Tamron – Need lightweight, compact mirrorless lenses? Tamron has you covered, with superior optics perfect for any situation. With weather sealing and advanced image stabilization, you’ll open up your creative possibilities.

Radiant Photo – Radiant Photo superior quality finished photos with perfect color rendition, delivered in record time. Your photos — simply RADIANT. The way they are meant to be.

AfterShoot – AfterShoot helps photographers cull their photos faster, leaving them more time to spend on creative tasks. Save $10 with the code PHOTOFOCUS10.

Mylio Photos – Access your photos from anywhere, without the cloud! Easily showcase your photos on-the-go, resolve duplicates, find faces and look for those stunning locations.

Skylum – Your photos, more beautiful in minutes. Skylum adapts to your style and skill level. Check out Luminar Neo’s unique sky replacement and portrait editing tools, now available.

B&H – B&H is a world renowned supplier of all the gear photographers, videographers, and cinematographers need and want to create their very best work.

MPB – Grab used but perfectly working cameras and lenses for less, or turn your old gear into cash by trading and selling them on MPB!

A rescue kitten captured as it prepared to pounce on its unsuspecting sibling has been announced as the winner of the Comedy Pet Photography Awards.

The picture of black and white felines Max and Alex was taken by professional wildlife photographer Michel Zoghzoghi.

“Max and Alex form a lethally cute duo. I had more fun and surprises taking photos of these two characters, than during my most adventurous wildlife photography trips,” he said.

Other winners include Boudicca the ferret on her first outdoor walk, which was captured by Darya Zelentsova, who is originally from Kyiv in Ukraine.

A chance snap of a dog leaping in front of surprised onlookers in a New York park took home the People’s Choice Award which is voted for by the public.

The picture – aptly titled Barking – was shot by Chris Porsz, an amateur street cameraman from the UK.

The competition was created by professional photographers Paul Joynson-Hicks and Tom Sullam.

The duo said they aim to promote positive awareness of animal welfare issues and “celebrate the incredible and hugely valuable contribution that pets can and do have on our lives”.

“This is still a very young competition in the whole scheme of things, but within a few short years we are already receiving some of the most uplifting, life affirming hilarious images of pets in the world,” Tom said.

“We couldn’t be more excited to share these with you all. Pets have played a fundamental role during the COVID years, and to be able to laugh out loud with these loveable creatures is the reason this competition exists.”

Thu, 10 Aug 2023 21:03:30 GMT (1691701410131)

32a17648de9010471cb1424969f60b8cd245ab5b

764af03fb5464b567cc88eb8e2b89c9094d4b4c5

by Erika Esquivel

Thu, August 10th 2023, 9:02 PM UTC

El Paso airport features photography of El Paso photography club (credit: KFOX14/CBS4)

Loading …

Having a handful of lighting styles ready at a moment’s notice can be invaluable, particularly in wedding photography. In this video, learn some staples and what makes them so powerful.

In this video, our very own Patrick Hall joins Chris Fain of Profoto to discuss lighting, particularly in a wedding context. Wedding photography is one of the most popular areas of professional photography, but it’s also a difficult one. Wedding photography is high-pressure and a mixture of styles and genres, so whenever you can create stable ground for yourself, you should. One component that is worth being well-versed in is lighting.

The posed portraits of the bride and the bride and groom together are typically the flagship images of the day. However, even if you have done the necessary preparation and know where you want to shoot, there will be some unknowables that you need to react to. For example, one wedding I shot was a beautiful location with natural light pouring through the windows at every turn; it was hard to take a bad shot. Then, after the ceremony, when it was time to take the portraits of the bride and groom, the darkest storm clouds I have ever seen amassed the sky, thrusting the venue into near-darkness. Without some lighting styles at the point of muscle memory, it would have been a disaster.

PUTNEY, Vt. – NXT Gallery presents an exhibit of works by Vermont Center for Photography Artists.

This small group exhibit, entitled “Four Perspectives,” represents the work of Al Karevy, Davida Carta, Joshua Farr, and Vaune Trachtman, four different local artists who are members of the Vermont Center for Photography in downtown Brattleboro. Each of these artists create photographic work covering a diverse range of styles and subject matter, though unified via a shared passion for the photographic arts and its many expressive possibilities. Each of the four artists will be displaying a small selection from a body of work, giving a greater context to their creative vision and process.

“Next Stage’s art gallery is a critical piece to our programming, as it’s one of the primary ways we are able to highlight the visual arts of the region,” says Keith Marks, executive director of Next Stage Arts. “The Vermont Center for Photography’s group show is an opportunity for us to highlight a peer cultural organization, and the range of talented visual artists within that medium.”

The exhibit will be in place Aug. 19 – Nov. 12. The NXT Gallery, on the second floor of Next Stage Arts, at 15 Kimball Hill in Putney, is open during events in the theater and by appointment. An opening reception will be held in the gallery on Sunday, Aug. 27, from 3-5 p.m.

Getting back to basics is never a bad way to go about learning photography.

When I am presenting to camera clubs or helping an individual with their photography, I try to nudge them beyond what settings were used to create an image.

Yes, settings are key to learning photography

Of course, the settings matter. I’m not discounting that. In fact, below you’ll find a back-to-basics exercise to help you get them ingrained in your head. 

So many want to know gear settings. Instead of figuring it out or learning it themselves, they just ask. The exposure triangle matters and so does learning how to use your camera. 

The problem with this is that you’re not always going to have the same scenario as the photographer you’re asking the question of. This means you can use the setting they told you they used, but you’re not going to get the result they did. There are too many factors that go into creating images to just use settings someone tells you.

Instead, think about the questions asked when looking at images. For portfolio reviews or critiques, the artist who is trying to help you is usually more focused on the composition or the story an image tells.

We all learn differently, but …

Workshops are great. Being around like-minded people and learning from each other and an instructor is typically inspiring and helpful. 

But, you don’t learn by attending workshops where the instructor tells you where to stand and what settings to use. Are they even explaining why to use those settings? I sure hope that at a minimum they explain that.

Avoid this by researching the information being taught. Make sure the instructor leading the workshop is a good fit for your learning style.

Go back to basics

Many of us learn by doing. Trial and error. When you change one setting how does it affect the image? Do this as an exercise until you know how what you change affects the other aspects of your settings.

A good way to brush up on the exposure triangle and learn your camera is to only photograph 12-36 images, like a roll of film. Write down all your settings, the light, the weather and anything else that affects the outcome of your image. 

Doing this will make you more aware of your camera and how it operates. You’ll learn it by being specific about what you’re going to photograph. Writing everything down allows you to slow down and look at what your settings are and/or should be.

When you upload your images, go back through your notes. Match up the notes with each image and pay attention to how each setting difference affected the photo. It’s only 12-36 images so it’s not so hard to go through them one by one.

How do you learn?

One thing I find to be true about most photographers is they learn from each other. What are some of the back to basics exercises you do to continue learning photography? Share them with us in the Photofocus Community. Let’s keep helping each other out.

Photography encompasses a wide gamut of genres, interpretations, and rules. And sometimes you need to challenge yourself to push your photography to the next level, or to find new joy in this medium that we all love so much.

I did just that a little over a year ago, when I got my very first Leica. I found myself in unfamiliar territory, away from sports photography and into the realm of street photography – and it was at that moment I knew I had to change my style if I wanted to start shooting black-and-white photography and give up on color for the year.

• Want to ditch color as well? These are the best black-and-white cameras

Dipping my toe into monochrome photography first started when, by no coincidence, I was reviewing the Leica M10-R – a 40MP rangefinder camera that I totally fell in love with, and that made me want to buy into the brand. 

Reviewing this camera I noticed that it had a black-and-white setting, which most Leica cameras and enthusiasts call Monochrom. I selected this and something inside me knew that I wanted to shoot more in black-and-white. 

While I must confess that I shot some fantastic color images with the M10-R, it was the mono photos that I kept getting drawn to – and what started me on this journey without color.

I began to look at some of the best street photography books on the market, looked up videos on YouTube, and delved deep into tips for black-and-white photography, and I felt ready to take the plunge. 

Image 1 of 4

Fast-forward a year and now 99% of my images are shot in black-and-white. And though I must say it’s nice to display an odd color image on my Instagram, black-and-white is now my main medium. While this wasn’t the intent of this exercise – I thought I’d just try it for a few months and be back to taking color images – it has been a year now and I don’t see myself stopping any time soon.

In fact, shooting in monochrome hasn’t just taken over my digital workflow; it’s also a solid staple in my film workflow, which is now 100% black-and-white with self-developing at home.

So what has this experiment, that’s turned into a way of life, taught me? Well I guess that, if you’re stuck in a rut with your photography, setting yourself a challenge is a great benefit, and you could turn out to really enjoy it in the process.

Only shooting black-and-white images both digitally and on film has enabled me to see things differently; subjects that might appear dull in color look great in mono. It helped me to think differently about my photography and enjoy it again as a hobby after ‘retiring’ from sports photography, which was my 9-5 job for over a decade.

While I do shoot the odd color image, that color image has to be special, with vivid colors and great composition. Shooting black-and-white all the time enables me to really enjoy color images as a special occasion, and not an everyday thing. 

I love shooting mono and, while I feel a still have a long way to go to really master this genre, it gives me the ability to express my passion for photography – which I will always be grateful for. Do I need to be thankful for that initial Leica that got the idea in my head? Possibly, and it’s not a coincidence that I shoot on a Leica today, but I am thankful to myself for seeing this project through.

You might also be interested in the best Leica cameras, which could inspire your own photography, along with the best Leica M lenses and best Leica SL lenses to go with them. 

Banda Aceh, Indonesia

Students attend a graduation ceremony at the University of Syiah Kuala. According to the Indonesia Central Statistics Agency (BPS), the unemployment numbers for 2023 reached 7.99 million in Indonesia, with 12% or about 958,800 unemployed university graduates

Photograph: Hotli Simanjuntak/EPA