Hamburg, NY– Buffalo Raceway is excited to announce a new track photographer for the 82nd harness racing season, John Emmerling.
Emmerling, a Hamburg native, has been an avid amateur photographer for the past 20 years. He has always enjoyed racing, action, and aviation photography. When the position at Buffalo Raceway opened this past fall, Emmerling jumped at the opportunity to take a more professional approach.
“I’m very excited” John Emmerling explained. “The more I look into the role, the more I realize that this is kind of an exclusive club. There aren’t many horse racing photographers. I’m proud and thrilled to be part of the group.”
While Emmerling may be a new face around the track, he is not a total rookie around horses. His daughter rode horses for years, and he worked at the barn where she rode.
Race photos will be available for order on Emmerling’s business website www.barnstormerimages.com. He can also take orders by email at barnstormerent@gmail.com or phone at 716-415-7716.
by Paige Usiak, for Buffalo Raceway
Apple’s iPhone has one of the strongest performing point-and-shoot cameras around. You don’t have to be a professional photographer to get a great shot from an iPhone, you just have to be able to press the shutter button and most of the hard work will be done for you.
That’s not to say the native camera app on iPhone offers everything, however. There’s no Magic Editor like Google offers on its Pixel 8 Pro, for example. Don’t worry though: whether you’re looking for extra functionality or you want to make the great pictures you’ve taken even better, these are the best iPhone photography apps out there to download.
There are a number of editing capabilities within iPhone’s native camera app, but Darkroom: Photo & Video Editor takes things to the next level, delivering excellent control over your images and videos. From real-time video playback and 4K video color grading to AI-enhanced depth editing and precise object detection, Darkroom will help transform your images and videos into something rather special.
There’s full resolution editing with more than 650 RAW formats supported, 16-bit color depth available and you can create your own presets too, whilst performing simpler editing tasks like cropping and adjusting background blur. There’s also the ability to batch process a selection of images and an integrated hashtag manager for super easy photo organisation too.
If you’re looking for a photo editing app that will do everything from whitening up your gnashers to nipping in your waist in your swimming trunks or bikini shots, YouCam Perfect will have your back. It will make a not-so-great selfie fabulous (even if a little fake), whilst also offering up avatars, filters and frames to add a slice of fun to your images too.
If slimming down your thighs or smoothing out your wrinkles isn’t for you, there’s also object removal, enabling you to remove a bin or another person from your otherwise Instagram-perfect shot, for example. And if that wasn’t enough, you can add animated effects to your selfies, and remove backgrounds.
Some photography apps are for editing, others give you more control at the capturing stage. The Pro Camera app falls into the latter, offering pro-level camera controls such as the ability to adjust shutter speed, ISO, exposure, focus and white balance. It will give you the power to split focus and exposure for the trickier shots, choose between thirds, square and golden ratio for the viewfinder grid and you can capture in uncompressed RAW, JPEG or HEIF formats.
There are a number of features for filmmakers too, including choosing between several color spaces and shooting in several codecs, along with a waveform monitor and RGB histogram. For those wanting to shoot serious shots with plenty of control, this is the app you’ll want to download
Adobe’s Lightroom is arguably one of the most famous photo editing apps and for good reason. There are a huge range of features built into it, and it’s catered to multiple levels of ability too, from seasoned professionals to those just wanting to enhance their photos and videos easily. There are AI-powered features from a one-tap Auto option and recommended filter presets, to precise editing through masking.
When you move past the AI features, there are controls for retouching and removing objects, editing hue, saturation, luminance and color grading and adjusting exposure, highlights, shadows, contrast, color and curves with precision sliders. In case that wasn’t sufficient though, there’s also a built-in camera delivering full manual controls, as well as RAW capture and you can apply presets in real time.
Snapseed is owned by Google and while it brings a whole host of features for iPhone, there is no Pixel Magic Editor sadly. That said, it offers plenty to make up for that with everything from healing for removing that irritating person that stepped in your shot, to Lens Blur for adding a bokeh effect to images.
As you might expect from a photo editing app, you can adjust exposure and color automatically or manually, as well as crop, enhance details, adjust curves and change the perspective of your images. This app is a photo and video editor only rather than a replacement camera app, but it will offer up tutorial cards with tips and tricks for the app itself, as well as photography in general. You never know, you might learn something.
VSCO is both a photo and video editor, as well as a potential replacement for the built-in camera app. It prides itself on being all about creativity, offering a number of free specialised presets for filtered effects, whilst also offering tools like Contrast and Saturation, Grain and Fade for various textures and results, and Crop and Skew for a different perspective.
There’s also the capacity to create video montages, as well as GIFs, while the premium subscription of VSCO introduces access to over 200 presets, along with advanced photo editing tools like HSL and Split Tone.
If you constantly find yourself taking incredible images but there’s a car in the shot, a tree in the wrong place, an extra person you didn’t want or a wire fence in front of an animal, then TouchRetouch is the app you’ll want on your iPhone. Rather than being about adjusting exposure and color levels, TouchRetouch is about making imperfections disappear.
It can remove a stain from a top, a street sign or person from a background or a mesh from the foreground. If you have a blemish on your face ruining that otherwise perfect selfie, it will have you covered and it can even remove text from Instagram and Snapchat posts. For the times when it goes overboard, there’s a clone tool for manual retouching.
Similar to Pro Camera mentioned above, Halide Mark II is a professional camera app for iPhone that is designed to be used in place of the native camera app. It’s designed for when you’re in the mood for capturing more serious photographs rather than a quick picture to send around the family WhatsApp group.
You can switch between automatic and manual shooting, depending on your mood and how creative you’re feeling, and there’s a huge number of features, including a gesture-based interface and the ability to use it one-handed. Whether you’re after histograms, waveforms or zebra stripes, this app will sort you out and if you have an Apple Watch, there is a companion app for remote shooting too.
If the perfect selfie is what you’re after, the Lensa app is one of the best out there. It’s a photo editing app rather than a replacement camera app, but snap that shot, import it into Lensa and you can smooth out your skin, blur the background, highlight your face and get rid of any other imperfections you don’t like.
If you really want to go to town on your poor face, you can get rid of eye bags with a single swipe, emphasize and add contrast to your eyes and thicken your eyebrows. Sounding like a lot of hard work? Don’t worry, there’s an Auto Adjust option to do everything or you. Just remember though, to someone you already look perfect.
This feature is part of iPhone Photography Week 2024. Expect new posts to appear daily, focused on making your photos shot with iPhone better than ever before.
Share your photos with iMore on X (Twitter) using #iMorePhotographyWeek
Image via Tyler Smiley.
This sanderling photo, taken at Fowler Beach, is one of the two pictures selected to move onto the final round for the Bird Photographer of the Year competition.
Tyler Smiley, a 2014 graduate of Phoenixville High School, is on his way to the final round of the global Bird Photographer of the Year competition, writes staff for The Daily Local News.
Out of the 10 photos that Smiley submitted, two of them advanced to the final round. His images included birds from in and around Rehoboth Beach, Delaware, including ospreys, herons, and screech owls. Small shorebirds known as sanderlings were the subject of the two photographs chosen.
“It is no small feat to reach this round of the competition, that’s for sure. When I entered, I don’t think I could have ever expected it, but I am extremely proud that it happened,” he said.
After high school, Smiley went to the University of South Carolina and then worked in marketing and real estate at the Delaware Beaches before he resolved to make photography his full-time job and passion in 2022. In addition to landscapes and wildlife around Delaware, he also does real estate and property photography.
The winner of the competition will be chosen in September 2024, with a grand prize of 3,000 Pounds, or around 3,793 USD.
“To say I’m grateful to be doing something I love as my career would be an understatement. Each day is more exciting than the last, and I am extremely grateful for the opportunities photography has given me,” Smiley said.
Read more about Tyler Smiley and his photographs submitted to the Bird Photographer of the Year competition at The Daily Local News.
______
Two long-eared owls appear to merge into one in this photograph taken in the city of Elburg in the Netherlands.
Hobbyist photographer Martin van der Kruijk captured the moment the birds, informally known as lesser horned owls or cat owls, nestled close to one another on a branch, their heads seemingly morphing into one.
The species raises its head feathers – known as “ear tufts”, despite not being used for hearing – when alarmed and is known to have extensive breeding ranges.
The birds are found across the UK, much of Europe, northern Africa, areas of North America and parts of Russia and China.
They are specialised predators, with their diets comprised almost entirely of small rodents, but they can adapt to digest a diversity of prey if their environment changes, including insects and other birds.
There are Gauri Gill and Rajesh Vangad’s portraits of a village in India’s coastal state of Maharashtra. Over Gill’s black-and-white photographic prints of quiet countryside, tribal artist Vangad has daubed a layer of intricate glyphs.
In one scene, a river’s fish are poisoned by the leakage of toxic waste – invisible to Gill’s camera, but pictured dripping into the water by Vangad. In another, a man walks through a forest glade, gathering herbs for medicine, and is enveloped by the painter in a cosmic web of stars and birds. It suggests an immense world, resonating beyond the confines of rural life.
And it’s Sarkissian who reminds you how fickle a photograph really is. His portraits of emptied rooms, from Lebanon to Brazil, look banal, hardly worth a second look, until you learn their sad secret. These living rooms and hallways, a Hello Kitty blanket and even a messy upright piano, are the places in which a missing person – disappeared in war or because of political dissent – was last seen.
Many people are troubled by how easily images of suffering are reproduced. Whether in a charity advert, or a newspaper, are we not in danger of reducing human pain to undignified spectacle?
Sarkissian’s pictures achieve something remarkable. You cannot gawp at them, or ignore them. He has spoken of using silence “as a tool to bring the viewer closer to the image”. They are haunted, and they still haunt me.
Art is not a competition. But if I had to throw my lot in with any of these, it would be the Austrian provocateur: her barbed assaults on voyeuristic men are spiked with wit.
One time, Export reportedly paraded through a pornographic cinema in crotchless trousers: a proud two fingers up at the male gaze, she thought. Later, she struck a macho pose, spreading her legs insouciantly, while clutching a rifle: in the gallery, she’s glowering for the camera, her hair a mad mess. It’s defiant, and rather crass – and that’s why I love it.
From Friday Feb 23-Jun 2; thephotographersgallery.org.uk
A central Iowa photographer is facing sexual exploitation and child pornography charges.
Information released from the Iowa Southern District U.S. Attorney’s office says 61-year-old Jeffrey Gray of Des Moines is accused of using hidden cameras in changing rooms at his photography business to produce child pornography from approximately 2005 to 2016.
Investigators say they recovered information from a hard drive at his business called Wicked Imagery. They say 15 minor victims have been identified, and they are asking for the public’s assistance in identifying other minors who may’ve been involved.
Any who thinks they have information relevant to the investigation is asked to visit www.fbi.gov/JeffreyGray.WickedImagery or email [email protected].
While the original iPhone revolutionized the smartphone, it’s fair to say that its camera was lacking. But a lot has changed since June 2007, the best iPhones have become image-making powerhouses that can capture high-resolution images and 4K video; conquer challenging low-light conditions; and expand creative options, thanks to multiple camera modules. Some even boast professional features such as Apple ProRaw and ProRes capture, as well as in-body image stabilization.
It’s not surprising then that the iPhone has become the camera of choice for casual photographers and has even been adopted by professional content creators. But while each new iteration increases the versatility of this multimedia multi-tool, there are still a few essential accessories that will help you up your production values and squeeze every ounce of creativity out of your iPhone. Here are my top picks…
Mike Harris
I’m Deputy Editor of N-Photo: The Nikon Magazine, but moonlight as iMore’s go-to photography know-it-all. I’ve worked in the photo industry for over six years and have been an avid iPhone photographer since the iPhone 4. I firmly believe that iPhone photography is a great starting point for burgeoning photographers, so I’ve created a series of iPhone photography basics tutorials so you can either firm up your existing iPhone camera skills or embark on a whole new passion.
If you’re looking to find that magic accessory that will have an instant impact on the quality of your iPhone photos, then a tripod and tripod mount is as close as you’re going to get. Being able to lock your iPhone on a tripod will allow you to steady your Night Mode images to mitigate camera shake, while enabling you to precisely refine your framing when composing images.
The downside of using a tripod is that it will hamper the portability of your iPhone setup, so it’s best reserved for situations where you have a particular image in mind and you know it’s going to be used.
You can’t just use any tripod though. You need to find either a dedicated iPhone tripod or an iPhone tripod head. Various manufacturers make iPhone-compatible tripod heads such as PopSocket and Joby. Look for a head with a standard tripod thread so it can be attached to most camera tripods. You can also pick up MagSafe tripods and heads, such as the Joby GripTight Mount for MagSafe.
Before the days of social media, the most talked about filters in photography were physical pieces of glass that you placed directly in front of a camera’s lens. And just like today’s digital filters, physical filters are used to alter the look of an image in a variety of ways. The most common filters used by photographers are neutral density filters (ND filters) and polarizing filters.
The former acts like a pair of sunglasses, partially blocking light and forcing the camera to shoot longer exposures – ideal for blurring movement in bright conditions, such as waterfalls. The latter blocks polarized light, which cuts reflections and glare, and adds contrast to blue skies.
Nowadays, you can pick up a variety of iPhone-compatible filters, from NDs and polarizers to red filters that add punch to black and white images, mist filters that add an ethereal haze to lighting and more. You’ll find iPhone filters to suit various budgets too. At the more affordable end of the scale, you’ll find sets like the NEEWER 67mm Clip On Filters Kit. And at the more expensive end of the spectrum, you can pick up premium filters from dedicated camera filter manufacturers such as NiSi, like the NiSi IP-A Landscape Kit for iPhone.
An iPhone camera grip like the ShiftCam SnapGrip isn’t an essential accessory, but could prove very useful if you’re an avid iPhone photographer. The biggest advantages of attaching a grip to your iPhone are that it allows you to hold the device much more securely and with greater comfort. Not only does this mean you’re less likely to drop your phone, but you’re also less likely to experience camera shake – helpful when shooting Night Mode long exposures – because a grip allows you to hold your iPhone in a much more stable position.
Pressing the shutter button is when unwanted movement is most likely to happen, since depressing a volume button or tapping the screen can cause you to move the camera. With a grip, you’re able to firmly hold your camera while resting your finger on a dedicated shutter button, meaning you can fire the shutter in a less intrusive manner.
The ShiftCam SnapGrip is easily attached via MagSafe and your iPhone can be spun into landscape- or portrait-orientation positions so you can continue grasping the grip, while shooting horizontally or vertically. It also doubles as a powerbank and dock, is available in a variety of colors, and can be purchased standalone or with other accessories – including a tripod and ring light – as part of two different Creator Kits.
Ever noticed a fuzzy dot or two on your images, patches of blurriness that have nothing to do with your point of focus or an overall haziness? You could have a blob of dirt, an oily fingerprint or a patch of condensation on the front element of one of your iPhone’s camera modules. It’s certainly not uncommon for an iPhone lens to require cleaning, after all, iPhones are constantly shoved in and out of pockets, dropped, rained on and situated near food.
Thankfully, visible specks of dust and dirt in your images aren’t common, since the small size of a camera module’s front element provides very little surface area for debris to settle on and ‘dust spots’ are less visible at the very wide apertures used by iPhones. Condensation is really only a problem if you’re quickly moving your iPhone between very warm and very cold temperatures. But easily the most common reason why you’ll need to clean a lens is fingerprints. Ideally, you don’t want to touch your iPhone’s lens elements, but you inevitably will do, often when you’re removing it from your pocket or even holding it while taking a photo.
That’s why I always carry around a microfiber cloth, so I can quickly remove grime at a moment’s notice. If I’m dealing with a particularly stubborn deposit, I personally choose to use ZEISS Lens Wipes, ZEISS being a legendary lens manufacturer. However, as far as I’m aware, these are not endorsed by Apple, so use them at your own discretion. Guidelines for cleaning Apple products can be found via .
If you’re an iPhone-wielding maverick who parades your ‘naked’ device around in all its aerospace-grade aluminum (or titanium) glory then you do you, but the vast majority of iPhone users seek to safeguard their precious investment with a case. However, if you find yourself increasingly using your iPhone for photography, then it might be worth investing in something a little more robust. The best rugged cases are a good shout, with brands such as Otterbox and Mous providing durable cases to help mitigate damage.
If you’re not likely to be trudging through muddy fields and scrambling across rocks to capture incredible landscapes, you could always plump for a slightly ironic iPhone case, which transforms your iPhone into a retro-looking camera. The Yatchen Emily in Paris Phone Case looks like a vintage SLR and even includes a couple of buttons that sit on top of the volume dials to mimic a shutter button. Okay, so this one’s a little tongue in cheek, but if you want to look like an avid street photographer or are a superfan of Netflix rom-com Emily in Paris and fancy a phone case just like the series’ titular character, then this one might be for you.
Gimbals are used by videographers to stabilize handheld footage. They feature multiple rotating axes to keep the camera on an even keel, even as the camera operator moves around. You might be thinking that your iPhone already features in-built image stabilization and you’d be right. All currently supported iPhones have some form of optical image stabilization [OIS].
Apple’s standard OIS moves the lens to help stabilize footage, while later models added sensor-shift optical image stabilization (debuted on the iPhone 12 Pro Max) which moves the sensor instead. The iPhone 15 Pro Max takes things a step further with 3D sensor‑shift optical image stabilization in its 5x Telephoto lens.
But while the latest iPhone’s boast very impressive image stabilization, there are a couple of reasons why using a gimbal will provide you with better results. Firstly, iPhone lenses are not built equally. For example, even in the case of the iPhone 15 Pro Max, the Main camera system boasts Apple’s second-gen sensor-shift tech, but the Ultra Wide lens doesn’t have any form of OIS. If you’re using a gimbal, you’ll be able to stabilize it anyway.
Secondly, while iPhone 14 and 15 users can take advantage of Apple’s Enhanced Stabilization for video, a gimbal will provide better quality footage. You see, unlike OIS, which works by physically shifting the sensor or lens to compensate for movement, Enhanced Stabilization is purely digital. It crops into the sensor to create a border of footage, so the frame can be shifted, digitally. The downside of this is that you lose pixels by cropping into the footage, so for the best quality and smoothest video, gimbals reign supreme.
Finally, gimbals tend to be jam-packed with additional features. I use a Joby Smart Stabilizer, which features a joystick to smoothly pan and tilt the iPhone, an app that enables face and object tracking and even an extendable handle, useful for vlogging. Another great iPhone-compatible gimbal is the DJI Osmo Mobile 6.
If you’re trying to create more professional videos, focusing all of your efforts on capturing better looking footage will only get you so far. Audio has a huge impact on the overall production value of a video. It’s no good having stunning-looking footage, with audio that’s muffled, or dogged with popping sounds thanks to the battering wind.
What microphone you choose will depend on the type of audio you’re trying to capture and you’ll find a huge variety of iPhone-compatible mics available. If you’re a vlogger, a lavalier mic such as the MAYBESTA Professional Wireless Lavalier Lapel Microphone would be a good investment. These tiny microphones clip onto clothing, so you can capture great-quality audio, while keeping your hands free.
If you only ever shoot voiceover [VO], then a standalone condenser mic like the Shure MV5 Digital Condenser Microphone would be a good choice. Condenser microphones come in cardioid and omnidirectional flavors. The former is best – unless you’re working in a soundproof room – as it will pick up sound from a single direction, meaning you’re less likely to introduce unwanted, ambient noises.
And finally, for a versatile microphone that can be used to record distant or multiple sounds, a piece to camera and even VO, you may wish to consider a shotgun microphone. These microphones are typically attached to the camera via a rig, grip or tripod head, but can also be positioned off-camera on a boom arm or stand. However, a tiny example that will perch right atop your iPhone is the RØDE Microphones VideoMic Me-L Microphone. Shotgun microphones can be fitted with windshields to prevent popping and are highly directional, meaning they have to be pointed towards the audio source.
You might already assume that your iPhone is waterproof. After all, the iPhone 12 and later models have an IP68 water-resistance rating, with a “maximum depth of 6 metres up to 30 minutes,” according to . Heck, while depths and times vary, you can go back even farther – the iPhone XS has an IP68 rating and even the iPhone 7 has an IP67 rating according to IEC standards.
But you should never knowingly submerge your iPhone in water. If it gets water damaged, it won’t be covered under warranty. Water resistance ratings should only be considered as a failsafe, should your iPhone accidentally take a tumble into the washing-up bowl. Hopefully, it’ll be fine… But it’s important to note that water resistance degrades over time, something Apple makes very clear.
So, if you want to use your iPhone to indulge in a spot of underwater photography during that once-in-a-lifetime snorkeling trip, an underwater housing is essential. Products range from waterproof pouches that can be picked up for pittance on Amazon to hundreds-of-dollars housings that are designed to accommodate more adventurous underwater adventures, such as the SeaLife SportDiver Underwater Smartphone Housing, which features dual leak alarms, large tactile controls and an underwater color-correction filter.
Submerging any camera carries an inherent risk. Underwater housings can flood due to a fault or human error, so make sure you factor that in before merrily trotting into the sea with your brand new iPhone 15 Pro Max. Then again, you could drop your precious iPhone into a pond or off a high vantage point anyway, so use your own discretion to work out whether a spot of underwater photography is for you. A good tip for the cautious iPhone owner is to give last year’s device a new lease of life as an underwater camera.
This feature is part of iPhone Photography Week 2024. Expect new posts to appear daily, focused on making your photos shot with iPhone better than ever before.
Share your photos with iMore on X (Twitter) using #iMorePhotographyWeek
