News

Moore, OK Tornado via NASA

Satellite Photos Show What the Oklahoma Tornado Looked Like From Space

NASA has today released a series of images along with a video following Monday's devastating thunderstorms that produced an F-4 tornado (winds between 166 and 200 miles per hour) that touched down in Moore, Oklahoma. Several satellites were used to provide forecasters with the latest imagery.

NASA's Aqua satellite was responsible for a visible-light image which provided a high-resolution look at the storm. The NOAA GOES-13 satellite provided images of the storm every 15 minutes, and the NASA/NOAA Suomi National Polar-orbiting Partnership satellite observed lightning from the system.

PhotoPills iOS

PhotoPills: Plan Photo Shoots With the Sun and Moon Using Your iPhone

Planning lighting is a critical step in the planning of a photo shoot. But what happens if you don't exactly have control of your lighting. What if your planned source of light is the sun or the moon?

Rafael Pons believes he has the solution to planning photo shoots that involve the sun and the move with a new application for iOS called PhotoPills. "You just have to decide where you want the sun or moon to be and tap the search button to get all possible dates it happens," he says.

Google Plus Android Update

Google+ Android App Updated: Improved Photo Experience, Snapseed Integration

Following the Google+ updates last week at Google I/O that overall improved the photo experience for its users, Mountain View-based Google is now making that very updated experience for users of its Google+ Android application.

The update, which boasts 41 new features total, includes Auto Backup (stores photos as you take them), Auto Highlight (allows for the ability to browse top shots from added sets), Auto Enhance (automatically enhances images), and even something called Auto Awesome (which creates fun new versions of pictures, such as panoramas and animations, based on images already in your library).

Swiss Research Group Creates Their Own Insect-Inspired Compound Eye Cam

A few weeks ago, a team of researchers from all over the world boasted that they had created the world's first working compound eye cam at the University of Illinois. Sort of like a balloon with 180 node-like "ommatidia" on it, the camera was quite an achievement.

It didn't take long, however, for another team of researchers to break into the same market and offer the Illinois camera some bug-eyed competition. The Swiss research group Curvace has created a 180-degree field of view camera that looks a little like something Star Trek's Geordi La Forge would wear.

A Time-Lapse and Footage of the Tornado That Struck Oklahoma

Update on 12/16/21: This video has been removed by its creator.

A devastating tornado struck Moore, Oklahoma on Monday, May 20, 2013. It was reportedly over 2 miles wide at one point, and covered 20 miles during the 40 minutes it was on the ground. The National Weather Service has classified it as at least an EF-4 tornado with winds of at least 166 miles per hour.

NBC affiliate station WMC-TV had a helicopter camera in the sky capturing the whole thing, and released the time-lapse video above showing the storm traveling across the land before finally disappearing back into the clouds.

Wacom Announces ‘Bamboo Loop,’ a Fun Photo Messaging App

Wacom -- the same company that brings Photoshop artists and big spenders products like the 24HD Touch -- announced today that it is making an addition to its more whimsical line of Bamboo products. Dubbed Bamboo Loop, the new iOS (and soon Android) app puts photo sharing and SMS together to create a more fun and engaging messaging experience.

Video: Mall Cop and Woman Fight Over Picture-Taking on Mall Property

This video recently uploaded to the web is making its rounds showing a mall security officer fiercely shouting at a group of curious citizens for taking pictures and videos. (Warning: It contains some violence and strong language)

The fiasco erupted after a semi truck plummeted into a ravine nearby the Ohio Valley Mall when a mall cop identifying herself as "Officer Adams" began demanding the onlookers discontinue taking pictures and erase the images.

Clipping Magic Dog

Clipping Magic Helps You Easily Remove Picture Backgrounds

Here's a tool you may not have heard about but may useful at some time in the future. It's called Clipping Magic, and it's designed to remove backgrounds from user-uploaded pictures.

The concept is rather simple, you upload an image, mark the areas in the background you don't want in red, and mark the areas in the foreground you do want in green. The website's algorithm takes over and (hopefully) produces a background-free picture. Sounds simple, doesn't it? But how does it fare when used for an image with a background you actually want to remove?

Camera Captures What It’s Like to Get Eaten by a Grizzly Bear

When Brad Josephs took his GoPro camera out in beautiful Alaska, he was probably trying to get majestic footage of Grizzly bears for the BBC's Great Bear Stakeout. Instead, what he got was a hungry mother Grizzly and her cub trying to eat his camera. We get some, shall we say, interesting views of what a Grizzly bear's mouth looks like (not that that's something we're all interested in seeing, is it?).

Canadian Anti-Piracy Site Caught Using Photos Without Permission

Canipre -- short for Canadian Intellectual Property Rights Enforcement -- is a Canadian anti-piracy company that has joined hand-in-hand with film studios and record companies to track down those who steal and share stolen content over the internet. On the surface there's nothing wrong with this, what is wrong is when an intellectual property advocate is found using photos without permission, which is exactly what happened to Canipre a couple of days ago.

Olympus Shifting Focus Away From P&S Cameras, Kills Off Budget Lineup

Shoppers will soon have a tough time trying to pick up a cheap Olympus point-and-shoot compact camera. The company has said it is planning to do away with its V lineup of low-cost compact cameras, priced just under $200 at various retailers.

The move comes as the company anticipates a steep decline in its camera business, with forecasted digital camera sales this fiscal year expected to be about 2.7 million units, down from 5.1 million units last year. Olympus president Hiroyuki Sasa has put the financial loss from its camera business at about $225 million.

Metabones Speed Booster for Micro Four Thirds Starting to Make Appearances

Back in January 2013, lens adapter company Metabones rocked the camera world by announcing the Speed Booster, an SLR-to-mirrorless lens adapter that can magically increase your maximum aperture, sharpness, and angle of view.

So far the adapter has been released for Sony NEX and Fuji X cameras, but greater things are on the horizon: Metabones will be releasing the Speed Booster for Micro Four Thirds cameras as well.

Embryo at 6 weeks

Time-Lapse Photos of Embryos May Lead to Heathier In-Vitro Babies

An interesting new imaging technique in use by fertility experts at the CARE fertility clinic in the United Kingdom may be the key to increasing the likelihood of a successful a IVF therapy. The process involves snapping thousands of images of embryos in development in order to help doctors better select which embryos to implant successfully.

Photographer Offers Video Proof that You Can Dig Up and Save Expired Snapchats

After reading our previous article on how Decipher Forensics had managed to find and restore expired Snapchats on Android devices, a photographer named Nick got to thinking that he might be able to do the same thing on his jailbroken iPhone.

The idea was that, since these snaps were simply saved in a folder in the file system, he should be able to use an app such as iFile to browse to that folder and see, save or even e-mail them to himself. It turns out he can, and it only took Nick 10 minutes to figure out where "deleted" Snapchat videos were stored.

ONDU: A New Line of Beautiful Wooden Pinhole Cameras

Slovenian industrial designer Elvis Halilović, who dubs himself "a passionate lensless photographer" is aiming to bring several sleek-looking wooden pinhole cameras to the  masses through a Kickstarter project that has already exceeded its financial goal by over $20,000.

Some Airlines Saying ‘No’ to Onboard Photography

Most people in today's society have a mobile phone. Most mobile phones have cameras. Anyone and everyone has become an on-the-scene photojournalist, reporting on everything from major news events to the odd and crazy.

Some of these picture-worthy events take place on everyday flights. Shutter-happy passengers, snapping or even video recording the woman on the next aisle over acting unusual or a fellow passenger being disruptive. It's undeniable that we are curious beings, and want to document and share events we witness. But not everyone is pleased citizen photojournalists.

New Yorkers Upset Over Photographer’s Secret Snaps Through Their Windows

Photographer Arne Svenson lives on the second floor of an apartment building in the Tribeca neighborhood of New York City. For his project "The Neighbors," he pointed his camera at a luxury apartment building across the street and secretly photographed its inhabitants through open windows.

Those photographs are now being sold for thousands of dollars at a gallery in NYC, but it turns out the subjects aren't very happy with having their images stealthily snapped and sold.

Redditors Pitch In to Help Restore an 87-Year-Old Grandfather’s WWII Photo

Redditor Steven Withey's grandfather Derek is an 87-year-old WWII veteran who served in the Royal Navy, and a little while back he showed his grandson a badly damaged Navy photo (of a photo) of himself as a 20-year-old.

He had showed him the photo in the hopes that his technologically savvy grandson could maybe touch it up a bit, but given the massive creases and tears he didn't have much hope. It turns out he needn't have worried, because in this particular case, Reddit came to the rescue.

Google+ Can Now Automatically Select Your Best Pics, Edit Them and More

"Your darkroom is now a datacenter." That's the thought and slogan behind a huge update that Google+ Photos is rolling out over the next week. Many people already considered Google+ the photographer's social network because of the many features Google has built into the system over the years -- this announcement is another giant leap in that direction.

Photo Contest: Giving Away 10 Portfolio Upgrades on 500px

500px is sponsoring us for the next week and a half to promote its new Portfolios, which we covered back in early April. As part of the partnership, we're running a photo contest for the next 10 days in which 10 people will have their accounts upgraded to the new portfolio system.

Photos and Video of ‘Ice Heaves’ Slowly Tearing Through Homes in Minnesota

Yesterday we shared some photos of the Sun Halo that kept New Yorkers pointing their cameras skyward most of the day. That phenomenon is both harmless and cool to look at. Unfortunately, the recent ice heaves -- glacier-like lake ice that is pushed inland by strong winds -- in Minnesota only fall into the second of those categories..