This entry to the How I Took It contest by Cheyne from Firebird Photography a studio specializing in retro portraits completely took me by surprise. I loved the final image and was very impressed with the atmosphere. Little did I know, it was taken on a coffee table.
The first month of the contest is just about over, if you want in on our fabuouls set of prizes, this is how you enter. Click to continue ›
Photographers are creative people. This usually reflects in submitted work, portfolios, and vision. Does it also reflect in what you leave with your client when you first meet?
Here are five ideas to inspire your business card. (Click the titles for additional info). Click to continue ›
The Brenizer method is a way to take huge shallow depth photographs by stitching together many smaller photographs taken with a medium focal length lens. So you would get the equivalent coverage of a wide angle lens, but the shallow depth of field of the actual lens you are using. Here is a guide if you wanna know how it works and try it out.
While usually you would use an 85mm or a 50mm wide aperture lenses to achieve that, Photographer Benjamin Wong pulled an $9,000 400mm lens out of his hat to get some awesome results. Click to continue ›
Our How I Took I contest is quickly gaining critical mass with all the great tutorials being submitted by you guys. Got some great news on that, the folks at Rosco just chipped in with a LitePad Loop kit.
Raj Khepar submitted a cool tutorial about how he built a rain machine for one of his shoots.
While we have had a rain machine before, this one is quite different in the way it was built and in the final effect it creates.
A while back I shared that fact that I was enjoying SLR Lounge's A-Z Lightroom video tutorials. One of the chapters I liked most is dealt with tweaking and adjusting an image which was hard to expose, turning it into a great landscape image. I asked Post Production Pye and the team over at SLRL for a tutorial on that technique which they gladly shared.
In this tutorial, I want to take an image that was shot several years ago on a Canon 40D in RAW, and show you just what we can do to artistically edit this very plain "walk-up" shot. Click to continue ›
When you are starting out as a photographer it is sometime hard to start your portfolio going. There are many posts out there on how to collaborate with models for starting up check this one from DPS), or you can ask your friends, close by acting schools or dance schools and model mayhem.
Here is a fresh thought, why not going to a place where interesting people are meeting and there is a good chance of them wanting to be photographed?
Benjamin Von Wong shares an interesting idea, going to conventions that have a custom party built in. That can take care of wardrobe, props and sometimes a set. Which as a starting photographer you can't always afford. (Of course, if you have the Von Wong mindset, you can pretty much get a custom party with dozens of orcs, death riders and medieval knights any time you like).
Here is something fun to try if you are looking for some room decoration. Stapes offers large huge black and white engineering prints that you can frame (or not) into cool art.
While traditionally engineering prints are used for.. em... well... engineering plans, a strong contrasty B&W image will print pretty well and if framed right (or not) can make for a cool wall poster. And starting at $1.79 for a 18"x24 print over at Staples it is a sweet deal. (and a gigantic 36"x48" will set you back a full $7.29) Click to continue ›
One of the nice things about how the online photography community is the frictionless flow of information and knowledge. Where talented photographers share not only their pictures, but also their motivation, setups and considerations for making a shoot.
Take this blog post and video by Benjamin Von Wong (who's been featured quite a bit on the blog) describing a shoot of a charcoal covered stripper.
Rolling Shutter is the way that most DSLR are shooting video. (and point and shoots and iPhones too). For 95% of the time it does not really matter what type of shutter is used for capturing video, in the other 5% it matters a lot. Following is a break down and explanation of what is Rolling Shutter why it is being used and what are its quarks. Click to continue ›
Photographer Tom Eshchar was bored with nude photography and took a different angle on it.
In NoFace Tom uses a home movie projector to blast images of his subject's inner worlds on their (mostly) naked bodies. In some photographs you can clearly see the bodies, but in some the bodies dissolve into the projection.
Here is an interesting observation Tom made on the project
The person sitting in front of the camera, looking at the projector feel completely exposed. They don't see the picture and cannot know that from the camera side it is not as exposed as they think."
