Fstoppers Original Articles

People often forget that all successful photographers started from the bottom. This knowledge should be an aspiring photographer's motivation that fuels every action and re-touch. Each person has the ability to exceed beyond expectations; to set goals and reach them. In the future, you may look back at your work with embarrassment. Remembering where you started from should be a source of pride. The growth of 20 popular photographers in their retouching skills might be the greatest source of inspiration.

Learning photography and trying to create better photographs can be a daunting task when you're just starting. Here are some guidelines I've taught in my workshops to help new photographers create stronger images.

A modern trend that is taking over every freelancer is hustling. The mantra is repeated by some of the most popular productivity “gurus.” The more hours you put in, the more outcome you will get. However, following this hours = improvement idea is dangerous for your health, creativity, and ultimately, photography.

Do you have a Canon EOS R5? In that case, you’re probably aware of the overheating issues when filming. It isn’t of any concern if you’ll never use the video function. But what if an overheating warning occurs while photographing? I experienced that situation, and I have the solution.

This year has been... memorable. While half the world is locked in their homes, forests are burning down to celebrate a child's gender, companies are going belly up, and it's starting to feel like the apocalypse, Canon has finally awoken from their slumber.

This may be appalling to some, or realistic to others, but I think if we don't discuss the state of the profession of photography we will eventually regret it. When it is more than a hobby, how has the industry changed? Is it a good change? Has technology helped or hurt the professional?

The rise of smartphones has left many professional photographers wondering if their services have a future. However, it’s now having an impact on the industry in ways that many might not have anticipated.

Buying a beautiful f/2.8 lens zoom is tempting. Large apertures are always better. If you’re using primes, a f/1.8 or f/1.4 is even better. But is that expensive large aperture lens really necessary for your photography?

Apple has removed all reviews from their website and it might be my fault.

If you love photography, there’s no doubt that you want to know the best ways to improve your photography. There are countless blogs and articles on this subject alone; what I’m going to do is drop five ideas that might help you become better at photography.

I'll be honest, when it came to shooting swimwear, I went straight to Pinterest looking for whatever ideas and inspiration I could find. Swimwear is different enough from the other types of shoots that I was typically shooting that I really had no idea where to begin. Granted, my clients weren't clothing line companies, so I wasn't aiming for the more routine, catalog-style shots. Since the people wanting the shots were the models themselves, I wanted to make sure that the end results looked as good as possible and hopefully a bit more stylish.

Notwithstanding problems with ramping back up production to pre-COVID levels, manufacturers have been generally optimistic about the emerging camera market as consumers start spending money that has been hoarded over periods of lockdown. Canon looks set to be the big beneficiary, but what about the other manufacturers?

Sometimes, two is better than one when it comes to gear purchases.

Do you consider yourself a successful photographer? Is that something you want to be? How do you even measure that? There are certain things that all top photographers have, whether as amateurs or professionals. The Canon R5 isn’t one of them.

Looking for a camera that can serve many purposes, but not sure where to look? The Nikon Z f might be the right place to start.

There’s no question that the New York Times photo of James Comey during his Senate Intelligence Committee hearing, where he detailed his uncomfortable and suspect dealings with President Donald Trump, is going to be one of the iconic ones of our time. There’s also no question about who overwhelmingly seems to dominate the photojournalism field based on this photo: white men.

The good news is 2020 is over. The bad news is that 2020's woes appear to be coming with us into 2021. So, if you want to improve in photography, it's going to take more effort and focus than usual.

I'm sure every one of us has spent at least a four-figure amount in gear that was supposed to make our images and videos better, but in the end, it didn't. Here are a few tips that could save you a few thousand dollars.

One of the questions I had when starting out was how to get jobs. How to turn my hobby into money? The advice on the internet was few and far between. So, here is my advice to anyone who wants to take the next step and make some cash from their art.

Tired of endlessly cloning out every little image sensor spot on your catalog of photos? Use this automated process to remove spots from hundreds of photos at once, and go put your feet up.

Imagine you’re somewhere deep in the Pacific Rain Forest to take pictures of the elusive spirit bear. It’s wet, and it’s cold. On top of that, the light is patchy, the shadows are dark. There’s a bit of movement down river. You lift your camera to your eye to capture the moment. In your imagination, what were you holding? A DSLR and a long lens? In actual fact, for some photographers, more and more often, it’s a mirrorless kit.

Photographers who already made it beyond the beginner's level sometimes have trouble getting out to shoot. Because they know what a good photograph needs, they're afraid they can't deliver that quality. If that's you, then maybe you're the Worst Photographer Ever.

For the last month I have shared a useful tip in Lightroom each week and I look forward to continuing the series. For this week I show you how to use the often overlooked color sliders to control the hue, saturation and luminance of each color in your photo. In the short video I also show how to get those mint saturated greens that are currently very popular.

The world wide web was set ablaze this week by the photography community when Brides.com published an article telling prospective brides which vendors they should and shouldn't be feeding, and this advice strongly suggested photographers should not be fed. Of course, anger ensued. Surely, in this day and age, the author would have crafted a rebuttal or an apology to the legion of photographers in the trenches that she had scorned. Nope. They silently covered it up.

In a recent and popular advertisement, DJI uses Chris Burkard to showcase the new Mavic Air. But when advertisements don't line up with reality and end up costing customers a few hundred, maybe a thousand bucks, what is there to do?

Let's face it, photographers can be really annoying people. While some of their actions are just mildly tiresome, other things they do are downright harmful to our profession. Are you guilty of any of these wrongdoings?

You can get cool results when photographing water or cloudy skies with long exposures. For that you often need a filter that reduces the amount of light that enters the lens: a neutral density filter. But what if you don’t have such a filter? In that case there is another way to retrieve almost the same results. In this article I will explain how to shoot long exposures without the help of a neutral density filter.

You've probably seen the photos featuring a landscape with an intense red sky. There is a simple but effective way of achieving such a photo even when the colors are only a small band at the horizon.

Who doesn't love a photography related bargain? The problem is that some of those cheaper deals could cause you some serious headaches further down the line. Here are ten items which you should always avoid buying on the cheap.

The night sky is an astounding phenomenon that fascinates almost every individual. Stars have been around for thousands of years and yet, humankind is still mesmerized by their beauty. Despite the distance, we have such a strong connection and love for these great unknown entities. Capturing the magnificence of the night sky is highly rewarding and can be an exciting process as well.

Over years of teaching, I’ve gotten a chance to review photographs by all types of photographers. While there are lots of mistakes that can be made, there are a few consistent ones that stand out the most to me.

Modern cameras support fantastic image stabilization, and ISO noise is not a problem anymore. We can shoot freehand in dusk conditions and get stunning, sharp photos. So, have tripods become obsolete?

The first instinct most will have when looking to improve image quality is to buy better gear. It's so easy to blame low image quality on your crappy gear even if most of the time the photographer is the one who needs to improve their habits.

I’ll admit it, I’ve jumped on the MacBook Pro bandwagon a lot later than most. Just a couple of years ago I was beating the drum about how great the old Macbook Air was for photographers. The thing is, after a few weeks with the 13” MacBook Pro, in some ways, I still feel that way.

Adobe recently brought out a new feature called Super Resolution, which can increase the resolution of your images by up to four times. I tested this feature out on some heavily cropped images I'd recently edited. The results were fantastic.

Recently while filming video for our next educational tutorial with landscape photographer Elia Locardi I found myself asking, "Why in the world do our $4000 cameras still not do this?" Today I have laid out 12 simple features I believe would make all of our lives a lot easier, and most of them could probably be implemented right now! Give me your opinion in the full post poll.

Understanding the internal light meter of my camera is one of the best skills I've ever learned. It helps me to shoot in fully manual mode, so that I rarely look at the back of my camera. Let me tell you how to get a correctly exposed picture from the first click just by using your camera's internal light meter.

I remember when I first started photography, I'd try and find out what lens and camera had been used for every photograph I liked. I was convinced that if I had that combination of glass and mirrors I would be creating masterpieces. Unfortunately, that train of thought is closer to smoke and mirrors, and I soon knew better. Curiously, however, I now think there's some truth to it, and that truth was revealed to me by a lens that is now my secret weapon.

Landscape photography is fun and exciting when the landscape in front of you is grand and epic, but what do you do when the landscape is flat and boring?

When it comes to the quantity of lights that one needs, opinions are often heavily polarized and a hotly contested debate often rages. There are those that are staunch supporters of one light while others claim that a handful of lights are needed before anything meaningful can be done. Ultimately neither group is right as there is no definable minimum or maximum number of lights that one should use.

As photographers, many of us are obsessive gear heads always on the hunt for the holy grail of glass. No lens is good enough, we have this mysterious idea of a perfect lens in our imagination that no company could possibly ever actually create. There are, however, a ton of fantastic lenses out there that many photographer would never give a second thought that are more than capable of bringing magic to your next shoot. In this post I'm going to cover three of my favorites.

A strong critical reaction has led to Fujifilm pulling an advertisement that highlighted the work of photographer Tatsuo Suzuki. It seems that holding an expensive camera is not a license for an obnoxious and provocative style of street photography.

One of the biggest mistakes in landscape photography is to think that the best light appears just around sunset or sunrise. You could get the best light you have ever seen in your life straight around noon, as well. This is what you have to consider.

Most Lightroom users aren't taking advantage of this simple feature that literally organizes your photos for you, and it only takes around 30 seconds to set up in Lightroom Classic. Save time, and keep your library organized by following this tutorial.

Minimalism is a fascinating genre of photography and one, which can deliver some incredible and powerful photos. This is the genre where “less is more” really shines. Here I share five steps you can take to create incredible minimalist photos.

Earlier this year, Adobe ditched the option to buy Lightroom for a one-off fee, forcing customers to take out annual subscriptions with monthly payments, and annoying a few people along the way. However, this subscription model does present a few opportunities to save money. Check out this simple trick.

The craft of photography has arguably changed more in the last 20 years than in the century before it. With each improvement to the equipment comes the inevitable groans of many photographers who believe the technology takes away from the craft. Is that well-founded or mistaken?

It doesn't matter what kind of photographer you are, chances are your images will benefit from being edited in some way. If you are serious about your pictures looking their best, these six key Photoshop techniques are well worth mastering.

Photography is a commodity; It's not a secret, and we all know it. When I meet a new group of people, it seems that every time the conversation of “jobs” or “careers” is brought up, inevitably, someone is always a “photographer” by trade. Commodification is a process that happens to every industry, and we couldn’t prevent it even if we tried. So since becoming a commodity is unavoidable in any market, we, as small business owners, have to learn to overcome being branded a “commodity.”

Learn how to make cleaner, more powerful shots by following the dos and don'ts of this simple, six step formula for retouching success.