LaKeith Stanfield will be the voice of Ernest Cole, South Africa’s first Black freelance photographer, in an upcoming documentary about his life.

According to Variety, Oscar-nominated actor Stanfield has joined Raoul Peck’s project Ernest Cole: Lost and Found.

Stanfield has been cast as the voice of Cole — whose early images of Black life under apartheid shocked the world but whose later photographs of America were thought to be lost until 2017.

Stanfield, who has starred in Atlanta, and Get Out, will help bring the photographer’s words to life on screen.

Variety reports that Peck’s documentary production has the full collaboration of the Ernest Cole Family Estate, which is helmed by Cole’s nephew Leslie Matlaisane.

It has granted Peck exclusive access to the totality of the family’s archive, including images never previously seen by the public.

“I have long admired the peerless Raoul Peck’s singular body of work,” Stanfield says.

“I’m honored to have the opportunity to collaborate with him on ensuring Ernest Cole’s essential story is heard.”

A Photographer: Lost and Found

Born in 1940 in the Eersterust township, near Pretoria, South Africa, Cole witnessed the formalization of the apartheid regime growing up as a child.

When he was a teenager, Cole began working for Drum, a South African magazine geared toward Black readers.

As South Africa’s first Black freelance photographer, he was in a unique position to detail what was happening in his country. His early photography is known for revealing the horrors of apartheid to the world.

However, Cole’s work earned the ire of apartheid enforcers by capturing the human costs of the regime. At the age of 26, the South African authorities arrested Cole and labeled him a “banned person” for his photography.

In 1966, Cole fled South Africa and moved to the U.S. Cole’s House of Bondage was published the following year — the first and only book of those early South African photographs published during his lifetime.

However, throughout the late 1960s and early 1970s, Cole traveled across America and photographed extensively in New York City, Chicago, and the American South.

Cole was fascinated by the ways that the country mirrored his homeland’s segregated culture. It was a critical time in the United States, with the Civil Rights Movement peaking and tensions rising after the assassination of Martin Luther King Jr.

However, Cole never published these images of America in another book and his photographs were seemingly lost. Cole died in exile in New York City in 1990.

But according to The Atlantic, in 2017, a member of Cole’s family was mysteriously invited to Stockholm at the behest of a Swedish bank.

There, in three safety-deposit boxes, were more than 60,000 of his 35mm film negatives, many taken during Cole’s years in America.

In January this year, 260 of Cole’s images of that period were published in a book called The True America.

Peck’s film Ernest Cole: Lost and Found will tell Cole’s story through his writings, the recollections of those closest to him, and the images he captured with his camera.

The filmmakers hope the documentary will reintroduce “a pivotal Black artist to a new generation.”

Magnolia acquired North American rights from Range Media Partners and is planning a theatrical release for Ernest Cole: Lost and Found later this year.

Image credits: Header photo licensed via Depositphotos (left) and Wikimedia Commons (right).

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If you’ve ever found yourself struggling with the art of posing in photography, you’re not alone. Posing is challenging, requiring a delicate balance of personal connection, confidence, and creative expression. But like anything, with practice, you can get better at directing your clients and creating beautiful natural couple portraits.

In this video, wedding and portrait photographer Katelyn James goes through the ten most common red flags to avoid when posing couples.

Red Flag: Stiff and Rigid Poses

Solution: Embrace the concept that if a body part can bend, it should bend. Encourage your clients to avoid straight wrists, elbows, and knees, as this creates a more authentic and relaxed appearance.

Red Flag: Scary Eyes

Solution: Too much white in the eyes can make your subject look surprised or scared. Experiment with subtle changes in where they are looking, guiding your clients to achieve a natural and approachable gaze.

Red Flag: Awkward Legs

Solution: For clients with awkward-looking legs, especially those with longer limbs, suggest simple adjustments like crossing legs or crossing ankles. These small changes make anyone appear more natural.

Red Flag: Relying on Memorized Poses

Solution: Move away from a rigid set of memorized poses and embrace a more dynamic, flow-based approach. Learn to adapt and evolve your poses based on the unique characteristics of each couple, allowing for greater variety and creativity.

Red Flag: Clients Appear Larger Than Real Life

Solution: Be mindful of the relative positioning of your client’s head and hips. Ensure that the hips are not closer to the camera than the head, as this can create the illusion of a larger appearance. Guide your clients to lean slightly towards the camera to maintain a flattering perspective.

Red Flag: Not Adapting to Your Subject

Solution: Tailor your posing approach to the specific needs and characteristics of each couple. Consider factors such as height, build, and physical comfort, ensuring that your poses are both flattering and feasible for your clients.

Red Flag: Compressed Chin

Solution: Instead of directly addressing a double chin, instruct your clients to bring their foreheads towards the camera. This subtle adjustment helps alleviate the compression without making them self-conscious.

Red Flag: Compressed Arms

Solution: Avoid compressed arms by creating breathing room. Encourage natural spacing by having your clients pinch their dresses, place hands on hips, or hold a piece of hair – simple gestures that can open up the composition.

Red Flag: Shooting Up Client’s Nose

Solution: Pay attention to your shooting angle, especially if you are shorter than your clients. Elevate yourself or have your clients tilt slightly towards you to avoid shooting from underneath and creating unflattering perspectives.

Red Flag: Clients Are Unsure

Solution: Give clear and detailed instructions to make your clients feel more relaxed. Foster a positive and confident atmosphere during the session, ensuring that clients feel excited and assured without questioning their actions.

It feels like an awful lot of things to be thinking about, especially when you’re trying to engage your clients and get them feeling relaxed at the same time. However, I find that methodically checking through these details actually helps to relax your subjects, as they feel as though you are in control of the shoot.

Additionally, if you have the help of an assistant or stylist, you can enlist them to help you spot these red flags. It’s always better to fix things in camera than in post later.

If in doubt, do what I do and make your clients laugh. I find that usually relaxes them the best and helps them get the most natural-looking portraits. If they are too busy thinking about something else, they can’t think about how awkward they feel.

Smartphone manufacturers pay a lot of attention to mobile photography. Especially some brands are making efforts to improve the camera in mobile devices and are partnering with different companies. For example, Xiaomi is partnering with Leica.

As an effort of this partnership, smartphones are specially tested by both companies and not only that, they also add advanced effects for photos. Of course, you may ask whether every brand needs to partner with another company. Well, some companies may feel that they no longer need to partner and may soon decide to start their own image development company.

Device manufacturers create their own imaging companies

With advanced hardware, smartphones can deliver good photos, although not as good as photographic cameras. Many device manufacturers work on mobile photography and cameras are developing more and more every day.

Now the latest report from Digital Chat Station surprises everyone. Some smartphone manufacturers are reportedly preparing to stop making exclusive partnerships for imaging systems and will set up their own private companies. First of all, it is not known which brand will establish its own imaging company.

But we don’t think Xiaomi’s partnership with Leica will end immediately, so this could happen in the future for Xiaomi. It’s thought that Vivo or Oppo will set up their own special imaging company. Formerly, Huawei ended its partnership with Leica and created its own company called XMAGE. This company works to improve the photo and video quality of Huawei devices.

Related:

Sony has revealed its speaker lineup for The Photography & Video Show – the UK’s largest event for professional and enthusiast image makers, taking place 16-19 March at the NEC in Birmingham, England.

Crammed full of demonstrations, talks, and brand-new gear, has something for everyone – and Sony is bringing out the big guns. Its booth will be a hub of creative inspiration, with talks from industry leaders and a showcase of the best Sony cameras and lenses on the market. 

A standout will certainly be the recently released Sony A9 III, boasting the world’s first full-frame global shutter, AI-enhanced AF tracking, and an insane burst rate of 120fps! The A9 III will be one of the products available to get your hands on at the show, along with demonstrations from those who use it. 

Sony has also unveiled its full list of speakers, including experts across a wide range of genres including wildlife, weddings, beauty, portraiture, and video, set to ignite a creative fire within you:

• Alice Greenfield

• Will Burrard-Lucas

• Liam Man

• Teja Lisjak

• Kate & Brent Kirkman

• Terry Donnelly

• Hannah Couzens

• Yolanda Kingdom

• Mick Shah

• Alan Stockdale

Two speakers that I am particularly excited by are Alice Greenfield and Hannah Couzens. Alice is a video expert and will be giving a talk titled One Shot: The Story of an Adventurous Commercial Shoot, where she will share the process of working on a commissioned brief in a detailed and transparent way, providing valuable insight into what goes into a professional video shoot. 

Hannah’s talk will be just as inspiring, offering tips and insights into directing portrait subjects in her talk titled Perfecting your Portraits – How to Direct your Subject with Confidence. 

These are just two of the many speakers at the show – the full list, along with dates and times, are available on The Photography & Video Show website. (Tip: Planning a timetable ahead of arrival will ensure you don’t miss the speakers you want to see!)

Tickets are on sale now – and to save 20% on entry, visit the link below and use the code DCWTPS24! 

The best Sony cameras include everything from the best cameras for beginners to  the best professional cameras.

Finally, the era of global shutters has arrived for full-frame professional cameras with the release of the Sony A9 III. I don’t use Sony cameras, but regardless, this is a huge innovation that will slowly take over the industry and push camera technology ahead.

I don’t expect global shutters to be in every new camera from now on. I expect that it will take five or more years for this technology to trickle down–and for Sony and other manufacturers to make a variety of global shutter cameras. Since Sony is the largest manufacturer of camera sensors, it will be the company dictating the pace at which global shutters are incorporated into cameras.

One of the downsides of global shutter sensors is that their dynamic range and noise characteristics are not as good as the older regular CMOS sensors. The Sony A9 III is more akin to an APS-C sensor of the same resolution when compared to similar 24 MP cameras.

Nonetheless, this is a small issue in light of the advantages–especially for sports and wildlife photographers. Also, with the new AI Denoise feature in Lightroom, noise doesn’t really matter anymore. ISO 12,800 on just about any camera is totally usable with a little AI Denoise applied in post-processing. Certainly, as new global shutter sensors are improved, the issues with noise and dynamic range will be addressed and improved upon.

History of high-speed flash synchronization

In my photography, as many of my readers will know, I have been pushing the envelope in terms of high shutter speed flash photography for quite some time now. I started out using the Elinchrom Ranger strobes with the PocketWizard Hypersync technology built into their radio transmitters, which allowed me to get up to around 1/1,600th second shutter speeds using strobes.

I first used Hypersync as an experiment photographing ice climbing way back in 2012 (as shown below). Hypersync was the first technique I found that allowed me to raise my shutter speed to freeze action and light up a subject that was more than 60 feet (18 meters) away from the strobe.

I then took those Hypersync techniques to Hawaii, where I used five 1,100 Ws Elinchrom Ranger strobes to light up a surfer on a wave that was around 500 feet (152 meters) away from the strobe, as shown below.

There is a behind-the-scenes video entitled Hypersync Surfing on my website from that experimental project. I wanted to see just how far I could push the flash technology–and I found out. While the Hypersync technology was clunky and hard to figure out, the results are hard to argue with.

The surfing image we created wasn’t the best surfing image ever, but it did offer insight into the possibilities–and it was, as far as I know, the farthest anyone had ever pushed strobe technology (outside of military applications).

At the same time that Hypersync was developed by PocketWizard, Profoto was hard at work implementing High-Speed Sync into their new B1 500 Ws flashes. High-Speed Sync (HSS) has been around for decades in Nikon and Canon speedlights as a way to sync flash at higher shutter speeds than the standard 1/250th second sync speed.

It was great to see this brought to more powerful strobes like the B1 and later the B1X, but it was still not anywhere nearly as powerful as the Hypersync technique noted above. The advantage of the HSS strobes was that they could sync at up to 1/8,000th second, whereas the Hypersync option depended greatly on the camera used and really only worked at up to 1/1,600th second on Nikon cameras.

To be clear, HSS and Hypersync function quite a bit differently. For a full explanation of HSS vs Hypersync (also later known as Hi-Sync), check out the blog post HS vs HSS that I wrote for Elinchrom.

With the release of the Elinchrom ELB400 way back in 2015, Elinchrom took the Hypersync technology and customized it to work much better for the ELB400 and, later, the ELB1200 strobes. In fact, on a flight home from Switzerland returning from a pre-production distributor meeting at Elinchrom HQ, I came up with fifty or sixty different names for the new technology, knowing that Elinchrom wanted to name it HS.

“Hi-Sync” is the name they chose off the list. Hence, the new Hi-Sync (HS) technology they created was the ultimate high-speed flash photography option on the market–until the release of the Sony A9 III. The HS technology they created allowed for syncing flashes up to 1/8,000th second shutter speeds with both the ELB 400 and the ELB1200 using the HS flash heads–which had a slow flash duration to help sync up the timing.

Essentially, the flash fired before the shutter, and this allowed the camera to use a slice of the light emitted by the flash. As shown below in an image created for the launch of the Elinchrom ELB1200, this gave us the ultimate in outdoor flash power.

The problem with HS technology was that it was hard to figure out. There was no auto setting, and you really have to experiment with it to make it work for you. In contrast, the Profoto B1 and later the B1X had TTL but modes just like a speedlight that allowed for full auto flash control. And hence, as you would suspect, many photographers went with the easier but much more limited option.

Using strobes with leaf shutters

After using the Hypersync and Hi-Sync technology for five or six years, I dove into the medium format world and purchased a Hasselblad H5D 50c, which used leaf shutters in the lenses instead of a focal plane shutter in the camera.

That camera system cost more than my car, so it was a huge investment. The leaf shutter in Hasselblad cameras allows for syncing strobes at all shutter speeds available on the camera. The H5D 50c only went up to 1/800th second, but their newer cameras had shutter speeds up to 1/2,000th second.

The leaf shutter was the original “global shutter” and essentially acted the same way. The full sensor (or piece of film back in the day) was fully exposed to the light with no restrictions at all shutter speeds, just like the newer global shutter in the Sony A9 III.

As shown below, I used the Hasselblad for both portraits and action images. The autofocus on the H5D was pretty pathetic, but with some workarounds, I could make it work for some sports, especially if I was using lighting.

I found the leaf shutter to be extremely powerful compared to other flash techniques, but in reality, I found using the HS (Hi-Sync) technology with my Nikon cameras and the Elinchrom ELB1200 was still more powerful for lighting up a subject from a far distance.

Sadly, Elinchrom has given up on the HS technology as none of their strobes has that built-in anymore. They have gone for the easier-to-use HSS option with TTL and auto modes, which totally makes sense as most people purchasing a flash want to create portraits, and the flash is relatively close in those scenarios.

The number of photographers using the Hi-Sync techniques to light up distant subjects was understandably a very small number, so it didn’t make much sense to keep producing strobes with that technology. The only manufacturer that still has HS technology (not HSS) incorporated into their strobes is Broncolor.

They have HS built into the Move 1200 L and the Siros 400 L and 800 L strobes. But with those options, Broncolor did not optimize the flash tubes to work specifically for HS, and hence, they only work in HS mode at the highest power settings where the flash duration is slow enough to make it work.

I still consider the Elinchrom ELB1200, which went out of production in 2020, to be the most technically advanced strobe ever created by any company. Sadly, they are very hard to find now. I will keep mine in good condition as long as I can until something better comes along.

The trick with using leaf shutters with your strobes was pretty simple. Your flash duration (i.e. how long the burst of light emitted from the flash) needed to be faster than your shutter speed for everything to work as expected. If the flash duration was shorter than the shutter speed, then you would end up clipping the flash, and the exposure would not match what your light meter read.

This is partly why Hasselblad shutter speeds only went up to 1/800th second and later to 1/2,000th second. Most strobes, even the high-end Profoto and Broncolor studio strobes, had relatively slow flash durations at the full power settings.

Even the incredible Bronocolor Scoro packs, which cost over $15,000 just for the pack itself, have a t0.1 flash duration of only 1/132 second. That is incredibly slow. They get much faster as you lower the power on the pack–as with all strobes.

The Profoto Pro-11, which costs an eye-bleeding $17,849 and that is just for the power pack, goes up to a wicked fast t0.1 flash duration of 1/17,500th second at the lowest power setting, but at full power, the t0.1 flash duration is a pedestrian 1/600th second.

Using global shutters with strobes

Global shutters are sensors that read out all pixels at the same time. Older digital sensors scan the pixels on the sensor line by line. Some cameras, like the Nikon Z9 and the Sony A1, could do this incredibly fast, as shown below, but they were not reading all of the pixels at the same time. Hence, a global digital sensor is essentially the same as a leaf shutter used in medium-format cameras.

The only real-world difference is that they can achieve much higher shutter speeds than any leaf shutter ever could. For example, the Sony A9 III can go up to 1/80,000th second shutter speed.

As discussed in the previous section on using leaf shutters with strobes, the flash duration needs to ideally be shorter than the shutter speed when using a global shutter (or you will have to compensate the exposure slightly since you are only getting a slice of the light in the actual image).

This was the same scenario with leaf-shutter cameras from Hasselblad and Phase One. Another common issue when using leaf shutters is that the radio transmitter has to be more powerful and able to transmit the information to the flash faster than normal to trigger the strobe right when the shutter button is depressed.

Otherwise, you will end up clipping the light from the flash because of the delay in the radio trigger sending the signal to the flash/strobe. I had to switch my Elinchrom strobes over to a different “speed” mode to trigger the strobes faster with my Hasselblad.

With global shutters and fast shutter speeds, the reality is if we want to use flashes and/or larger, more powerful strobes with these new sensors, we need to invest in better strobes that have fast flash durations at all power settings.

What that means is the cheaper, slower HSS TTL strobes with very slow flash durations at the higher power settings are going to be tough to use with global shutters, especially outdoors where you want more power.

Even though they are quite expensive, the strobes shown above, like the Broncolor Move 1200L (left), Profoto Pro-11 (centre) and the Elinchrom FIVE (right) at lower power settings, are going to work much better than a lot of the cheaper strobe options like Godox and Westcott. I’m not saying you can’t work with those less expensive options, but just as with leaf shutters, the best results will always be gained with the higher-end strobes.

Both Broncolor and Elinchrom do have strobes that have much faster flash durations at the full power setting — somewhere in the order of 1/2,400th second (t0.5) at full power. Sports photographers have been using these types of fast flash duration strobes (from Elinchrom, Dynalite and others) for years because they needed fast flash durations at full power to freeze motion with the lights up in the rafters of stadiums (think Basketball and Hockey).

This is where a lot of the TTL HSS (like the Profoto B1X, Godox, etc.) strobes are going to have a lot of issues with the new global shutter cameras because their full-power flash durations are incredibly slow. Looking at the specs, the Broncolor Move 1200L would be one of the best strobes on the market for use with global shutters since it has a t0.1 flash duration of 1/2,300th second at 80% power–and it only gets faster the lower the power setting.

The Profoto D2 1,000 Ws moonlight is another excellent option. My old Elinchrom ELB1200 is in that same ballpark (as the Broncolor Move pack) when used with the Action flash heads–but sadly, it is no longer made.

As global shutter becomes the norm in future cameras, I foresee a slew of professional photographers ditching their cheaper strobes and upgrading to higher-end professional strobes like those made by Broncolor, Profoto and Elinchrom that have faster flash durations.

Profoto certainly has a phenomenal strobe in the Pro-11, but the weight and cost of that strobe are prohibitive. The Profoto D2, as noted above, is a great option for much less money–but it is still quite expensive. Broncolor has the venerable Siros L options with fast flash durations, but their strobes are the most expensive options across the board until you get up to the Profoto Pro-11 level.

If you still have an Elinchrom ELB1200 and the action flash heads, hold onto those, as they will be excellent strobes for the forthcoming global shutter future. Hopefully, the strobe manufacturers are aware of this change and will start developing new products with faster flash durations in anticipation of the forthcoming technology.

At some point, there will be no need for HSS or HS technology at all. The new global shutters will open up a new era of creativity in the photography world–and I, for one, am very excited to see what we can do with the new technology.

ORLANDO, Fla. — A+ Teacher John Burke has a passion for showing his students the best ways to capture a moment in time. The Boone High School creative photography teacher believes that cultivating creativity is key to building confidence.

Burke’s students are captivated in his classroom as they get hands on instruction in photography.

“I like them to get to know each and every member of the class, (to) work with each and every member of the class,” he said. “So they get some diverse interactions and just get used to working with other students and I find in the long run that definitely helps with their creativity.”

He remembers his own time in school and what he enjoyed the most.

“I always loved hands-on activities and participating in projects and so that’s the kind of atmosphere that I try to do in my class,” he said.

The passion and dedication his students put into their projects are proudly displayed in class. Burke says he thinks about how this can translate into something outside the classroom, so maybe they take yearbook photos of a high school game or do family portraits.

Burke’s personable personality is a perfect fit for the classroom. He’s been at it for more than two decades and says his students are always his main focus.

“You know, after 28 years, I really think there’s no better feeling for a teacher than to see a student succeed outside the classroom and come back and attribute some of that success to you,” Burke said. “The main thing I want them to take away from the class is their ability to believe in themselves creatively, so they can look at situations and think about them in new and creative ways and then also just use that to help tell their own narrative.”

Burke said overall it’s a confidence builder for the students to believe in themselves.

The images pre-selected for this year’s contest show wildlife of all kinds around the world, from more traditional photographs such as action photos and serene portraits, to impressive reflections on how pollution and human activity are harming animals.

The winner of the contest

The winning photograph was taken in the Svalbard archipelago and shows a male polar bear asleep on a small iceberg. Entitled “Ice Bed”, Nima’s photograph was crowned champion after a contest in which more than 75,000 people voted. The winner is a British amateur photographer who was exploring the Norwegian archipelago of Svalbard on an expedition ship. He won against four highly recommended finalists to win the crown.

Nima Sarikhani said she felt honored to have won the prize of this contest, which is considered the most prestigious wildlife photography contest. This photograph aroused strong emotions in many of those who saw it. Although climate change is the biggest challenge we face, the purpose of this photograph would also be to inspire hope.

“Ice Bed” was selected from a narrowlist of 25 images. Before the jury selected the photograph as a finalist, “Ice Bed” was presented as one of 49,957 total applications for this year’s Wildlife Photographer of the Year contest.

Climate change is considered the greatest threat to the survival of polar bears in nature, since the increase in temperatures melts the sea ice on which these animals depend. According to the Red List of Endangered Species of the International Union for Conservation of Nature, it is estimated that about 26,000 polar bears remain in the wild, being considered vulnerable to extinction.

Wildlife Photographer of the Year People’s Choice Award

This contest is developed and produced by the Natural History Museum of London. And only this year, it received photographs of 95 countries. The winning image will be on display at the museum until June 30.

Since its creation in 1965, the Wildlife Photographer of the Year awards have grown in importance and impact. They started as a small exhibition, but since then they have become an internationally recognized event, attracting both professional and amateur photographers.

The contest encourages the celebration and protection of the natural world, highlighting its beauty, diversity and the urgent need for conservation efforts. Every year, the awards celebrate the work of the best nature photographers in the world, presenting images that inspire conservation and appreciation for the beauty and complexity of wildlife.