographer Thomas Heaton will give you some ideas on how to optimize your pack. It's a 12-minute look through the gear he’s settled on for his camping photo trips.
Speculation about Nikon's mirrorless camera ambitions is heating up, and two new patents are adding fuel to the fire. Nikon has patented two new ultra-fast lenses for a full frame mirrorless camera system. One is a 52mm f/0.9 and the other is a 36mm f/1.2.
Fujifilm has just announced its new Fujinon XF 80mm f/2.8 R LM OIS WR Macro lens, the first X Series lens to offer 1.0x magnification.
Fujifilm just announced its new X-E3, a "rangefinder-style" mirrorless camera that combines solid imaging features with a small and sleek camera body.
Netflix has bought the worldwide streaming rights to Hondros, a documentary film about the late war photographer Chris Hondros.
Episode 209 of the PetaPixel Photography Podcast.
Download MP3 - Subscribe via iTunes, Google Play, email or RSS!
Featured: Sony Artisan of Imagery, Thibault Roland
Want to see what it's like to fly into the eye of one of the most powerful hurricanes ever recorded? After Hurricane Irma developed into a Category 5 storm yesterday, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) flew airplanes directly into the hurricane to gather weather data. Cameras on the planes captured videos and photos of the experience.
Reddit user Blownsh*tup was chatting with a Tinder dating app match named Orli when the two had this brilliant and punny exchange.
Pixelmator is an image editor for macOS that launched back in 2007 and has since grown into a formidable alternative to Adobe Photoshop in a previously untouchable domain. Now the company has just announced a Pro version of its software, which is set to be released this fall.
The new Nikon D850 lets you create 8K timelapses using the 45.7-megapixel sensor and the built-in Interval Timer. If you've been wanting to see what 8K shot with the camera looks like, today's your lucky day: we got our hands on the first 8K timelapse short film shot on the D850.
More bits are better, right? But do you really know the difference between 8-bit and 16-bit images? Photo educator Nathaniel Dodson breaks it down for us in this informative 8-minute video for his channel tutvid.
Here's a 2.5-minute video by Hugo Cornellier, who has captured a selfie every day of his life from when he was 12 years old up until his recent wedding. The video starts in February 2008 and ends when Cornellier tied the knot in August 2017 -- a span documented by over 2,500 photos.
Here's a 10-minute video tutorial by PiXimperfect that teaches how to add artificial film grain to your photos. Learn three ways to give your digital photos a film look.
Back in August 2016, the Blue Cut wildfire tore through Cajon Pass in Southern California, burning 37,000 acres, dozens of cars, and over 300 homes and structures. Local photojournalist James Quigg documented the fire's damage in a creative and unusual way: he found a burned teapot and turned it into a pinhole camera.
Lightroom is a fairly straightforward and simple piece of software to get your head around. But, like anything, there are always shortcuts and tricks you can use to improve and streamline your workflow. In this 6-minute video from Travis Transient, try out these 3 top tips for making Lightroom life flow more smoothly.
British LED lighting manufacturer Rotolight has announced an update to its NEO range with the new NEO 2, which is a solution for photographers and videographers looking for both strobe and continuous LED lighting.
My 3-year-old daughter is at that phase in which she wants to do everything that daddy does. Apparently photography is not immune to this phase and seeing this as a potentially huge win (it's not easy to coax her into driving 6 hours to go shoot some waterfall) I dug out my old Canon 40D DSLR and a 50mm prime lens that I had lying around and let the experiment begin!
Photographers now have a number of options for full-frame camera bodies that can be had for less than $2,000, but how do they stack up? This video from The Slanted Lens compares three of them: the Sony a7 II, the Canon 6D Mark II, and a used Canon 5D Mark III. They’re all brilliant cameras, but which comes out on top in terms of quality?
Florida's Orange County Animal Services (OCAS) just broke a 48-year-old adoption record last month, and it says photography played a huge role in that. The organization has released a series of before-and-after photos showing what a difference good photos can make.
I recently dipped my toe for the first time in the world of alpinism, also known as mountaineering. I took part in a course teaching basic alpinism skills, and at the same time shot photos of the course for Mountain Network, the agency that organized it. I’d prepared for this assignment by reading up on how to shoot photos in this unique environment. Some of the tips I’d found on the Internet came in handy, but I also learned some things I hadn’t read about before, which I thought I’d …
An Ohio newspaper photojournalist was shot by a police officer last night after the cop mistook the camera and tripod the photographer was holding for a rifle.
We’ve seen how the upcoming Nikon D850 handles low light, but how does the new sensor perform in a studio shoot? This 4-minute AdoramaTV video with photographer Seth Miranda puts it to the test, shooting a model with special effects makeup.
Photographer video maker Lok Cheung made this humorous 5-minute video featuring different things people do and say that get on photographers' nerves.
