It’s November, but let’s face it, Christmas is gonna be here in no time. So, a Shelbyville, Indiana-based photographer Amy Haehl recently posted a baby photo inspired by the iconic movie A Christmas Story. But instead of evoking holiday spirit, the photo caused a flood of negative comments because of a wooden BB gun the baby boy is holding in his arms. Amy, who is the owner of Coffee Creek Studio, creates Christmas-themed photos for babies born around the holiday every year....

If you are currently knocking some doors, searching for opportunities and chasing your dreams as a photographer, you know that it can get tough. You may want to give it all up and just start doing something else. If this is the case, here is some inspiration to keep you going. In this video, Joel Grimes talks about how his first portfolio showing almost caused him to quit. But luckily, he managed to get through the tough times and rejections, and he ended up fulfilling his dream to be a professional photographer....

I’m going to start from the beginning. I didn’t have a bad upbringing. My parents worked hard for our family and always provided for me and my sister. They taught us right from wrong, how to be kind, loving and caring. We weren’t rich, but we never ever went without. You know the kind of people that never study for tests, always messing around but ace their exams? That was me… School was easy for me educationally, but difficult for me socially....

A Hong Kong company Pisofttech has announced an interesting piece of gear in the 360-degree camera market. Pilot Era is an “all-in-one” professional 360° VR camera. It shoots 8K video and allows in-camera stitching, which can save you plenty of time and effort in post. Additionally, it features a touchscreen and a smart OS. The Pilot Era is soon to be launched, and we bring you specs and more details about the camera....

Ok, so maybe you’re not planning to travel much for a little while just yet, but when the world eventually opens back up, people are going to. And some of you are going to want to take your shiny new drone with you to capture scenes of the places you visit from the air. But every country has its own unique and specific drone regulations that you may not be aware of....

I focus my lens not on the forms but on the life that animates them. That’s what attracts me. If this triggers something in you, read on. On December 20, 2011, exactly five years ago, I shot the first picture of my lucky series “Portraits In Silence”. At the time, I wasn’t completely aware of being at a big turning point in my way of shooting pictures. I just followed my gut....

Adobe Premiere Pro is one of the most widespread video editing applications out there. It’s always been a hugely popular application since its initial release. But editing can be a tedious process, especially if you edit for multiple platforms. You need a 16:9 for YouTube and Facebook, a square video for your regular Instagram feed, and a vertical video for Stories and IGTV. Well, Adobe has been paying attention to the needs of social media video creators and is introducing a new AI-powered Auto Reframe feature to Premiere Pro to help speed up that workflow....

Although V90 cards are the pinnacle of speed when it comes to UHS-II SD cards, V60 cards are still fast enough to cover the needs of most users – even shooting high bitrate 4K video. The one thing that those video shooters do need, though, are high-capacity cards. Well, ProGrade Digital has today announced its new high-capacity 512GB UHS-II V60 SD cards. The new card expands ProGrade’s Gold series of cards, adding to the existing 128GB and 256GB cards, and offers write speeds of up to 130MB/sec with sustained write speeds guaranteed to be a minimum of 60MB/sec....

If you haven’t used color gels so far, in this video you’ll see some quick tips how to introduce color gels into your portrait work. Photographer Manny Ortiz gives you a suggestion of the setting, and also a quick tip how to make the best out of color gels. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cbUU-g6AJQA Manny uses two speedlights, one on each side of the model, a strip box with a grid and a 22inch beauty dish....

This quick tip comes courtesy of Ireland-based photographer Maciej Pietuszyński. It’s a simple and easy way to get a film light leak style effect in-camera with digital. All you need is your camera, a lens and a few sticky page markers. Maciej uses this technique to good effect, as can be seen above, and he always keeps a few of the page markers in his bag for when the mood strikes....

After the rare Zeiss Planar 50mm f/0.7, another interesting lens is soon to be up for an auction: Canon 1200mm f/5.6. Other than being rare, this telephoto monster is also the world’s longest SLR autofocus lens, and it’s an iconic one. According to B&H, it’s “one of the most legendary telephoto lenses ever made.” The Canon EF 1200mm f/5.6 L USM lens reportedly first appeared in 1984 at the Summer Olympics in LA....

Seven years ago I decided to buy a camera to capture my climbing adventures. Little did I know how it would change my life. Not only did it make the climbing even more enjoyable, it also taught me all the important aspects of photography. A short while ago, that camera, my trusty Canon Powershot G12, officially died. So, as an homage to this little beast, I’d like to present twelve of my favourite photo’s taken with my G12....

If you shoot film and want to try something new, there’s an interesting new camera coming up. RETO3D is an affordable 3D camera aimed at film photographers of the modern day. It relies on the already familiar concept of 3D film cameras, but it sells at a way more affordable price. The RETO3D is currently being funded through a Kickstarter campaign, and at the time of writing this, it’s about $7,000 USD away from its $25,500 USD goal....

Although many lens filters were pretty much eradicated by the advent of digital photography, there are two which still hold a lot of value that can’t really be accurately replicated in Photoshop. Those are polarizers and neutral density filters. You can try, but you’ll never get it looking exactly like the real thing. Recently, I’ve been trying out Haida’s M10 filter system, along with their circular polarizer, 6-stop M10 drop-in ND filter and the 100x100mm square 10-stop Red Diamond ND filter....

Rode has announced their new Rode Lavalier II microphone. It’s the latest iteration of Rode’s premium lavalier microphone first introduced around 2010. It comes with a new low-profile design that not only differentiates it from its predecessor but pretty much every other lav on the market. The new design should make it much more discreet and easier to conceal underneath clothing or other items. The new microphone boasts “broadcast-grade sound quality” with a flat frequency response and omnidirectional polar pattern....

Earlier this month, Russia decided to ban Facebook citing “discrimination against Russian media.” But as of today, Instagram is banned in this country, too. One of the reasons behind this decision is the fact that Meta has allowed posts that call for violence against Russian soldiers and politicians. But both moves have inevitably caused some censorship concerns, too. Federal Service for Supervision of Communications, Information Technology, and Mass Communications (Roskomnadzor) issued a statement on 4 March to inform the public of the Facebook ban....

It looks like smartphone makers are competing who will launch a phone with more cameras. And according to the latest reports, we’ve reached the number of six. Some sources claim that Samsung is working on Galaxy S10 which will be a six-camera phone, with two cameras in the front and four in the back. Some previous reports claimed that the Samsung Galaxy S10 will feature five cameras (two on the front and three in the back)....

Announced in mid-January, Samsung’s ISOCELL HM3 108-megapixel sensor was both a “wow!” and a “wtf?” moment for smartphone cameras. It’s an insane resolution for a smartphone, based on the raw pixel count alone, but it offers a lot of potential advantages for computational photography. It’s only been released in the Samsung Galaxy S21 ultra so far, and it’s not yet made it into any other brand’s smartphones (but there are likely a few on the way)....

If you’ve ever helplessly looked at a pile of random Lego bricks and thought “what on Earth do I make from this,” your problem has been solved. Brickit has made a really cool AI-powered app that helps you make something out of that messy pile of Legos. All you need to do is point the camera at the bricks. The app will scan them and give you suggestions of what you can make....

Advertisements To begin with, we store all of our images and videos on hard drives and so the speed of those drives will dictate how fast we can work. It will also affect our creativity. If I am editing an image or video and have to wait while my machine is rendering or whatever other technical things can slow me down, it can disrupt the creative flow. Backup is also really important....