What Your Camera Flash Has to Do With an Atomic Bomb
On July 16th, 1945, 35 miles southeast of Socorro, New Mexico, the White Sands Proving Ground was rocked by a massive explosion.
A Look Back at RawShooter, the Predecessor of Adobe Lightroom
Digital photo editing has come a long way in the past two decades, and two software programs that have impacted the field are RawShooter and Lightroom.
Victorian-Era Photos Prove Electric Cars Were Popular Way Before Tesla
Electric vehicles seem like a new invention, but these fascinating photos from over 100 years ago show that EVs existed long before Elon Musk and Tesla.
Museum Releases Early Color Photos of a Vanished World a Century Ago
Stunning color images recently made available in high resolution by a French museum capture much of the world as it was transformed by technology and geopolitics 100 years ago.
The Story Behind the 1990 ‘Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles’ Movie Poster
1990 marked the release of one of my all-time favorite movies: Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles. I was nine years old and that warm fuzzy feeling of nostalgia is burned deep within me whenever I re-watch it.
Lost Film Rolls of the Fall of the Soviet Union Developed 26 Years Later
Australian photographer Dean Sewell spent 15 months in Russia after the breakup of the former USSR. When Russia invaded Ukraine, he was suddenly reminded that he still had more than two dozen undeveloped B&W film rolls from 1996 to 1997.
Colorized Footage Reveals What Downtown L.A. Looked Like in the 1930s
Video restoration expert NASS colorized and enhanced footage from nearly a century ago to create this 7-minute video that reveals what downtown Los Angeles looked like in the 1930s.
Photographer Finds Abandoned Cold War Nuclear Fallout Shelter
The Cold War is the conventional name for the period of political and military competition between two blocs led by the US and the USSR. This rivalry was mainly ideological and economic, intensified by the conventional and nuclear arms race.
This Was ‘Instagram vs Reality’ in 1909
If you're tired of the unrealistic beauty standards set by all the edited pictures on Instagram and long for a return to "the good old days," here is some bad news: people have been "Photoshopping" portraits for just about as long as photography has been around.
The 10 Hottest 35mm Cameras You Could Buy in 1991
1991. What a great time to be alive. Seeing movies like Robin Hood and Hook in the theatres, and hearing hits like "Joyride" by Roxette or "Losing My Religion" by REM are some of my favorite pop culture memories of that time. Not to mention watching TV shows like Home Improvement, America’s Funniest Home Videos, and The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air.
My First Digital Camera: A Review of the Sony S70 21 Years Later
For me, the year 2000 was when digital cameras really started to become useful. A wealth of cameras arrived sporting Sony’s latest 3 megapixel CCD sensor at a sub-$1,000 price, with enough resolution to make 7x5-inch prints and more than enough for online use.
10 of the Hottest 35mm Cameras You Could Buy in 1982
1982. Michael Jackson releases Thriller, E.T. hits the movie theatres and Cats opens on Broadway. It was a great time to be a fan of movies, music, and theater. But it was also an amazing time to be a photographer -- there were innovations with every release and more around every corner.
A Look Back at the Olympus IS-1, an Early Bridge Camera
Do you know what ZLR stands for? How about ED, or ESP? And what in the world is Fuzzy Logic? In this article, we'll learn all about the Olympus IS-1, a pivotal model in a whole new category of camera released in the 1990s, and all the strange acronyms that come with it.
This Photo Shows the First 3 Licensed Women Doctors of Their Countries
This historical 1885 photograph depicts three women doctors who all graduated and each became the first woman from their respective countries (India, Japan, and Syria) to obtain a degree in Western medicine.
The Crazy Inventions of Two Wildlife Photography Pioneers
Throughout photography history, determined, creative, and brave photographers have gone to extreme lengths to capture the perfect shot. Here's a curious photo from the 1890s that shows a crazy tripod setup used by wildlife photography pioneers in the 1890s.
Kodak Ektar 25, Frozen for Over 30 Years
Can you preserve a 30-year-old roll of color film and shoot it like the day it was purchased? Today I’m going to answer that question as well as give an in-depth history of one of Kodak’s most pivotal films, Ektar 25. I think that some of its history as well the results may surprise you.
Polaroid Founder Edwin Land Foresaw the Smartphone Camera in 1970
Polaroid founder Edwin Land was a visionary tech titan of his time, and as is common with pioneering entrepreneurs, Land had unusual foresight into where technology was headed. Here's a neat video from 1970 in which Land accurately predicts the coming age of smartphone cameras in everyone's pocket.
From Bombs to Bubbles: Repurposing a 610mm Spy Plane Lens for Macro Photos
You didn’t ask to learn about bellows extension factors, but we're going to cover it with the most absurd camera that you may ever see!
This Camera Was Used for Aerial Photos During WWII
Check out this absolute unit of a camera that was used to do aerial photography during World War II. Mounted on the front of the camera is a massive 2-foot long 610mm f/6 lens.
Calypso, The Original Underwater Camera That Became the Nikonos
Camera West recently received an unusual camera through a customer trade-in. In this 3-minute video, the camera shop takes a hands-on look at the Calypso, the first 35mm underwater film camera that didn't require a bulky housing.
90s Throwback: My Street Photos of New York City
The streets of New York City as a photo studio. That is the idea. Nearly 9 million people live in New York and another nearly 2 million travel to New York every day, so the streets are bursting with people.
This Interactive Map is a Street View of 1940s New York City
1940s NYC is a new online interactive map created by NYC-based software engineer Julian Boilen. It's like Google Street View, except every photo taken shows New York City between 1939 and 1941.
Colorized 1902 Footage of a ‘Flying Train’ Ride Through a German Town
Here's a fascinating 4-minute video that offers a tiny window into what life in one German town was like back in 1902.
A Rare Photo of Someone Smiling in the 19th Century
Portrait photos from over a century ago rarely show subjects smiling, but this 19th century photo is an exception, and it's been going viral online for that reason.
How Wicker Chairs Became a Portrait Photography Staple for Decades
If you look at album covers from the 1970s, one of the things you'll repeatedly see is a particular type of wicker chair commonly referred to as a peacock chair. Here's an interesting 7.5-minute video by Vox that looks into the history of this photography trope, which was 100 years in the making.
Blast from the Past: Using the Polaroid Palette to Make 35mm Negatives from iPhone Photos
The hybrid processes from the transition to digital photography generated lots of garbage, cheap stuff to experiment with. This story is about one of these discoveries.
Russians in Boats: The Strange Photo Fad of the Tsarist Era
Back in the Tsarist era, a fad for posing in fake boats, planes, and automobiles resulted in some of Russia’s quaintest portraits.
Watch a Compilation of Classic Kodak Commercials from the 1950s and 60s
The folks over at The Phoblographer have uncovered a great "blast from the past" on YouTube: a compilation of old Kodak camera commercials from the 1950s and 60s that'll have you yearning for simpler times ... when it was much more complicated to take an actual photograph.
This Classic Polaroid SX 70 Ad is a Blast from Photography’s Past
If you're a fan of instant photography, Polaroid, or you just like the history of photography, you'll love this Polaroid SX-70 Land Camera ad that resurfaced online over the weekend. The 11-minute ad gives an in-depth look at every aspect of this iconic, folding instant film camera that is still beloved today.
A Look Back at the First Aerial Photo Shot in the United States
To mark the 159th anniversary of the first aerial photo in the United States, CBS Sunday Morning aired this 2-minute Almanac segment about the landmark photo by photographer James Wallace Black and how aerial photography has developed since then.