The world of photography is an exciting one, and it is only getting more and more accessible as technology improves. Technically, anyone with a smartphone can be a photographer; whether or not you choose to be a “good” photographer is up to you. Commercial photographers are some of the most sought after image-takers in the world as they have to Continue Reading
The post 7 Tips and Tricks to Learn From Commercial Photographers appeared first on Photodoto.
Many photographers own two cameras – a DSLR plus lenses for ‘serious’ photography and a compact camera of sorts to carry around for unexpected photo opportunities. Or else they may opt for a so-called ‘bridge’ camera with a built-in zoom lens. Some of these are almost the size of a DSLR which may then lead to the need for a Continue Reading
The post What are the Best Phones for Photographers? appeared first on Photodoto.
Since the first consumer camera was introduced more than 130 years ago, photography folders have provided a solid means for organizing and protecting developed and printed images. Somewhere down the line, ambitious photographers began to use them to market their services and separate themselves from the pack by branding their work. Presentation folders for photographers should be taken seriously because Continue Reading
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Since the first consumer camera was introduced more than 130 years ago, photography folders have provided a solid means for organizing and protecting developed and printed images. Somewhere down the line, ambitious photographers began to use them to market their services and separate themselves from the pack by branding their work. Presentation folders for photographers should be taken seriously because Continue Reading
The post 15 Inspirational Presentation Folders for Professional Photographers appeared first on Photodoto.
The post The Best Photographers Make Time To Practice appeared first on Digital Photography School. It was authored by Charlie Moss.
The 10,000-hour rule is often quoted as the magic number of hours that you need to practice in order to master an activity. Now, I’m not saying that after 10,000 hours of practice you’ll definitely have mastered photography. But I do think it’s true that the more you practice, the better you will get!
The secret of practicing to improve your skills is to have a plan. You need to know what you’re practicing, you need to set goals, and you need to find a way to somehow measure your improvement.
Recently, I spent the day practicing with a new lens at Silverstone motor racing circuit. I just wanted to improve my panning to show speed and learn more about my equipment. I was reminded at the time that many photographers can find real joy in just practicing their craft and trying to improve. So with that in mind, here’s my guide on how to make a plan to make your practicing more productive!
It sounds obvious, but you need to start with something in mind that you’d like to improve. Wanting to improve your photography is too general. Try and narrow it down more. I wanted to improve my automotive photography and identified that shooting moving objects was a real weak spot in my technique.
Once you’ve narrowed it to something specific you can begin to research. Start here on Digital Photography School. There’s a handy search bar on every page to help you find articles that might be useful. Read those articles and make some notes on things to keep in mind when you’re next shooting. Start building your own instruction manual in your own words to take with you.
When you’ve decided the things you want to improve, you need to start planning a subject, time, and a place to shoot. This could be as simple as photographing food in your kitchen, or as complicated as a week-long road trip. Put your plans in your diary and make a note of how long you’ve got to prepare. If you get organized, you’ll be far more likely to stick to your plan.
Make sure what you plan is something you find interesting too. Don’t plan for a day of photography (or even a few hours) that you’ll find boring and won’t enjoy. It’ll only put you off photography in the future.
If you need a piece of equipment that you don’t currently own, now is the time to decide how you’re going to get it. Hiring lenses can be a cheap way to try new options before buying (but borrowing from friends is even cheaper). Sometimes a piece of new equipment can be just what you need to kickstart your photography, but you need to practice and learn how to use it.
For some pieces of equipment, there are even DIY solutions. Don’t be afraid to experiment and try things out. It doesn’t matter if your shots aren’t perfect; this is an exercise in practicing, not perfection!
When you go out shooting to practice, make sure you take your notes with you. It doesn’t matter if they’re in a notebook or on your phone, but make sure you’ve got that research that you did while you were planning.
If you’re trying something new, then you may well have questions as you practice. Even if you’re an old hand at photography, it’s still good to refresh your knowledge before you start taking pictures.
The costs of film and developing don’t limit you in this digital age. This means you have the opportunity to shoot lots of images when you practice.
Digital storage is cheap, so take a couple of memory cards and keep shooting until you get it right.
Make the most of your time out practicing photography and shoot as much as you can. You never know which image you’ve taken will teach you something new. It could be the first, or it could be the last!
I like to make a day of it when I go out practicing, stubbornly shooting images long past everyone else has left, and my friends have got fed up. It feels like the more I practice, the more I learn, so I try to make the most of the opportunities I get to practice.
The aim of practicing isn’t to get images for your portfolio or to take pictures to publish on social media or show your non-photographer friends. The aim is to improve your technique or your creativity.
Check your images as you shoot. The displays on the back of digital cameras are good enough to see if you’re on the right track.
You should be taking the opportunity to try new things and be experimental. Don’t just write off an idea that you’ve had because it won’t work – take the pictures and prove to yourself that it won’t work! You never know what you’ll learn from a failed experiment until you’ve got back home and reviewed the pictures.
Sometimes your practice will be over when you finish shooting. You’ll have learned enough about the technique that you don’t need to review the images.
However, while the experience is fresh in your mind, it’s worth sitting down at a piece of software such as Adobe Lightroom and reviewing the images in conjunction with the EXIF data to try and work out exactly what worked and why (and what didn’t work and why).
The Library module in Adobe Lightroom has the ability to view all the data from your images including shutter speed, ISO, aperture, and focal length. Start pulling up your images one by one, marking the ones that you like, and then reviewing the EXIF data for them.
Ideally, with the research notes that you made before you went shooting, make some notes on how your practice went. Look for patterns in the EXIF data to tell you what was successful and what wasn’t. Write down how you feel about the images, and perhaps make a note for other related techniques that you’d like to work on in the future.
If you consistently made the same mistake over and over while you were practicing, then you’ll want to work out how to fix that for next time.
Read some more articles or even try and find a mentor. Ask questions to your friends who seem to already have the technique nailed (or see if you can go shooting with them for some practice).
Make notes on how to improve for next time using everything you’ve learned so far. If you try and keep it all in your head, then I promise you’ll forget most of it before you get your camera out again!
Practice makes perfect, after all. And you don’t learn everything on your first attempt.
Using the notes and research that you’ve gathered plan another time to practice. Perhaps this time you’ll work on something related that you’ve identified as a weak spot in your technique. Perhaps you could try the same technique but in a different setting (I’m planning a day out shooting moving wildlife next having now practiced on cars at a racing circuit).
Whatever you plan next, don’t stop practicing. Not even after you’ve reached over ten-thousand hours of practice because there’s always something new to learn.
The post The Best Photographers Make Time To Practice appeared first on Digital Photography School. It was authored by Charlie Moss.
The post Is Unsplash Really an Issue for Photographers? appeared first on Digital Photography School. It was authored by Carl Spring.
Joseph Barrientos on Unsplash
Unsplash is killing photography! I am sure you will have read this somewhere? After all, photography blogs have been full of articles like this. You may agree – you may hate Unsplash. You may want to educate every photographer you meet on why they should not upload their photos to the platform. However, despite photographers and websites rallying against it, the platform continues to thrive. But is Unsplash really wrecking the photography industry?
Unsplash started back in 2013 by Mikael Cho. Cho was the founder of the company Crew – a company designed as a marketplace for freelancers. Cho needed images for the home page of his business website but was unable to find the type of images he wanted online and within his price range. To get the images he wanted, he hired a photographer to create the imagery for the brand.
After the shoot, there were several leftover images. So Cho decided to post them on his Tumblr, allowing others to download them for free and use as they wished. Cho uploaded ten free images every ten days. The blog (which also directed people to Crew) was launched on Hacker News and instantly became the top story.
It took off.
Soon millions of people were searching for the images, and thousands were redirected to Crew.
Unsplash launched in May 2013, and by September it had hit one million downloads. In the first 12 months, it reached ten million downloads. This is when Unsplash moved away from Tumblr and launched an independent website.
Since then, it has continued to grow at an alarming rate. I checked the latest Unsplash stats whilst preparing for this article and the numbers are mind-blowing. 21 photos are downloaded from the platform every second!
Unsplash has a community of over 121,000 photographers whose photos have been downloaded heading for one billion times. A partnership with Squarespace allows users to place Unsplash images into their site directly from one of the most popular website builders. Like it or not, Unsplash has changed the photography industry.
Built into Squarespace. It is simple and easy to get copyright-free images.
It is pretty easy to see how Unsplash is affecting the world of commercial photography. The Squarespace/Unsplash partnership is the perfect example of this. As the screenshot below shows, I can go into Unsplash, search for anything and usually find an image. Not just an image, though – a really good quality image. It is easy to see why photographers might be upset about this.
Why pay for a photographer, when I can get something similar to what I want? Want a photo of a beautiful shoreline for an article on the World’s best beaches? Unsplash has the answer. Want a magazine cover for an issue about coffee? They have that too. It is simple to get photographs of pretty much anything – on demand, and for free. Perfect for an editor, but not so much for a photographer.
The issue with Unsplash is that it devalues photography.
High-quality photography is now literally free.
You do not need to budget for it, which is great for small companies who cannot afford bespoke photography. It also means, in the age of good enough is good enough, the bigger companies who can afford great photography, simply don’t see the need.
For every blogger out there who makes no money from their blogs, but wants to be ethical and use images legally, there is also a large media company who simply want to maximize profits.
This problem isn’t new though. In case you have forgotten, the disruption started with the introduction of microstock.
Ryan Holloway on Unsplash
Remember when microstock burst onto the scene? There was an uproar by so many photographers about how it destroyed the stock industry. When researching this article, I found several rants on websites about how microstock was destroying the photography industry. I found stories of people who made a good living in stock photography having their livelihood ruined by the likes of sites like iStock photo. As one photographer wrote about microstock in 2009 “they came in like a drunk bull in a china shop with careless regard for the devastation of the existing market”.
The rise of microstock and the rise of affordable, high-quality digital cameras are easily linked. Technology changed the game – especially the stock photography game – and many didn’t adapt.
The industry changed, rapidly, and many got left behind. When we look at Unsplash, it is hard not to look at microstock. As many photographers use Adobe products, I looked at Adobe stock to see what was happening in the microstock world.
In terms of quality, there is some great stuff on Adobe stock. But whilst it is not free, the pricing structure is hardly enough to make a business out of it.
Looking on their site now, Adobe can purchase 10 images a month for £19.99 (roughly £2.00 per image) or 40 for £47.99 (roughly £1.20 per image). In the UK, the minimum wage is £8.21 per hour meaning that even if the photographer got 100% of the £1.20 per image, they would need to sell roughly 260 images per week to make the UK minimum wage.
I know that if you want to use the image commercially to sell products, the license fee is larger. But still, it is not enough to live off without selling a huge volume.
Yet when was the last time we saw the major photo websites writing hate-filled articles about Adobe ruining photography? Okay, I stand corrected. It all kicked off when it looked like they would increase the photography subscription fee.
But seriously, almost all photographers use Adobe. Even though you can make a little pocket money, Adobe has a business that is strikingly similar to Unsplash, yet nobody mentions it.
The question is though, do we not mention it because we agree with this model, or do we see it as normal now?
I think it is because we see it as normal.
The outrage, the rallying cry of photographers, was drowned out by market forces. This is what is happening with Unsplash. One billion downloads prove that despite the passionate reasoning, arguing, and pleading, once again the market has spoken. They don’t care about your business model; they care about their bottom line.
It appears that the main market that will be affected by Unsplash is microstock. As I said before, microstock was not a way to make a living before Unsplash, so effectively nothing has changed.
Charles ?? on Unsplash
This is the point that tends to make hypocrites of photographers (and the websites) rallying against Unsplash. Many photographers do the exact same thing.
How many photography videos do you see with free-use music in them? Who has used Fiverr for a logo rather than pay a professional designer? Why do we use templates for web design rather than pay a professional web designer to create a bespoke site for us? Photographers do this with other services frequently. What is the difference between free photographs and free music?
Unfortunately, the answer lies in ourselves. We only tend to see the impact of changing business models affecting our own industry. We happily use free music (or the microstock equivalent) without thinking about it, because that’s how it is. Unsplash is now how it is for us. As I said earlier, we adapt, or we die.
My favorite example of hypocrisy was when one of the biggest photography blogs wrote an article about the damage Unsplash is doing to photography. However, in the same article, they admitted that their site had used images from Unsplash for their articles. If that isn’t the perfect description of irony, I don’t know what is.
I have heard many terms like, ‘we need to educate people about this,’ ‘people need to stop being so stupid,’ ‘how can people let their photography be exploited?’
Whilst this is a noble cause, there are huge issues here.
The biggest is the fact that rather than educate, people tend to rant and belittle. Calling people stupid does not help educate them. The fact is, many of them are educated on the facts and choose to do it regardless. They don’t need your approval and trying to tell them they are wrong will achieve nothing but make an enemy of them.
Many people do not want photography careers. Many love the fact that people appreciate their imagery, and that is enough for them.
Photography for many is a passion and an art. Charging for their work takes away their reasons for doing it. Uploading to Unsplash, Pexels or to Flickr with a Creative Commons zero license is a way to get more peoples eyes on their work. And the feedback and likes are their rewards.
This is not wrong. Some people have to accept that others live their lives by different rules, with their own set of morals and they can do whatever they want with their photos. You might not agree, but that is life.
Finally, even if you are right (in your opinion), you cannot educate everybody. It is the equivalent of trying to push water uphill. Many will admire your determination, but unfortunately, in the end, it is futile.
Sebastian Unrau on Unsplash
Rather than give a yes or no answer to this (I will leave that to you guys in the comments), I thought the best way to conclude this article was to look at what you need to be aware of when uploading to Unsplash. Things that you might not know that could help you make informed choices.
Lots of photographers will have heard some variation of the following phrase: “We can’t afford to pay you, but it will be great exposure.”
The problem is, exposure doesn’t pay the bills. I can’t pay for my electricity with a photo credit. And, I can’t pay for my food with exposure either.
However, I have done work for exposure, to get in with the right people, that has lead to paid work. I wrote about this in a previous blog post.
There is no doubt that Unsplash provides photographers with great exposure. Unsplash is used by influential people every day. Being on the platform is a great way to get your work seen by these people. There are stories of people out there who, through their work on Unsplash, have been offered high-paid jobs with major clients. However, this is not the norm.
Unsplash, will more than likely not make you any money. Microstock may make you a small amount of money, but without a huge library, this is not an income you can use to start saving for a Ferrari. In fact, you will probably struggle to buy a toy Ferrari.
It is important to go into this with this in mind.
People who use your images will generally not bother to credit you. Most of them will not even care about you. You may end up on the cover of a high-end magazine and never even know about it. For better or worse, this is how Unsplash works. Your photos are free, and they will be treated as such. Your work (and by extension you) will generally be given zero respect.
Zack Arias summed this up best in one of his videos on the subject of Unsplash. He tells the story of a woman whose photo was used on a gift guide for a major UK bridal publication. The photographer was not informed about this or offered a copy of the magazine for her portfolio. Instead, she simply happened to stumble across it when browsing magazines in a coffee shop. This magazine’s full-page ad rate is £10,000, and she did not even get a photo credit or an email to thank her. This shows you the value placed on your work.
The thrill of getting featured can lose a little shine when you look at it like this.
Sasha • Stories on Unsplash
This is the educational part. The Unsplash license does not cover the use of an identifiable person in a commercial setting. You, as the photographer, are liable. If a photo ends up being used commercially via Unsplash and you do not have a model release, then you had better have deep pockets (and a good legal team), because if the subject in the photo objects, you are in big trouble.
A model release should be completed by anyone whose photo you plan to upload to Unsplash, even family members or partners. A partner can soon become an angry ex-partner with a grudge. If a photo of them you uploaded to Unsplash gets used commercially, you may end up in a world of pain.
A simple Google search will help you find an appropriate model release. There are also many model release apps. This allows you to digitally store the release and allow the model to sign it on your phone. Simply put, there is no excuse for not using a model release; you need to protect yourself. This should be something you always do when photographing models, Unsplash or not.
Is Unsplash ruining photography? No. It’s changing it.
Photography, like many industries, is in constant flux. It is disrupting traditional income models, but I think microstock was much more disruptive.
Is Unsplash taking advantage of people? Again, it depends on your point of view.
The people who upload to Unsplash know what they are doing. Some may be naive in thinking this is the easy way to photography stardom. However, I bet that for some of them, it will be the start of a great career. Just because it is different, doesn’t always make it wrong.
What do you think? Share with us in the comments below.
The post Is Unsplash Really an Issue for Photographers? appeared first on Digital Photography School. It was authored by Carl Spring.
Moment has introduced a new range of sling-style bags and a series of wallet cases for photographers who like to travel light. Described as part fanny-pack, part sling the bags are intended to look good and be functional at the same time.
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The bags are designed to hold a mobile phone as well as Moment’s accessory smartphone lenses and even a small compact camera, as well as the usual travel essentials like passports. The bags can be worn over the shoulder like a sling or around the waist like a fanny pack, and come in a range of materials and colors.
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Smaller wallet cases are aimed at those who want to carry only daily essentials along with their phone, while a new line of phone cases come with pockets for credit cards for those who really want to travel light.
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The Fanny Slings costs $ 69.99 and the Crossbody Wallets cost $ 74.99. To purchase either or for more information visit the Moment website.
Articles: Digital Photography Review (dpreview.com)
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Québec City Jean Lesage International Airport, often shortened to Jean Lesage International Airport, has made camera holes in a range of locations around its perimeter fence to allow photographers an unhindered view of planes taking off, landing and moving along its runways and taxi areas.
The airport has propelled itself to the number one spot for aviation photographers with the project. Metal frames surround the holes to prevent wire scratching lenses and accompanying signs to clarify the area is reserved for photographers.
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The airport got together with local plane-spotting group YQB Aviation to identify the best angles for photographers and then created a total of 10 sites all around the airport that provide views of exactly what photographers want to shoot, seen in the image below:
Jean Lesage International Airport which recently won awards for its environmental practices and as an outstanding workplace, and which carried almost 1.8 million passengers in 2018, also hosted a 5km run on its runways earlier this month to offer locals a different view of the airport.
Photo credit: Images by Jean-Lesage International airport, used with permission.
Articles: Digital Photography Review (dpreview.com)
Many photographers own two cameras – a DSLR plus lenses for ‘serious’ photography and a compact camera of sorts to carry around for unexpected photo opportunities. Or else they may opt for a so-called ‘bridge’ camera with a built-in zoom lens. Some of these are almost the size of a DSLR which may then lead to the need for a Continue Reading
The post What are the Best Phones for Photographers? appeared first on Photodoto.
The post Adobe Price Hike Just a ‘Test’; Should Photographers Be Worried? appeared first on Digital Photography School. It was authored by Jaymes Dempsey.
Adobe made waves earlier this month when it doubled the price of its Creative Cloud Photography plan–from $ 9.99/month to $ 19.99/month.
Soon after, the price reverted back to the original. And Adobe has assured its customers that it was just testing a new price.
But this begs the question:
Should photographers be concerned?
It’s not like we haven’t seen this before. Last year, Adobe announced price increases for a number of its CC products, though the Photography plan was spared. So the Photography plan – which includes Photoshop, Lightroom, and Lightroom Classic – remained an affordable deal for professional photographers.
But if Adobe is testing out a price increase, then it’s no doubt a real possibility for the future.
If that’s the case, would Lightroom and Photoshop be worth it?
The increased price did come with one benefit: Creative Cloud storage, which currently sits at 20GB, shot up to 1TB.
(It’s now back to 20GB.)
But how many photographers have been waiting for additional storage? For many photographers, the increased CC storage is worth little.
Maybe it’s time to start looking into other options.
In the past few years, a number of strong Photoshop and Lightroom contenders have been released–and at significantly lower price points.
For instance, Affinity Photo retails at a one-time payment of $ 49.99. It offers many of the same functions as Photoshop, including basic editing tools, layers, and some more sophisticated options, such as lens distortion corrections.
And ON1 Photo RAW is a neat alternative to Lightroom. For a single payment of $ 79.99, you get a combination of advanced photo editing and photo organization software. Plus, it comes with a set of excellent presets.
Photographers should also check out Luminar 3. This is a full-featured program, offering an excellent combination of basic editing options, local adjustments, and photo organization. All for a one-time price of $ 70.
A couple more options:
Here’s the bottom line:
With Adobe considering a Lightroom/Photoshop price hike, other options (which you can purchase for a one-time fee) have suddenly become far more enticing.
For those of you who aren’t willing to fork out the additional US$ 10 per month, take a look at these other options.
Just in case.
The post Adobe Price Hike Just a ‘Test’; Should Photographers Be Worried? appeared first on Digital Photography School. It was authored by Jaymes Dempsey.
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