What can I say…I’m a sucker for a pretty girl. Not so much the super-airbrushed models who look inhuman as much as real women in everyday situations, just being themselves. This is why I’ve often photographed the girl I was dating. At first though, I remember being to shy to ask. Too worried about offending her, making her feeling like Continue Reading
The post 7 Tips for Shooting Alluring Photos of Your Girlfriend appeared first on Photodoto.
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Your morning yoga routine brings you energy to make it through the day.
The Solio Sun Powered Charger has its own yoga-like abilities, turning sun salutations into battery power to recharge your phone.
Position the Solio outside on a sunny day, or plug it directly into an outlet and it will gather power.
This li’l guy can soak up enough sun to give your phone an 80% boost. It’ll even hold on to that power for up to a year, so it’s there when you need it.
The Solio is compact and travel friendly. Tuck it along side your yoga mat for a boost anywhere and anytime you need photo taking power.
Find Power in the Sun, Namaste
$ 70 at the Photojojo Shop
© Britta for Photojojo, 2014. |
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[ By Steph in Culture & History & Travel. ]
If you think you can smuggle a sword cleverly concealed inside a cane, a lipstick that’s actually a taser, pigeons wrapped in newspaper or nylon bags full of snakes onto an airplane, think again. The Transportation Security Administration has truly seen and confiscated it all, as documented on both their blog and their Instagram. Here are 13 of the weirdest and most disturbing items that the TSA has discovered during the security screening process.
TSA screeners monitoring a body scanner at the Miami International Airport in 2011 were puzzled by what looked like bulbous growths attached to a man’s legs. Pulling him aside, they discovered that the man’s pants were full of snakes and tortoises wrapped in nylon bags. Had they not caught him, he would have walked onto the plane with seven snakes and three tortoises, likely bound for the illegal pet trade.
Says the TSA of this unusual discovery, “And while it isn’t prohibited, a passenger wearing a chastity belt alarmed the body scanner at one of our checkpoints. I’m sure you can imagine where an undergarment such as this might be a problem at a security checkpoint. Especially if there is no key.”
Do some quick internet browsing and you can find knives and other weapons disguised as all sorts of clever things. That doesn’t mean you should try to take them on a flight. Screeners don’t take it lightly when they find hairbrushes, combs and other everyday items concealing potentially deadly daggers.
Would it ever occur to you that a stuffed Mickey Mouse clutched in someone’s arms was filled with firearms? Maybe that depends on who’s holding it. Mickey is just one of many stuffed animals that have been used to smuggle guns and ammunition at the airport.
Referring to the incident as a “nomadic aquarium for people on the go,” the TSA pulled aside a passenger who was attempting to transport 163 tropical fish, 12 ‘red sliders,’ 22 invertebrates, 24 live coral species, 8 pieces of Scleactinina with mushroom polyps and 8 pieces of soft coral from Miami to Maracaibo. “We’re not in the business of looking for marine life, but you can probably imagine how odd this looked on our monitor.”
Here’s a look at some of the busiest airports in the world, at night, when not only is the airport sleeping, but so are the many weary passengers.
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Nothing lasts forever. Abandoned relics of air transport are proof of that. Unused hulking planes and enormous runways are sometimes just left and forgotten.
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Have you ever wanted to rule your very own country? Some people have actually managed to make it work, though their histories can be strange and amazing.
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[ By Steph in Culture & History & Travel. ]
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My last head shot had been getting a little long in the tooth. So on a whim the other day, I redid it.
Gotta keep things fresh, I always say. So I try to redo my head shot every seven years, whether it needs it or not.
As photographers, we only get to see one side of the equation—and that does not involve looking down the barrel of the gun, either. So being on the receiving end is always a learning experience. Even more so when you are on the shooting and receiving end.
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Strobist
There’s an expression in the photography world called ‘ESP’ which stands for ‘Expressions sell photographs’. It’s true, a lovely expression is the single most important thing in any portrait photo (unless it’s a silhouette).
However, portrait photography isn’t as simple as teasing out a beaming smile, or haughty laugh from your subject. If your captivating expression is complemented by delicious light and an intriguing environment then you have all the ingredients for a cracking image.
Whenever I photograph portraits these are some of the things I’m looking for when I scrutinize the location.
How to choose a great portrait location
The first thing to do is ask yourself if the location adds to the story you’re trying to tell. For example, when I’m hired to create family portraits I always ask the family if there’s anywhere they like to go, a location to which they have a strong emotional connection. Sometimes they’re proud of their home or garden and we do the session there. Other times it will be in a wood where they walk their dog, or where they go picnicking on lazy summer days. This is far more meaningful to them than some sanitized image on a white background.
Your goal is to either choose a location that helps tell the story of the people in the portrait, or that gives the photo more emotional meaning to the people you’re photographing.
Every time a bride tells me they’re praying for a gloriously sunny wedding day I don’t have the heart to tell them I’m praying for some lightly diffused cloud cover with intermittent dashes of sunlight upon my express request.
Glaring sunshine causes harsh shadows, particularly in the most important part of the portrait – the eyes.
Open shade is ideal because it doesn’t have harsh sunlight falling directly on the subject, but because the shade is ‘open’ it means there’s still enough light to give the eyes some sparkle. A tree is a perfect example of open shade, so is window light. The subject is in shade but they’re not completely closed off as they would be in the centre of a room, or in a forest. Open shade offers you some nice, soft directional light that creates enough shadow on the face to create depth, but without being harsh.
Lead in lines are just as helpful to portrait photography as they are to landscapes. They create depth to a photograph, lead you towards your subject and give the image a three-dimensional feel.
You can use fences, paths, a long twisting tree branch, the lines in a cornfield – anything that draws the viewer’s eye towards your model.
If you position your subject so there are back-lit leaves behind them then you’ll get a beautiful mosaic of green twinkles behind your subject if you use a low f-number on your camera (like f/4 for example).
With backlit subjects like this it’s often wise to use the spot metering mode to help your camera expose correctly for the face and avoid having a silhouette. Using a reflector to bounce some extra light into their face will help even more.
A barn door may not sound like a very exciting background, but rough textures can help the smoothness of your model’s skin pop out of the photograph. I also like rustic walls, and the repeating parallel lines of reeds.
Our brains like order. We like the pieces of the puzzle to fit together, which is probably why we get so frustrated when putting together flat-pack furniture! This is why our brains like the elements of a photograph to fit together like a completed jigsaw. I look for triangles, circles, rectangles and squares; and compose the image in a way that helps them fit together in harmony. This is also why we like clean, uncluttered hotel rooms that subtly use defined shapes, like the folded triangle of a bed sheet, or the repeating rectangles of a stack of towels.
When you start looking for shapes you’ll see them everywhere. Geometric shapes are often the basis for modern art and when you deconstruct many great photos into line drawings they’ll often look like that.
To give your images depth and a three-dimensional feel you need the viewer’s eye to find interest in the front, middle and background of the photo. Diffused blades of grass could be the foreground, a smiling toddler can be the mid-ground and sunlight sparkling through a tree could be the background.
I love the effect you get when photographing people in an avenue of trees, using a long lens, because it ticks nearly all the boxes in one go. The leaves provide the necessary shade while the path provides a lead in line and creates depth in the photo. The long lens helps produce a fabulous tunnel vision effect that draws you in and helps to frame the photo, along with the trees themselves.
The next time you decide to photograph someone use these tips and place your subject in the best position to ensure great light and cracking composition. If you have any questions then I’ll be happy to answer them below.
The post How to Choose a Great Portrait Photography Location by Dan Waters appeared first on Digital Photography School.
Way up in Norway’s arctic northwest lies a small, yet incredibly beautiful and diverse archipelago, home to some of that country’s most magical landscapes and a truly wonderful winter atmosphere. Photographer Erez Marom shares his experience of shooting in the Lofoten Islands in Arctic Norway, from a traditional fishing village to mountains and ice-covered lakes. Learn more
Articles: Digital Photography Review (dpreview.com)
FashionPhotographyBlog.com caught up with Photo of The Week winner, Canadian artist, Dean McClelland who won, what could be described as one of the most intense rounds of Photo of the Week to date. There were over 200 votes that were counted that week and about fifty percent of the votes were for Deans winning photo, “Summer” with second place only merely a handful of votes away. The week was truly represented the week’s theme – “Savage Survivor”.
Based near the Rocky Mountain’s in Calgary, Alberta, Dean, coincidentally, was celebrating his birthday that week so winning Photo of the Week was an added surprise. I sat down with Dean and asked him about his winning image and how did he find his way into the world of photography.
So how did Dean’s photography journey began? The photographed revealed that, “2003 was the year of exploration of a new media for me. (Lord Of The Rings) Return of the King just came out in theatres and having watched the making of the last two movies I was intrigued in colour processing. Peter Jackson revolutionized how we view movies with digital colour pallets. His story telling was enhanced because of it. Adobe Photoshop became affordable and had the tool set I was looking for to explore this area of colour and storytelling through a single image.
Buying my first digital camera allowed me to jump into the world of photography and experience a creative work flow that had endless potential. The learning curve was steep but I quickly became acquainted with a small tool set that made my photos stand apart from other photographers. I found that conceptual and digital photo composite fine art best suit my interest and my style.”
Dean’s unique artistic style reflects his family’s heritage from his mother’s side. You see, his grandfather was a vaudeville magician and his brother carries on the tradition as the photographer explained “My interest in fashion photography harks back to the lifestyle of the vaudeville era – a time when people were drawn to sideshows, midways and vaudeville shows by the smells of candy floss and corn dogs and the chance to see oddities and performances that fuelled the imagination.
My grandfather owned such a show and when he retired all of his equipment to his backyard my brother, cousins and I would play on the old midway rides. The magic of that era led my brother to develop his own magic and illusion show, which fascinated me and led to my own interest in the era. The advent of the digital age made it easier to access the tools, like Photoshop, that allowed me to develop my own approach to photography. I would classify my art as conceptual with a focus on character and storytelling. You will find whimsy and a touch of dark humour in my work.”
Growing up with these oddities around him, he found the pieces to create his style through observation and study of his brother’s art of sideshow. Dean’s work embodies a sense of whimsy, humor, and a quirkiness to his photography which is fused with an essense that not all is right in this world as seen in Dean’s winning image. So what inspired this piece, depicting a sultry woman in a shawl standing her ground beside to a tiger in a parched desert? The photographer mentioned that “I had a hair stylist take a liking to my photography and we went into discussions on doing a photo shoot with the theme of summer, spring, fall, and winter. The picture show cased here was of our summer theme.”
To create this shoot Dean has provided a list of the specific equipment he used to created this shoot that includes:
Camera: 5D Mark 2
Lighting: Elinchrom ranger pack, Elinchrom EL- Skyport
Lighting: 100 cm soft box
Lens: Canon 24 mm prime
Photoshop CS Extended
Lightroom
For more information about Dean McClelland’s work you can find his work submitted to Flickr and 500px. Just plug his name in their search bar and you will find him :). Ending the interview, Dean shared, as a takeaway for our readers, what he thought were the most important elements that a photographer should know to become successful in fashion photography, these being, “Know your client well, create a photo that reflects the client’s objectives, and enjoy what you do.”
Currently, we have another round of Photo Of The Week running. To participate in the voting, make sure you “like” our Facebook page here and vote for your favorite photographer‘s photo out of the finalists in the comments section of the post. The photo with the most vote’s by the end of the week at Sunday midnight will win Photo of the Week and win the great prizes on offer.
Since FashionPhotographyBlog.com is Google’s #1 site on fashion photography in the world, you might be interested in entering our Photo of The Week competition. This could be your entry to some great exposure if you submit your photo and win. To find out more details on how to enter, make sure you join our mailing list. We will send you the entry details via your email. As a reminder, voting ends at the end of the week so make sure you get voting our Facebook page here.
What do you think of Dean’s winning photo? We want to know what you think. Tell us in the comments below, do you agree with how this week’s voting outcome? What is your critique on this photo? We want to hear from you!
I love shooting at mix. Especially when there are epic clouds on the move. And even more so while monitoring my Dark Skies app to know exactly when the rain will start falling on a OMGHowMuchDidThatThingCost? cello.
Just keeps things interesting, you know?
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Strobist
Nishe fotografiert Emotionen der Liebe, Trauer und Einsamkeit. Es sind Gefühle, die uns allen bekannt sind, doch in Bildform treten sie selten auf. Umso auffälliger ist es, wenn eine Fotografin es beherrscht, diesem so schwierig zu beschreibenden Phänomenen des menschlichen Daseins eine Plattform zu geben: Das Foto.
Und das macht es leicht, sich einzufühlen, denn die Bilder sind weder hochkomplex komponiert, noch mehrdeutig ironisch. Jedes Bild hat ein Thema, das direkt und unkompliziert verdeutlicht wird. Paarbegegnungen zitieren Nähe und Intimität, die in keinster Weise unnatürlich anmuten – im Gegenteil.
Meiner Meinung nach sind Nishes Aufnahmen weit entfernt vom Kitsch der 80er- und 90er-Studioaufnahmen, wie sie zu Tausenden in Fotostudios zu sehen sind. Selbst körperliche Nähe wird nicht übertrieben dargestellt, sondern glaubhaft, ganz ohne Happy-Clappy verabreicht.
Meine Fotos zeigen, was mich tief berührt. Sie sind eine Sehnsucht nach der Vergangenheit und mein Weg, in der Zeit zurückzugehen und in einer anderen Welt zu leben. Sie sind eine Flucht aus der Realität. Meine Bilder sind auch mein Weg, mit anderen in Verbindung zu treten und ihnen zu zeigen, wie ich die Welt sehe und wohin mich meine Vorstellungskraft trägt.
Selten wird von einem Künstler so direkt (und ehrlich) benannt, was ihm oder ihr wichtig, was zentrales Anliegen der Arbeiten ist. Doch sie sieht darin nicht nur sich, sondern auch ihr Umfeld.
Magdalena Lutek lebt in Polen und tritt unter dem Künstlernamen „Nishe“ auf. Sie ist überall zu finden, so etwa auf Flickr, Facebook und Instagram, um nur ein paar Anlaufstationen zu erwähnen.
kwerfeldein – Fotografie Magazin | Fotocommunity
[ By WebUrbanist in Destinations & Sights & Travel. ]
Using a mapping algorithm coupled with citizen reviews of sights and scenery, a team of researchers has developed a way to choose paths through cities based on beauty, quiet and happiness rather than simply the shortest distance between two points.
The project employed Google Street View and Geograph as well as Flickr images and their metadata to build out an initial estimation of probable best paths, then solicited human feedback (to check and enhance the results) from a group of participants on the website UrbanGems (shown above).
The study, published by Cornell University’s arXiv, came up with a number of route suggestions in Boston and London and contains a number of interesting findings. For starters, the ‘beautiful’ routes were only slightly longer than the shortest routes, and significantly shorter than typical tourist-oriented directions and guided-tour paths. As the algorithm improves, it is increasingly able to generate paths through new cities via metadata alone, reducing reliance on input from people.
The project’s creators included Daniele Quercia and Luca Maria Aiello of Yahoo Labs in Barcelona and Rossano Schifanella of the University of Torino, Italy. From their abstract: “When providing directions to a place, web and mobile mapping services are all able to suggest the shortest route. The goal of this work is to automatically suggest routes that are not only short but also emotionally pleasant.
The assessments are not simply qualitative value judgments, but a hybrid of human and machine input: “Based on a quantitative validation, we find that, compared to the shortest routes, the recommended ones add just a few extra walking minutes and are indeed perceived to be more beautiful, quiet, and happy.”
From UrbanGems: “Buildings and neighbourhoods speak. They speak of egalitarianism or elitism, beauty or ugliness, acceptance or arrogance. The aim of UrbanGems is to identify the visual cues that are generally associated with concepts difficult to define such beauty, happiness, quietness, or even deprivation. The difficult task of deciding what makes a building beautiful, or what is sought after in a quiet location is outsourced to the users of this site using comparisons of pictures. With a comprehensive list of aesthetic virtues at hand, we would be more likely to systematically understand and re-create the environments we intuitively love.”
When urban planners and developers want to know what businesses local residents would like in their neighborhoods, where to put new bike lanes, or specific …
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An explicitly illicit use of dimensional data buried in Google Street View, the Urban Jungle project adds eerie layers of post-apocalyptic green overgrowth to …
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The notion of a mobile city is not new, but in this case, the architect has gone to great lengths to construct a vision that could conceivably be built. So …
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[ By WebUrbanist in Destinations & Sights & Travel. ]
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