experimental

My Journey to Cubist Photography

Nude Descending a Staircase, N0 2. The 1912 painting by Marcel Duchamp is what started me on my exploratory journey into cubist photography. I thought to recreate it with a long exposure and multiple bursts of flash. But I don’t know anyone with a long open staircase nor anyone willing to model naked on a public staircase.

These Daguerreotypes Were Made by Painting Light Onto Body Parts

Chimacabres come out at night. They are around during the day too of course, but the night is when they really thrive. In the dark, it’s harder to tell if you’re face to face with a fellow person or if it’s a chimacabre in front of you, and they don’t even have faces.

A Multi-Plate, Multi-Lens Daguerreotype Panorama

I’ve been experimenting non-stop with a few new daguerreotype techniques lately, and however promising the results are looking so far, those experiments are slow going. But here’s something I thought up and was able to execute in a relatively speedy manner -- something I believe warrants a look. I don’t believe this method of making a panoramic image has ever been utilized before, so I’m dubbing it the "Antorama."

My First Shoot with a Fine Art Photography Collective

I’m always looking to find new ways to incorporate larger goals into my photography. I find it focuses my approach to the way I treat it as a career and a hobby. By dedicating myself to projects outside of things relevant to my life, I am able to explore potential new ways of seeing and interacting the world through my camera. Something I’ve always been interested in is the idea of photography collectives; a group of visual artists with shared philosophies, spaces, and resources.

Film Photos Captured with 5 Seconds of Sound Before and After

Photographer Mario Cipriano has started a new project titled "Light Sounds Light" using a technique he calls audiophotography. Cipriano is using a digital audio recorder to capture the sound context behind each of his film photos, resulting in a fascinating way of experiencing the photographer's work.

This Underwater Short Film Was Shot on a Bare iPhone

London-based filmmaker Frederic van Strydonck made this creative short film titled Spltch, which teleports the viewer to different locations through taking dips below the water's surface. Everything was shot with an unprotected iPhone X.

This Short Film Was Lit Entirely with Drone Lights

Using drones to illuminate scenes and subjects using flashes and powerful LED lights is a new trend made possible by the emergence of affordable and intelligent consumer drones. If you'd like to see what the latest experimentation is producing, check out the 2.5-minute short film above, titled "mémoires". It was lit entirely with drone lights.

Opinion: Lomography, an Alternative Perspective on Traditional Photo Standards

Lomography began as an art movement in the early 1990s after a group of Viennese students discovered the LC-A, a camera manufactured by Russian imaging company LOMO. The fixed lens 32mm f/2.8 compact camera produced unique images that were off-color, vibrant, and soft. On a mission to advocate the use of these creative cameras and experimental film, photographers quickly formed the Lomographic Society International in 1992.

Despite the movement producing wonderfully interesting images that have been exhibited in both Moscow and New York City, it has received substantial criticism from self-dubbed “real photographers.” This opinion piece aims at breaking down the wall of prejudice, and opening minds to the possibility of creative photography outside of normal standards.

A Time-Lapse from a Telescope’s Point of View

Since 2012, photographer Kenneth Brandon has regularly ventured into the great outdoors at night to shoot time-lapse photos of the dark sky. He recently began to wonder what a time-lapse would look like from a point-of-view on his telescope rather than through it, so he attached a DSLR to the outside on a recent shoot in Panamint Valley, California. The video above is what resulted.

This Experimental Time-Lapse Imagines Life Without Light Pollution

What kind of nighttime time-lapses could you shoot in cities like Los Angeles if light pollution weren't a problem? A couple of time-lapse photographers want to show you. They've created an experimental time-lapse that shows a sky full of stars and star trails over the light-polluted city of Los Angeles.

Hundreds of Photos of New York City Turned Into a Flowing Visual Experience

When Israeli freelance artist Ynon Lan visited New York City earlier this year, he wanted to capture the things he saw in a way that conveyed the constant energy he felt as he walked around. He then came up with the idea of taking thousands of still photographs of particular themes and combine them afterward into a video as a flowing visual experience.

Iconic Che Guevara Photograph Brought to Life in an Experimental Short Film

The short film above, titled "Che - A Moment in Time," was created entirely out of still photographs. Animator Bennie Melwin created the experimental short film by taking historical photographs -- including the iconic "Guerrillero Heroico" photo of Che Guevara -- and bringing the scenes to life through clever digital trickery.

Experimental Underwater Scanner Makes for Beautiful Happy Accidents

If you enjoy strange and experimental photography, Nathaniel Stern's work should delight you.

For the past ten years, Stern has been creating experimental image-capturing devices using a conglomeration of hacked-together desktop scanners, battery packs and other various computer components. Once created, he straps these machines to his body and takes them from location to location capturing images unlike any other camera out there.

Experimental Light Painting Self-Portraits

Self-portraits aren't exactly ground-breaking -- in fact, the word "selfie" was recently added to the dictionary -- but Alex DeForest's self-portraits are anything but ordinary. His interesting creations mix light painting techniques with self-portrait photography to create some pretty cool results.

Toy Camera Photographs Developed with Everything From Juice to Medicine

Ever wonder what resulting photos would look like if you developed film with various liquids found around the house? Photographer Matthew Cetta does too, and he's actually spent quite some time finding out. Cetta has been doing experiments through a project called "Photogenic Alchemy," creating toy camera photos with wild aesthetics by developing the films with all kinds of random things -- everything from lemon juice to Pepto Bismol.

Mind-Bending Recursive Illusion Created Using Printed Photographs

Whoa. If you enjoy watching mind-bending concepts that confuse you and make your brain hurt, check out this experimental short by Willie Witte, titled "Screengrab."

Nothing in the video is computer generated trickery: it simply uses clever camera tricks and a whole lotta printed photographs to create the seamless transitions. "All the trickery took place literally in front of the camera," Witte says. See if you can understand what's going on through the entire 1 minute and 30 seconds.

An Introduction to Playing with Ultraviolet Fluorescence in Photographs

Ultraviolet fluorescence is a mechanism in which UV radiation excites chemicals in an object and causes them to release visible light. There are many household objects which fluoresce, such as some washing detergents (anything that ‘makes your whites whiter), soda water (it contains a chemical called quinine which makes it taste bitter, and also causes the fluorescence), the dyes found in highlighters, the bacteria found on the face (which cause spots and acne), bodily fluids (including urine) and much more.