Reviews Archives - Page 4 of 23

Upleap Review – Instagram Tool Promises to Grow Organic Followers and Engagement

May 19, 2018 by JP Danko 4 Comments

Instagram is becoming more and more relevant to photography and video clients, to the point where a respectable Instagram following is part of how clients choose potential creators for paid jobs.

Brand sponsorship, affiliate marketing, complimentary products for review and influencer access are also a few of the side benefits to growing a large Instagram following with high engagement.

As a visual medium, Instagram is uniquely tailored to the advantage of photographers and videographers who produce visual content for a living…so how do you grow organic followers and engagement on Instagram?

I have tried many Instagram growth strategies over the years: from like and follow schemes to bots to outright purchasing followers and likes – but in this Upleap review, we are going to look at a new Instagram tool that promises to grow organic followers and engagement.

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Will the Tamron 28-75mm F2.8 FE do well in face and eye-detection autofocus test?

May 16, 2018 by Chad Verzosa Leave a Comment

A lot of photographers felt excited when the Tamron 28-75mm F2.8 FE was first announced in February. And although Tamron recently said that they might not be able to deliver on time, early reviews of the lens still appear to be positive. The latest is of David Oastler who wanted to see if Sony’s face and eye-detection would work well with the new lens. So, is it any good?

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ThinkTank Photo Airport Roller Derby review, after 4 years of use

May 12, 2018 by Lee Herbet 1 Comment

First, full disclosure: I know a few of the team at ThinkTankPhoto and I really like them, they’re a really nice group of people. So you may think it’s because I really like the people that I like their bags so much. Except I really like my dentist but I don’t like what he does to me every six months for my check up. I suppose this is my way of saying that I can be objective even though I am reviewing something that is made by people that I like.

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Hands-on review of Fujifilm X-H1 for photography and video

May 7, 2018 by Dunja Djudjic Leave a Comment

Fujifilm X-H1 was announced in February, and we had the first look at this camera at The Photography Show in March. And now, Chris and Jordan of DPReview (formerly known from The Camera Store TV) bring you a more detailed hands-on review of Fujifilm’s X-H1. As usual, they test it both for photography and videography, and they’ll show you some upsides and downsides of Fujifilm’s latest camera.

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Is Flickr Still A Relevant Social Media Outlet? Yes – and You Should Use It!

April 22, 2018 by JP Danko 3 Comments

Years ago I had a Flickr account – I didn’t use it much and it languished in oblivion until at some point Flickr deleted it.

I didn’t really give it a second though – I kind of thought of Flickr as a place newbies post snapshots of flowers and sunsets. All the cool photographers used 500px. Flickr is a dead social media platform anyway right?

However, I recently needed a platform where I could keep track of all my published photography, so I opened a new Flickr account – and hello, I discovered that Flickr is actually an amazing tool for your photography business (if you treat it like a tool, not a social media platform).

Here is why I think you should still post your photos to Flickr…

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Signili Review – Invisible Digital Watermark to Protect Your Photos from Copyright Infringement

April 15, 2018 by JP Danko Leave a Comment

If you share your photography online, you know that your images will be re-distributed and re-published without your permission.

If you are a professional photographer, or a photo enthusiast, you probably also realize that rampant online copyright infringement costs creative professionals a significant amount of lost revenue – every image that is published without a valid license is a lost sale for someone.

If you have always wanted to fight back against copyright infringement, or if you just want to see exactly who is using your photography where, one solution is to apply an invisible digital watermark to your photography.

In this article, we will review Signili, a new service that can add invisible watermarks (as hidden copyright information) to your photos, and then help track exactly where those photos are used online…

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First impressions of the Tamron 70-210mm f/4 Di VC USD Lens

April 14, 2018 by Tim Neumann 1 Comment

Working on hitting the trifecta, Tamron has released a new lens which includes a very respectable 70-210mm focal range, a quality packaged compact footprint, and a price targeted at starting shooters. The folks at Midwest Photo and Tamron were kind enough to provide me with a pre-release copy, so I happily took it for a spin.

Before we get too deep into my first impressions, let me tell you that I wouldn’t normally consider a lens in this focal range, with anything less than a f/2.8 aperture available to me. I decided it would be worth considering what this lens had to offer, so here we are. I won’t jump to the conclusion just yet, but let me quickly summarize here and let you know that I enjoyed shooting with this lens and it has some surprising features in store for its price point.

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Laowa 15mm f/2 Sony FE Review

April 4, 2018 by Albert Dros 2 Comments

Most of you have probably heard of the name Laowa by now. They were a rather unknown brand up until recently when they made name for themselves in the landscape photography world with the Laowa 12mm f/2.8 wide angle lens that was well received. Laowa (Venus Optics) is a Chinese brand known for their innovative lenses. Laowa is showing support to the Sony E-mount with releasing their 15mm f/2 that was specifically designed for the E-mount making it possible to make it smaller and lighter than the lenses they make for DSLR mounts. 2 years ago I met the Laowa guys at Photokina and I already briefly tested the prototype of the 15mm there. I was impressed with the sharpness across the frame and was eager to try out the final version. Now that I have this lens for a while I feel confident to write a decent review about it. I used this lens in my own country the Netherlands and took it to Dubai, Norway and Iceland. I have seen a bunch of reviews online but they were mainly technical without a lot of real world examples. In this review I’ll discuss how this lens performs in ‘real world usage’. Most people who are reading my articles know that I am a landscape photographer so you can expect a lot of landscape photography use with this lens.

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Action light Death Match: Lume Cube vs. Litra Torch

April 4, 2018 by Udi Tirosh 10 Comments

Face it, if you want an action-light (those small on-your-motorcycle cube lights), there are two options in the market: the Lume Cube (Amazon, B&H) and the Litra Torch (Amazon, B&H). They are both great lights if you are doing any sorts of action sports photography, they are compact, light, have some resistance to the elements and hold a few hours if you avoid max power. But which is the better light? Which of those light will give you the most bang for your buck? we set out to find out and ran the two lights through a battery of (sometimes ridiculous) tests.

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Rockin’ out with Kodak TMAX P3200

April 2, 2018 by Johnny Martyr 2 Comments

Lead by spunky frontgirl Ashley Miles, Vinyl Rhino is my favorite cover band in Frederick, Maryland. For years, they’ve rocked our bars with high energy hits from the 80’s to what’s current. Saturday night they stopped by Champions and blew the roof off the place. I was there to capture it on the newly re-released Kodak TMAX P3200.

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