Sharing photos from a phone is easy as breathing these days, and we have Philippe Khan to thank for paving the way. In June 1997, he achieved a technological first that would be repeated countless times in the following decades: he shared a digital photo instantly.
It all came together just under the wire in the delivery room where his wife Sonia was in labor with their daughter, Sophie. He connected his Casio QV-10 camera to his laptop, and with a his flip phone rigged up to the laptop by way of a makeshift cable, the system was ready for Sophie’s arrival.
His laptop was connected to a server at home, already configured to send email notifications to friends and family once his photo and text were transmitted. He snapped the photo, and an email with a link to the photo was sent out to 2000 people. There are a lot fewer cables involved in the process today, but basically, we’re doing the same thing in delivery rooms twenty years later. New parents everywhere thank you, Philippe.
Nikon Ambassador Joshua Cripps was lucky enough to get hold of one of the company’s new lenses recently, for a shoot in Patagonia. Joshua took the new AF-S Fisheye NIKKOR 8-15mm F3.5-4.5E ED, along with his D810, to the southern area of the country. There, he shot the mountains, lakes and glaciers that make Patagonia such a popular location with photographers.
The sun setting over as mountain in southern Patagonia. Photo by Joshua Cripps, used with permission.
While many people avoid fisheye lenses on the (mistaken) assumption that they will always create unnaturally distorted images, Joshua found that with practice, the 8-15mm can be used to create very naturalistic compositions, with the benefit of a much wider field of view than would be possible with a conventional wide-angle lens.
As well as stills, he also used the new 8-15mm to create some time-lapse video.
Read Joshua Cripps’ first impressions of the Nikon 8-15mm fisheye
Samsung has introduced its new CHG90 monitor, which has an impressive 49-inch screen and ultra-wide 32:9 aspect ratio. It features a VA curved display with quantum dot technology, supports 125% of sRGB and 95% of DCI-P3 color spaces, and features HDR ‘picture enhancement technology.’
It’s hard to get a sense of the display’s size from photos, but this youtube video from BWOne is very helpful in that regard.
The resolution may bring a bit of disappointment, however. Most photographers in the market for a new display today are probably focused on 4K or even 5K options, but the CHG90’s resolution is 3840×1080 pixels. (Basically, it’s two 1080HD screens side-by-side.) That won’t provide the high pixel densities many of us are used to, but it does deliver a lot of horizontal real estate.
Samsung makes it pretty clear that this monitor is aimed at gamers, but it got me thinking… would you use a display like this for photo editing? It would be a heck of a way to scroll through my Lightroom library, and I can see hard-core panorama photographers nodding their heads in agreement, but what about the rest of us? What do you think?
The Dismal River in Nebraska Sand Hills is one of my favorite paddling destination. I started paddling the Dismal in 2001 when training for Texas Water Safari. The river felt quite similar to the San Marcos River in Texas. Since […] paddling with a camera
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Garrett Ellwood’s body of work speaks for itself. He’s a seasoned sports photographer and, according to his website, has been the official team photographer for the Charlotte Hornets, Carolina Panthers, Denver Nuggets and Colorado Rapids. Since 1995, he’s photographed 19 NBA Finals. So he’s got some experience.
While Ellwood’s more ‘standard’ action shots are well executed, images like the one above spark a lot of interest and attention because they’re different. Ellwood is still capturing a moment, a play in the game, but the result is evidence of greater pre-visualization and planning. Oh, and triggers, and very powerful strobes.
For those who aren’t sports shooters or who aren’t well-versed in using flash, here’s a quick breakdown of his (likely) setup.
A post shared by Garrett Ellwood (@gwephoto) on
The first thing you’d need for this sort of stuff is permission, and given Ellwood’s experience, he’s sure to have it. Next, you’ll need radio triggers; PocketWizard’s are the industry standard, and cost a pretty penny, but they’re reliable and have great range. You’ll then need to mount your strobe pretty high up in the rafters, and because of the distance from your subjects, it’d better be powerful.
We can also tell from these images that it’s likely a bare bulb (evident in the first image from the very hard shadows, the second image appears to have players more ‘filled in’ from light reflecting off the court). It looks to be in a cone-shaped reflector of some sort, or behind a grid – we can see this from the pronounced falloff midway up the court. Ellwood could have underexposed the background in two ways; first, he could have used a very narrow aperture, or he could have used high-speed sync, or a combination of the two. From there, just pump up the flash power to your desired level, and fire away.
The result is a decidedly different and dramatic look. The moral of the story? You don’t have to keep the strobes relegated to staged portraiture or studio shots – experiment with how your particular setup allows you to balance with ambient lighting scenarios, and have fun!
For more: Garrett Ellwood’s Instagram, portfolio, and a slideshow of additional images from NBA.com.
Some ideas are apparently too good to let die. DW Photo of Braunschweig, Germany, has become the latest company to attempt to produce the Hy6 645 medium format camera. This follows the collapse of DHW Fototechnik, which itself took over responsibility from the defunct Franke & Heidecke, which grew from the remains of Rollei.
The company will produce the Hy6 mod2 version of the camera, originally released in 2012 and use manufacturing facilities at the former Rollei factory. The camera will cost €5950.
German photo site Photoscala also has a fascinating look at how the camera, once sold under the Leaf, Sinar and Rolleiflex brands, came into being and how its collaborative development following the fall of Rollei has created a legal tangle for anyone trying to bring the camera back to market. Even in Google Translated form, it’s well worth a read.
Historic architecture meets modern art on the canals of Venice, where a pair of gigantic hands emerge from the depths to lend support above the waterline.
Designed by Lorenzo Quinn, “Support” was put into place a month in advance of the 57th International Art Biennale but is already drawing massive crowds ahead of its official debut.
It was prefabricated and shipped into positioned down the Grand Canal, then assembled and positioned so that it appears to support the Sagredo Hotel, a structure dating back to the 14th century.
Like many historic buildings in the city, this one rises straight up from the water — also like others, it is threatened by the prospect of higher sea levels as well as sinking and settling of the ground below.
“I wanted to sculpt what is considered the hardest and most technically challenging part of the human body. the hand holds so much power – the power to love, to hate, to create, to destroy” says the artist.
“Venice is a floating art city that has inspired cultures for centuries, but to continue to do so it needs the support of our generation and future ones, because it is threatened by climate change and time decay.”
A post shared by Nicolas Falcone (@nic.falcone) on
Le mani sono strumenti che possono tanto distruggere il mondo quanto salvarlo e trasmettono un istintivo sentimento di nobiltà e grandezza in grado anche di generare inquietudine poiché il gesto generoso di sostenere l'edificio ne evidenzia la fragilità. #venezia#venice#casagredohotel#mani#scultura#arte#support#lorenzoquinn#igersvenezia#igersveneto#loves_united_venice#loves_venezia#loves_veneto#veneziaunica#veneto_best_pics#veneto_in#loves_united_veneto#venetissimo#ig_venice#veniceinlove#loves_united_italy#loves_united_team#loves_united_details#volgoitalia#labellavenezia#volgoveneto#loves_veneto#venezia??
“Reflecting on the two sides of human nature, the creative and the destructive, as well as the capacity for humans to act and make an impact on history and the environment, Quinn addresses the ability for humans to make a change and re-balance the world around them—environmentally, economically, socially,” writes the Halycon Gallery, which represents Quinn.
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During its I/O 2017 conference yesterday, Google demonstrated a new algorithm-based technology that can remove unwanted objects from existing photographs. The demonstration showed the technology removing a chainlink fence from the foreground of an image, with the final result offering no discernible indications that the fence had ever existed (around 10:45 in the video below).
The technology was demonstrated on stage by Google’s CEO Sundar Pichai during a conversation about the company’s expanding visual technology. ‘Coming very soon,’ Pichai explained, ‘if you take a picture of your daughter at a baseball game and there’s something obstructing it, we can do the hard work and remove that structure and have the picture of what matters to you in front of you.’
It looks to be an evolution of the research Google and MIT have been collaborating on for some time – in fact, their demonstration from 2015 includes a very similar chain-link fence demo. This method takes advantage of the parallax effect to identify and remove obstructions from photos.
Unfortunately, Pichai didn’t elaborate on when this technology will be made available aside from ‘very soon,’ nor did he specify where the technology will be available. Given the company’s Google Photos announcements, however, it seems likely the technology will be implemented within that product.
We had a little bit of time to try out the new Olympus Tough TG-5 prior to its launch, in and around the waters of Seattle. As the weather improves, we’ll look to update this gallery with additional underwater samples and a range of samples from various lighting conditions. For now, wet your whistle with these.
Few things are as unshakable as the bond between humanity and our canine companions, except, perhaps, the bond between those canine companions and some good old tennis balls. Of course, the Sony X3000 action camera has optical stabilization, so it should be pretty unshakable too, but you’ll just have to watch the video to find out how it does.
The video is part of an action camera roundup The Wirecutter did earlier this year, which includes the GoPro Hero5 Black, the Sony FDR-X3000 that’s used above, and the Yi 4K Action Camera, which was actually one of our favorites.
For the full scoop, head on over to the The Wirecutter, or catch the highlights on Engadget.
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