Irix has announced the details of its new 45mm F1.4 manual lens for full-frame camera systems.
The lens was originally teased as a prototype way back in 2017 at The Photography Show. Last year, a cine version of the lens was released, but the still photography version remained to be seen, until today.
The 45mm F1.4 lens is based around Irix’s Dragonfly design technology, which uses an aluminum-magnesium alloy and composite elements to create a lightweight, but sturdy design that’s weather-resistant thanks to multiple gaskets throughout the lens. The focus ring has a 140-degree throw, a focus-lock feature and offers laser-engraved markings with luminescent paint for easier viewing in low-light environments.
No launch date or pricing information is available at this time. When the 45mmm F1.4 lens does launch, it will be available for Canon EF, Nikon F and Pentax K camera systems. We have contacted Irix to request more information and will update this article accordingly if and when we receive a response.
The post Camera Industry Hit Hard by Coronavirus, Causing Production Delays appeared first on Digital Photography School. It was authored by Jaymes Dempsey.
Over the past month, the coronavirus outbreak has rocked the world.
And now it’s making its way into the camera industry.
The three biggest imaging companies, Canon, Nikon, and Sony, have found themselves affected by coronavirus outbreaks.
First, Sony Alpha Rumors published a tip from an unnamed source, which said:
“We can expect product [launches] to be very delayed along with much lower capacity in production volumes for many of [Sony’s] current imaging products.”
While we can’t know exactly what product launches Sony Alpha is referring to, fans have been eagerly anticipating the announcement of the Sony a7s III, as well as the Sony a7 IV.
Around the same time, the CP+2020 expo, which was due to be hosted in Japan, was canceled, with the organizers citing “no effective treatment or containment measures to deal with the novel coronavirus.” Organizers went on to explain that the “event attracts around 70,000 unspecified visitors and therefore we cannot completely eliminate the risk of infection.”
Then, only weeks later, Canon Rumors says this:
“Canon…will suspend operations at its five offices in Kyushu, which produce cameras and related products, for about two weeks from March 2 to 13. The supply of parts from China may become unstable due to the effects of the new coronavirus.”
While Canon Rumors goes on to say that, “At the moment, no employees have been infected,” the message is clear: Coronavirus, directly or indirectly, is taking its toll on Canon’s camera business.
And finally, a report by Nikon Rumors, and further corroborated by PetaPixel, indicates that Nikon’s new AF-S 120-300mm f/2.8 lens would not ship as initially announced. Instead, you can expect the lens in late March, at least according to Amazon’s shipping date.
As explained in a statement from Nikon, “The U.S. availability for the AF-S NIKKOR 120-300mm f/2.8E FL ED SR VR will be announced at a later date as we determine the global impact of the novel coronavirus outbreak. We will communicate updates on timing as they become available.”
At present, it’s difficult to say what all this means; will Canon, Sony, and Nikon recover swiftly from the effects of the coronavirus? Or will the virus’s impact be more long-lasting? These closures may be just the beginning.
Here’s one concern: Nikon hasn’t reported good financial numbers in recent months. If the coronavirus continues to affect production, Nikon may see a significant drop in sales, something that could further impact the imaging company over the next year (and beyond).
And similar worries are undoubtedly plaguing companies such as Olympus, which recently weathered rumors of a camera division shutdown.
What do you think? How will things play out regarding the coronavirus and the camera industry? Is this as bad as it will get, or will things become worse?
Let me know in the comments!
The post Camera Industry Hit Hard by Coronavirus, Causing Production Delays appeared first on Digital Photography School. It was authored by Jaymes Dempsey.
The Olympus OM-D E-M1 Mark III is capable of shooting at up to 60 fps and tough enough to withstand use in harsh environments in every corner of the world. What better environment to put such a small, powerful and fast camera to the test than a remote control jet airplane convention?
Join action photographer Scott Rinckenberger as he takes the OM-D E-M1 Mark III to shoot the fascinating world of remote control jet planes at Jet Jam 2020 – held annually near Coachella, California.
The post 6 Reasons Why Dedicated Cameras are Better than Smartphones for Photography appeared first on Digital Photography School. It was authored by Simon Ringsmuth.
Modern smartphone cameras are amazing! They have facilitated an explosion in photography that shows no signs of stopping. Mobile phone cameras, apps, editing, and sharing have given people access to creative outlets that were unthinkable a mere 15 years ago. If the best camera is the one you have with you, then 9 times out of 10, the best camera is right in your pocket! Despite the advances in smartphone cameras, there are still few things smartphone cameras lack. So, in this article, we’ll explore why dedicated cameras are better than smartphones for photography. In other words, there are some photos you just can’t get with a smartphone.
Reasons why dedicated cameras are better than smartphones for photography
Nikon D7100, 85mm, f/2.8, 1/1000 second, ISO 100
1. Software vs. Physics
The first of the 5 reasons why dedicated cameras are better than smartphones for photography, is software vs physics.
I don’t want to sound like an old man yelling at clouds, decrying all modern technologies that might make my life better. Smartphone cameras and computational photography are incredible! They can use software and artificial intelligence to capture incredible images of night skies and portrait-style images with blurry backgrounds.
But digital trickery and software manipulations are no match for a mastery of light and physics, and this is where dedicated cameras still have an edge.
Most smartphones have lenses that approximate roughly a 28mm field of view on a full-frame camera. Some have second lenses that go a bit wider, usually about 15mm. It’s also not uncommon for higher-end phones to have a telephoto lens as well, which is roughly equivalent to a 50mm lens.
Nearly all smartphone cameras are stuck at a single aperture value as well, which gives you limited control over a key element of exposure. While there is much that can be done in software to overcome the inherent limitations of these lenses and focal lengths, sometimes you just need a separate camera to get the shot.
2. Foreground Blur
Nikon D7100, 50mm, f/1.8, 1/2000 second, ISO 100
Any smartphone can take pictures of flowers. This particular image shows a backlit flower whose petals are glowing with sunlight streaking in from above and behind, and a mobile phone could capture that just fine. However, there is one key element of this image that’s impossible on a smartphone – the foreground blur.
Smartphones have come a long way with so-called portrait-style photography. Portrait mode involves software combined with depth data that allows a smartphone to blur the background.
But not the foreground.
This is one of the things smartphone cameras lack. Try it for yourself!
Take a portrait-style photo with your smartphone but include objects in the foreground that you would like to blur. The background will get blurry, but the foreground will remain in focus.
Blurring both the foreground and background is a time-honored technique to add a sense of depth and perspective to your photos. Perhaps one day the software and AI techniques used on mobile phones will be able to replicate this. But, for now, if you’re using a smartphone, you’re stuck with just background blur.
3. Telephoto Zoom
Nikon D500, 200mm, f/8, 1/400 second, ISO 900
While smartphone cameras have had pinch-to-zoom capabilities for over a decade, it amounts to little more than just cropping your pictures. Modern smartphones do a better job of interpolating data between pixels and adjusting exposure values on the fly, but at the end of the day, you’re still just cropping.
In the process, you lose a lot of detail. And even then, you just can’t zoom in very far. It’s definitely one of the things smartphone cameras lack, despite some recent advances.
One classic example of this is a picture of the moon.
Smartphone lenses, and the laws of physics, make pictures like this impossible. You have probably noticed if you have ever tried to do a pinch-and-zoom photo of our nearest celestial neighbor.
You’ll need a dedicated camera if you want to get crisp, detailed photos of faraway objects. And this is just another reason dedicated cameras are better than smartphones.
Nikon D500, 200mm, f/2.8, 1/3000 second, ISO 100
Smartphones aren’t great for most long-distance shooting scenarios, such as this picture of a horse in the pasture.
While pinch-and-zoom can make it seem like you’re getting closer, you won’t get a tack-sharp, high-resolution image suitable for printing and framing.
Like everything tech-related, this is getting better and will improve with time. Some phones now are using stacked periscope-style lenses combined with software and AI processing to mimic 10x or even 100x zoom lenses. Right now, these make interesting tech demos, but the results don’t have the same level of clarity, color, and fidelity as you would get from a DSLR or mirrorless camera with a zoom lens attached.
4. Background compression
Nikon D7100, 200mm, f/2.8, 1/1500 second, ISO 100
Another reason dedicated cameras are better than smartphones is background compression.
Something interesting happens when you shoot photos with a telephoto zoom: the background appears to move closer to your subject.
It’s called background compression and is a time-honored compositional technique to make your subjects stand out and take your images up to another level. It’s also impossible to do on a smartphone.
In the picture above, the building is very far away from the woman walking in the foreground. Shooting with a telephoto lens compresses the background and makes it seem much closer.
Nikon D750, 200mm, f/4, 1/400 second, ISO 3200
In this family photo, you can see the trees and leaves in the background, which are very far away. However, they appear closer as a result of background compression.
While some smartphone cameras do have some limited zoom capability, their smaller lenses and image sensors simply do not allow for these types of pictures.
5. Fast action
Before I get too far in this section, I want to point out that smartphones are good at capturing some types of fast action. These conditions are fairly limited, though.
You have to be close to your subject, which isn’t possible in a lot of action situations. It also helps if you can lock focus on a specific area where you know the subject will be, or else have a smartphone with amazing autofocus capabilities. And if you can meet those challenges, then your phone could produce some good results.
For a lot of fast action, though, you need a DSLR or mirrorless camera. It helps to have a good lens attached too.
This will let you stand on the sidelines while getting up close and personal with your subjects. It helps to shoot with a wide aperture too, which will let you get a fast shutter speed and freeze the action.
Nikon D750, 185mm, f/4, 1/500 second, ISO 100
These types of action shots are impossible on smartphones because pinch-to-zoom just can’t get the job done. You’ll get pictures that are pixellated, blurry, or out of focus because smartphones are not able to match the speed and capability of a dedicated camera.
In the picture below, I was sitting in the stern of a boat zoomed in to 200mm. I had to use tracking autofocus to keep the picture sharp. My brother was also in the boat with his smartphone, and he didn’t like any of the shots he got.
Nikon D7100, 200mm, f/2.8, 1/2000 second, ISO 100
6. Portraits
The last of my reasons that dedicated cameras are better than smartphones relates to portrait photography.
This one might ruffle some feathers because phones have gotten so much better at portraits in recent years. In fact, some people can’t even tell the difference between portrait-style images shot on mobile phones and actual portraits taken with a dedicated camera. I have trouble sometimes too. In the coming years, mobile phones are going to keep getting better and better.
For now, and into the foreseeable future, dedicated cameras still have a significant advantage.
Software and AI, and computational horsepower can do a lot, but they can’t keep up with a good lens and physics.
In the picture below, the girl’s eyes are tack sharp but there is a subtle falloff as you look towards the edge of her face. Her hair goes from sharp to blurry in a smooth, even fashion.
The background isn’t just blurry – it’s obliterated. Mobile phones can’t do that.
Nikon D750, 170mm, f/2.8, 1/180 second, ISO 100
You don’t need expensive gear to take great portraits either.
In fact, you can spend far less on a used DSLR or Mirrorless camera than you would on a mobile phone with portrait mode.
The shot below was taken on a Nikon D200, which came out in 2006, and can be found today for about $ 150.
The lens is a cheap 50mm f/1.8. And the results blow away anything you can get from a mobile phone.
All the subtle details, like the way her eye is in focus but her ears are slightly blurry, to her hair slowly fading away, to the bokeh in the background, make this image a cut above what you could get from a smartphone. Just another reason that dedicated cameras are better than smartphones for photography.
Nikon D200, 50mm, f/1.8, 1/250 second, ISO 400
Conclusion
Before anyone gets out a bucket of tar and some feathers, please understand that I think smartphone cameras are amazing!
Despite the things smartphone cameras lack, they can take incredible pictures and technology will only make them better with time. I just think it’s important to understand their limitations and have a sense of some of the pictures they can’t yet achieve.
What about you?
I’m curious what your experience has been with smartphone pictures. Does your smartphone take the kinds of shots you want, or have you found that it can’t yet replace your DSLR or mirrorless camera?
I’d love to hear from you. Feel free to share your thoughts and example images in the comments below.
The post 6 Reasons Why Dedicated Cameras are Better than Smartphones for Photography appeared first on Digital Photography School. It was authored by Simon Ringsmuth.
The post How to Use the Photoshop Camera Raw Filter for Better Photo Editing appeared first on Digital Photography School. It was authored by John McIntire.
Inside Photoshop, there are an awful lot of tools for you to use to get the very most out of your images. Some of these tools (while not simple) have very specific functions that you use for specific tasks (Unsharp Mask for example). The Photoshop Camera Raw Filter is different.
This filter opens up the use of the (almost) full functionality of Adobe Camera Raw (ACR) anywhere in your Photoshop workflow. If you’ve ever used ACR (or Lightroom) to process a raw file, you know exactly how feature-packed this tool is.
The Camera Raw Filter is a powerful tool that allows you access to the features of ACR anytime in your workflow.
In normal cases, you would use ACR to process your photos at the beginning of your workflow during raw processing, but the Camera Raw Filter opens up these tools to you anytime you may want them.
This article will outline how to use the Photoshop Camera Raw Filter, show you some instances where you might want to use it, and give you some tips to get the most out of it.
What is the Photoshop Camera Raw Filter?
Lightroom is great for processing your raw files (so is ACR), but what if you could use these tools inside Photoshop?
At its most basic, the Photoshop Camera Raw filter allows you to use the functions of the ACR interface at any time within Photoshop. This allows you to make any adjustments within ACR at any time during your workflow instead of just limiting its usage to the raw processing stage.
While it would be possible to import your working file into Lightroom to make the same sets of adjustments, doing this in Photoshop saves you from that cumbersome step. It allows you the use of these tools without any extra effort.
You can find the Camera Raw Filter under the filter menu.
To find the Photoshop Camera Raw Filter, simply choose Filter->Camera Raw Filter and the dialog box will pop up.
Before you do this, you may want to stamp all layers by pressing Ctrl+Shift+Alt+e (Cmd+Shift+Alt+e). This will combine all of your layers into a new layer from which you can work.
The top layer here is stamped from the two layers below it.
What it doesn’t allow
White Balance – Because you are not working from a raw file, you lose a lot of the functionality of the white balance setting in ACR. You will still be able to make drastic changes to the coloring of your images with this tool. It will be the same, for example, as adjusting a JPG in Lightroom.
Crop tool – You also lose the crop and rotate tools that you would have access to when working on RAW files.
There are others, but these are the most important to take note of.
In the various menus of the Photoshop Camera Raw Filter, you will find there are a few options missing that you would see in ACR.
It’s also important to realize that because you are not working with a raw file at this stage, you won’t have the same versatility that you would with a raw file in ACR.
Instead, the process will be more akin to working on a JPG file in Lightroom or ACR. This means you will have less information to work with, such as, dynamic range.
This is all fine and to be expected. However, it illustrates the importance of getting things as close to right as possible while in the raw stage of post-processing.
How can it be used?
With all of the power of ACR behind the Photoshop Camera Raw filter, there is no way to make anything resembling a complete list of what you could do with it. But here are a few potential uses that I find myself using often.
Fine-tune adjustments after raw
Make certain adjustments easier than in Photoshop
Make quick, extreme adjustments for certain parts of your image
Quick and easy vignetting
Final tweaks before finishing your image
1. Fine-tuning adjustments after raw
Once in Photoshop, and after a bit of healing work, I decided that I wanted to make the image a touch cooler and reduce the vibrancy as well. To not lose the healing work, I used the Photoshop Camera Raw Filter to make a quick adjustment.
If you’re like me, you mostly make decisions about adjustments on the spot. This is fine when you process your raw file and move it into Photoshop immediately. However, if you leave it for a day or two before you come to it, you might find that you no longer like the decisions you made.
Of course, you could always go back into Lightroom and start again, but what happens if you have already started making adjustments to your image?
Chances are, you don’t want to lose those. A quick and easy solution is to stamp the layers to a new layer and run the Camera Raw Filter. Once there, you can make any adjustments you might want and click Okay.
This works great if you want to make quick adjustments to things like the overall exposure, contrast or vibrancy in an image. I will often come back to a file after a few days to find that I want to reduce the highlights and whites before I get started properly.
2. Make trickier adjustments
I find the Clarity tool in ACR tricky to replicate in Photoshop. Here, I darkened the background and cranked up the clarity with the Camera Raw Filter. I also used a Layer Mask to keep the changes off of the subject.
Photoshop might be all-powerful on its own, but ACR (and Lightroom by extension) do make a few things easier. For example, the Clarity slider is a tricky tool to replicate in Photoshop. Using the Photoshop camera raw filter to make these adjustments is easier and can save you a lot of time.
Another example is the use of the Highlights, Whites, Darks, and Blacks sliders to make quick, intuitive global contrast adjustments. Using these tools in this way is useful if you’re not yet fully familiar or comfortable with options like curves adjustments.
3. Local adjustments
Here, the shirt sleeve was still to bright for my taste, so I used the radial filter as a local adjustment to bring it down a bit
A common way I use the Photoshop camera raw filter is to make adjustments specific to a target area (such as a background).
After the adjustments are made, you can then use a layer mask to ensure that the adjustments are only affecting the areas that you want.
This method suits textured backdrops well because you can adjust the clarity and contrast to your heart’s content knowing that your subject won’t be affected once you make the layer mask.
4. Vignettes
ACR’s vignette tool is easy, fast and intuitive and hard to beat in Photoshop unless you need absolute control.
There are tonnes of ways to create a vignette in Photoshop, but in my opinion, the vignette tool within the ACR is by far the easiest, fastest and most intuitive to use. By doing it this way, you can create a subtle (or extreme if you prefer) vignette in just a few seconds. It is also easy to mask out (as per the previous section) any part of the vignette that might be interfering with your subject.
5. Final tweaks
With a finished image, you can always load up the Camera Raw Filter and see if there’s any small tweaks (like the ones here) to help the image.
Another useful trick for the Photoshop Camera Raw Filter is to use it to make a set of final tweaks to your finished images.
Once you’ve completed your image, you can run the filter and see if there’s any further small adjustments you’d like to make. Tiny adjustments to exposure, contrast (via all the sliders) clarity and vibrance can all help to give your finished images just a little more polish.
At this point, your images should be good to go, so do try to keep any adjustments at this stage small and subtle.
Just the beginning
With the exception of a bit of skin work (maybe five minutes) and some sharpening at the end, this image’s Photoshop workflow was completed otherwise entirely with the Camera Raw Filter. Hopefully you can see just how useful a tool it is.
With a tool like the Photoshop camera raw filter, there are so, so many options for you to use in your images.
If you can do it in ACR (with a few minor exceptions), you can do it with this filter inside Photoshop. Feel free to use it in any way that you need to that gets the results that you want.
Side-by-side comparison of the starting image and the final image.
Smart objects
Depending on your workflow and your style of post-processing, using the Photoshop Camera Raw Filter as a Smart Object might be a good choice for you.
Smart Objects allow you to come back to any adjustment you have made (with certain tools) and tweak them.
To setup a Smart Object, right click the layer that you want to use and choose Convert to Smart Object.
To work with Smart Objects, right-click the layer that you will run the Camera Raw Filter on and click Convert to Smart Object.
Now run the Camera Raw Filter and make any adjustments that you want to and press okay.
In the Layers Palette, and under the layer that you are working on, you will now see the name of the filter below the box titled Smart Filters. If you double click this, you will be taken back to the Camera Raw Filter dialog box where you can adjust any of the settings that you have tweaked.
This is a useful technique for any time you think you might second guess your decisions a bit later on.
With the layer converted to a Smart Object, you can apply your filter. To alter the adjustments, simply double click on the name of the filter in the layers palette.
Having said that, Smart Objects won’t suit every photographer’s workflow.
For example, I like to use a lot of stamped layers in my workflow and by the time I might see something I want to modify, I’ve already created and worked on a new stamped layer above it.
Any adjustments made to a Smart Object in this situation, would not be visible.
Overall
I will admit, that the way that the Camera Raw Filter was used in this example was extreme and bit over the top, but by using it in this manner, I hope you can see just how powerful an option it is for various adjustments in Photoshop.
The Photoshop camera raw filter is a very powerful tool that you can use while post processing your images for a great many different effects. Add to that the fact that anyone who shoots in raw format is already familiar with the interface, it makes using the filter quick and painless to make any number of adjustments. I have discussed only a few ways that you can use this filter in your images, but if you have any other suggestions on how you use it, please leave it in the comments below for other readers to benefit from.
The post How to Use the Photoshop Camera Raw Filter for Better Photo Editing appeared first on Digital Photography School. It was authored by John McIntire.
The post Images and Text: The Untapped Power of Photography Blogs appeared first on Digital Photography School. It was authored by Charlie Moss.
There is a lot of advice online about blogging for photographers. It’s often extremely good advice, and applicable to most photographers. But the advice is often more about the technical aspect of setting up a blog, or how to grow a blog to support a photographic business. Very rarely are they about the power of photography blogs for creative development.
There’s nothing wrong with creating a photography blog if you’re in business, of course. But what about if you want to use a blog to help you develop creatively? Or to explore different aspects of an ongoing photography project?
Blogs can be a great tool for inspiring creativity in photographers. For this reason, I think you should consider the idea of writing alongside your documentary or fine art photography practice.
Writing to develop your creativity
The most basic way to think about blogging for your photography is as an archival tool. By posting images and commentary regularly and then looking back through your archives, you will be able to see the journey that you have been on.
If you make your blog public, it also allows others to see the work that you’ve done – something a documentary photographer might find particularly useful.
I’ve been writing a “Behind the Image” series on my blog. I record my thoughts about the image-making process and sometimes ideas on what I might do in the future.
By understanding your journey, you can plan a path for the future of your photography. You’ll be able to more easily see what worked and what didn’t.
Being able to look at your entire body of work in a timeline format can be very beneficial.
Sometimes, because you see your own work all the time, it can feel like you aren’t making progress. There can be a real feeling that you aren’t creating anything new and exciting photographically.
But a blog can help with that by reminding you of pictures that you took months, or even years ago. The power of photography blogs comes from being able to compare your current pictures with this older work you will surely see an inspirational improvement.
A picture can paint a thousand words – but should it have to?
I always remember being told when I was learning photography, that if you had to explain a photograph beyond a title, it failed as an image. I suppose in a way that was good for me – it certainly made me work harder with my storytelling.
But I never understood why it should be the case that photographs should not be accompanied by words.
Is a title enough to explain a photo?
I wonder if this comes from a desire to imitate grand historical paintings that were full of signs and symbols.
Back then, the educated audience would have largely understood the visual language used. But it would also have been common for the owner of the painting to show off his knowledge by explaining it to his friends.
You’ll find that these paintings did often have long accompanying explanations – they just weren’t written down.
Of course, there will always be images that stand without words and tell a great story. But these images and series are comparatively rare – most images are at least helped out by the inclusion of a title.
A Japanese tradition
It’s often observed that the favored publishing medium for the greats of Japanese photography has been the photobook.
The book format allows photographers to write texts to accompany their images, and these texts are often quite lengthy. Certainly, they amount to more than a mere caption or title.
Publishing texts alongside their photographs in books and magazines means that their words can be every bit as influential as their images. This kind of approach is rarely seen in Western photographic traditions. I can’t help but wonder if blogs had been invented many years earlier if Japanese photographers would have harnessed the power of photography blogs alongside photobooks and magazine publishing.
Japanese photographers have traditionally explored photobooks as a way to put their images alongside the text they write.
The result of this writing that accompanies their photographs is often the feeling of a more intimate relationship with the photographer and their work. The viewed can gain more of a sense of why the photographer took the images and a deeper connection with the photographs.
It also gives the photographer a chance to link their work more closely to current affairs or politics. These themes are often reflected in the images and writing of the early pioneers of Japanese photography who lived through the Second World War.
How to write about photography
There are lots of different ways that you could write about your work on a blog and being able to mix and match styles is a power of photography blogs.
In the past, I have favored blog posts reflecting on how and why I took and photo. I like to also speculate about what I might do differently if I was to approach the same subject again.
Other photographers have taken a more reflective approach, considering their thoughts and feelings at the time they shot the image. This incredibly personal approach to writing about photographs is understandably too intimate for some. But when it works, it can help a photographer develop creatively, while bringing the audience on their journey with them.
One way to retain flexibility when blogging about your work might be to approach it like a diary. That way you can vary your approach on any given day. Let your mood and the photograph dictate how personal you want your words to be.
Alternatively, you could take an altogether more academic approach. Looking at aesthetics or even the technical aspects of photography and how it applies to your work could be another route.
This would be a different way to create a body of work made up of both images and text. Throughout history, artists have tried to formulate their own ideas of what constitutes good art. There is no reason that you shouldn’t do the same!
Beyond the blog
While a blog is a great format for text and images, there is always the possibility of transferring your work into a different medium. One option could be to publish your own book – collecting your photos alongside the words that you wrote about them.
You could choose to put everything you write and shoot into a series of books or pick pieces based on theme or location. If you think you might want to do thematic books in the future, this would be a good use of the tagging feature in your blog software!
I like to paste still life polaroids into notebooks and write about my thoughts for the day. It’s a way to slow down photography and take it away from the digital.
Alternatively, you could experiment with exhibiting your work. I worked on a project some time ago about the idea of showing work in a gallery space and using QR codes on the labels to link to digital content, such as long texts. This kind of thinking outside the box could really make a gallery show stand out!
Of course, if you don’t feel like telling the world about your photos you could simply keep a traditional paper journal with your thoughts and feelings alongside your photographs.
Printing the images and then pasting them into notebooks is a relaxing and creative process that can inspire all kinds of thoughts to write down. You can harness the power of photography blogs both in digital and analog formats.
Do you have anything else you’d like to add about the power of photography blogs? If so, please share them with us in the comments.
The post Images and Text: The Untapped Power of Photography Blogs appeared first on Digital Photography School. It was authored by Charlie Moss.
A prototype of the forthcoming Canon EOS R5, on display at the recent WPPI trade show
If it wasn’t obvious at the time, it should be clear now that the EOS R and RP don’t represent Canon’s full ambitions for full-frame mirrorless. Following the initial surge of those releases, there’s been an apparent lull while the real work continued. Now that Canon has started to release details of the forthcoming EOS R5, the bigger picture is becoming clearer.
This is not to downplay the role of those first two cameras. The RP in particular seems to be turning into the camera we thought it might: a competent and aggressively priced first-time full-framer, pitched below the 6D level to entice people into the system.
But it was very apparent that the R and RP weren’t at the center of Canon’s plans for the RF-mount and we’ve had to wait until now, to see more of Canon’s longer-term strategy.
The RF lenses have already set out the game plan though. That triumvirate of F2.8 L zooms is clearly not primarily aimed at RP or even R users. The prices and the performance that they’ve shown, along with the use of the widely respected ‘L’ designation, should make that clear.
Neither the ‘holy trinity’ of F2.8 L zooms, nor the 50 and 85mm F1.2 prime lenses will have been developed primarily for EOS R or RP shooters.
These lenses are laying the groundwork for a camera designed to appeal to the dedicated enthusiast and professional user.
The R5 will be a mirrorless 5D
One thing that’s certain, now that we’ve seen the prototype cameras, is that the inclusion of the number ‘5’ in the R5’s name is no coincidence.
The 5D line has been important for the company, both in terms of sales and in terms of reputation. The 5D DSLRs help cement the company’s image as the maker of aspirational products for enthusiasts and dependable cameras for working professionals, then extended that to create the first high-end stills/video hybrid camera. Like the ‘L’ designation, Canon is unlikely to risk undermining the values associated with that branding by casually applying it to something less ambitious.
Canon is unlikely to risk the 5-series branding by applying it to something less ambitious
The prototype units Canon has put on show also help to make clear that it’s this 5D-using crowd it’s targeting with the R5: the styling cues of the body might come from the EOS R but the control layout is reassuringly 5D-like. Wedding shooters, along with everyone else who got really anxious about such things when the EOS R was launched, will be reassured to hear the R5 will have twin card slots.
There are certainly plenty of design cues from the EOS R, including that square status panel and the mode button set inside the rear shoulder dial…
Canon was determined to get it right
The lag between the announcement of the system and the arrival of its key camera model suggests there was still work that needed to be done.
Given how much of a head start Sony had already established in full-frame mirrorless with its progressively better a7 cameras, there must have been a temptation for Canon to quickly establish a presence in such a key part of the market. But, rather than launching a rival to the Sony a7R III at the same time Nikon launched its Z7, Canon has kept its powder dry.
…but that rear-plate scroll wheel, that big, traditional joystick and the arrangement of the two buttons on the right shoulder have much more in common with Canon’s DSLR design.
This strongly suggests it’s been continuing to work on the technologies underpinning the R5. Whereas the R and RP placed sensors from existing models (the EOS 5D IV and EOS 6D II respectively), in less-expensive bodies, it’s now clear that the R5 will include a series of all-new technologies. And we’d guess at a price tag around the $ 3500 territory that EOS 5D models have been launched at.
It will feature new-to-Canon technologies
Canon confirmed to us over a year ago that it was developing an in-body stabilization system for a ‘pro-level’ RF camera, and this is likely to be one of the things still being perfected.
There’s scope for some misunderstanding in translation, of course, but the senior figures we interviewed seemed to suggest a system that would combine the efforts of in-body and in-lens stabilization, like Panasonic and Olympus do, rather than sharing the work by letting in-lens stabilization take over some of the work from the in-body mechanism, per Sony and Nikon.
Canon has a history of launching new systems by starting with the middle model. The launch model of the EF mount, the EOS 650, wasn’t an especially high-end offering.
While Canon has decades of experience of in-lens stabilization, it doesn’t have any prior experience of combining lens and sensor-shift IS. This is clearly a technology Canon wanted to get absolutely right before launching a 5D-level camera, rather than delivering a standalone IBIS system and then using the promise of combined IS to entice people to upgrade to an R5 Mark II.
It will push video capabilities forward
The EOS 5D II established the idea of the DSLR as a video device. It wasn’t quite the first video DSLR but with its Full HD capability and full-frame sensor, it was the one that ended up in the hands of would-be videographers the world over. The Mark III added a little polish to this but didn’t really push things forward.
But one of the undeniable advantages mirrorless offers over DSLRs is that you don’t have a mirror that needs to be moved out of the way before you can start recording. This, in turn, helps give a more coherent stills and video shooting experience, making it easier for photographers to adapt to shooting sequences of moving pictures, rather than just stills.
So a 5D-level mirrorless camera would be the perfect time to make a spiritual successor to the 5D Mark II and Canon is talking in terms of 8K capture.
The potential benefits of 8K apply to people watching in 4K, just as there were benefits to 4K capture before widespread adoption of 4K displays
You may not think you need 8K, if that’s what the camera ends up outputting. It’s true that the limits of human vision at sensible viewing distances take us into the realms of diminishing returns, but many of the potential benefits of 8K apply to people watching in 4K, just as there were benefits to 4K capture before widespread adoption of 4K displays.
The first is the ability to crop in, giving scope for adding panning or zooming movement into locked-off shots. This is hugely useful in terms of giving flexibility at the edit stage, particularly for single camera setups that an R5 is likely to be used for.
But the other option is to capture at 8K and output it as perfectly oversampled 4K, since you need to capture twice the resolution to accurately describe all the detail that a 4K video can show. It may be that this is what Canon is referring to 8K capture with 4K output, but even this would be an impressive step forward.
I won’t call it a flagship
So what we know from the announced details and what we can deduce from the RF lenses that have been launched is that the 5R will aim to be a ‘Super 5D’: with the addition of in-body IS and advanced video making it perhaps the biggest generational leap forward for ‘5’ level cameras since the introduction of Full HD video capture.
The EOS R5 promises to match the 1D X III in terms of its 20fps frame rate, but it’s still the 1D series that’s the real flagship in Canon’s lineup.
But I’m still loath to call it a flagship. 5D cameras are important to Canon and certainly help set public perception of the brand, but it’s the 1D-series that has entrenched the company’s position on the sidelines of sports across the world.
The R5 is likely to include some of the AI-trained autofocus know-how developed for the EOS-1D X Mark III, and it’s likely to be the top dog in the RF lineup for the foreseeable future. But the sheer amount of power offered by the 1D X III in mirrorless mode suggests we may be only a single generation away from an RF-mount 1D.
Dorothea Lange at work in California, 1936. Library of Congress, Prints & Photographs Division, Farm Security Administration/Office of War Information Black-and-White Negatives.
If you don’t know Dorothea Lange by name, you know ‘Migrant Mother’. It’s an image that’s practically synonymous with the Dust Bowl, a period of devastating drought in the North American plains that displaced hundreds of thousands. If you’ve opened an American history textbook or watched a Great Depression documentary on PBS, you’ve probably seen Lange’s classic photo.
it’s time to get better acquainted with Dorothea Lange and recognize her for who she was: a complete and utter boss
The work was part of a major project run by the Farm Security Administration, which involved multiple photographers including Walker Evans. Lange played a major role, and is best known for this Depression-era work, while other images like her photos of Japanese American internment and incarceration have only relatively recently gained wider recognition. And it probably comes as no surprise that behind this legacy was an incredibly resilient, hardworking woman whose body of work is as moving and relevant today as it was decades ago.
So just in case you haven’t already, it’s time to get better acquainted with Dorothea Lange and recognize her for who she was: a complete and utter boss.
She knew she was a photographer before she ever picked up a camera
On graduating school and being asked what career she’d like to pursue, Lange’s response was quick: a photographer. She’d never actually held a camera before, but that didn’t stop her. She walked into a well-known portrait photographer’s studio one day and asked for any job he could give her. Thus her career was born – she learned the trade and acquired her first camera.
She didn’t let trivial setbacks – like having all of her money stolen – hold her back
Born on the East Coast, Lange launched her career in San Francisco and many of her best-known works were made in western states. So how did she end up settling on the other side of the country? Funny story!
After graduating school she and a friend embarked on what was meant to be a trip around the world with her best friend. They only got as far as San Francisco when they encountered a minor setback: all of their money was stolen. Did they ask their parents for help? Admit defeat and go back home? Heck no, they just got jobs and decided to live there. Lange went on to establish a successful portrait photography business.
Her less well-known photos of Japanese American internment are as poignant and raw today as they were nearly 80 years ago
Well into her professional career she was hired by the federal government to take photos of Japanese Americans during internment and incarceration. Many websites (this one included) have reported in the past few years that the photos she took were hidden for decades from the public by officials, deeming them too biased against the government’s actions.
That’s not the case. While it’s true that the images were withheld for the duration of World War II, they’ve been available to the public ever since. Either way, the photos and the humanity that Lange captured are as poignant today as ever.
Even with mobility limitations, she never slowed down
Throughout her life, Lange walked with a limp – an effect of surviving polio in childhood. Toward the end of her career the lingering effects of the disease took a severe toll on her body, and when she couldn’t work through the physical pain any longer, began photographing subjects close to home. She worked right up until her death in 1965, planning her MoMA retrospective – the first for any female photographer.
Dorothea Lange Exhibition at the Museum of Modern Art, New York City, 1966. Photo by Rolf R. Petersen.
Her approach to documentary photography remains exemplary today – even if she didn’t always get it right
Lange considered her portrait subjects collaborators and is quoted as saying “I never steal a photograph.” While many of today’s working photographers share that philosophy, every now and again the debate re-surfaces around street photography and photography in third-world countries when a photo feels less like a collaboration and more like exploitation.
Nobody’s perfect of course. Lange admits that she did not ask for the name of her ‘Migrant Mother’ portrait subject, Florence Owens Thompson, who was embarrassed by the photo and didn’t want to be publicly identified when it began to gain recognition. Despite it being one of the works that solidified Lange’s legacy, Thompson received no benefit from it – financial or otherwise – until her family asked for help supporting her medical care at the very end of Thompson’s life.
However, Lange’s limited interaction with Thompson has been attributed to the photographer’s exhaustion after a long trip, and certainly appears to be a deviation from her standard approach of getting to know her subjects. As photographers – and human beings, really – that’s a philosophy we can still learn a lot from.
Fashion photographer and Canon Ambassador Lindsay Adler is the first woman to win Rangefinder‘s Icon of the Year Award. The announcement was made during the WPPI 2020 event last week, where Adler was caught off guard thanks to some careful planning by WPPI and Photo Group Content Director Arlene Evans, as well as Adler’s boyfriend and mother.
Rangefinder explains what it means to be named an ‘Icon,’ stating on its website that an Icon is someone who fills many roles; who is ‘super creative and has extraordinary talent’ in addition to serving as a role model, educator and more.
We contacted Adler to talk about her work, the new milestone award and what it means to her. In talking about winning the award, Adler said:
‘Winning Rangefinder’s Icon of the Year in an incredible honor that makes me feel that I am making an impact on my community and its continued success. This award is a beautiful way to show me that my sharing and love for photography and photographers have not gone unnoticed. I am constantly pushing myself to grow, and I hope this journey encourages others to do this same. I’ve been reading Rangefinder and attending WPPI for more than a decade, and this feels like a beautiful culmination… now I just wonder, what’s next! Can’t get much better than this!’
Adler’s photography has been featured in a number of notable publications, including Harper’s Bazaar, Marie Claire, InStyle and more, and she has worked with major brands like Microsoft, Grey and Edelman. In addition to her photography work, Adler also teaches at events and through various platforms, including everything from online tutorials to books. She explains:
‘My life is centered around creating and sharing. I create images and share the process. I create in-depth tutorials answering all the questions I once had as I grew my career. I create and I share, and I am so lucky to get endless love back from the community—whether in the form of praise, encouragement, or those simply following my journey.’
Behind-The-Scenes image of Adler (far-right) at work with a model.
Adler’s work is showcased on her website, which features collections of photos like ‘Seeing Red,’ ‘Editorial Beauty,’ ‘Skin’ and even ‘Cinemagraphs.’ Looking back over her career, Adler says:
‘I am truly the happiest I’ve ever been and am proud to [have] achieved so many of my life’s goals. I know that along the way there have been so many other gracious photographers, educators and industry leaders that have shared their knowledge, given me opportunities, encouraged me and ultimately been so important to my success. Because of this, I realize just how important it is for those with success to share with their community however they can.’
In addition to her website, Adler’s work can be found on her Instagram and her Canon Ambassador page.
Image credits: Photos used with permission from Lindsay Adler
The post 8 Important Composition Tips for Better Photos (video) appeared first on Digital Photography School. It was authored by Caz Nowaczyk.
In this video from Jamie Windsor, he explores composition tips for better photos.
As Jamie states in his video, sometimes a new photographer can be overwhelmed by all the so-called “rules” of photography. Those, such as the rule of thirds, Fibonacci spiral, and the phi grid. Jamie breaks it down for you, using some classic images by renowned photographers, such as Annie Leibovitz, Sally Mann, Steve McCurry, and Bruce Gilden as examples. While this helps to visualize the points that he is making, it is also great to see many of these fantastic images.
Get your position right
Use your phone to practice composition
Beware the Rule of Thirds
Squint or blur your eyes
Think conceptually as well as aesthetically
Keep it simple
Keep the edges clean
Work in post-processing
You may also like:
How to Use Radial Composition in Photography to Create Awesome Images!
Four Rules of Photographic Composition
Composition Checklist for Beginners
4 of the Most Common Composition Mistakes In Photography
How to Make Brilliant Black and White Photos with Dramatic Composition
The S-Curve: A Landscape Photography Composition Technique
How to Break the Rules with a Central Composition
The post 8 Important Composition Tips for Better Photos (video) appeared first on Digital Photography School. It was authored by Caz Nowaczyk.
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