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Portrait photography can seem awfully daunting if you’ve never done it. How many lights do you use? Which modifiers are the best? Do you need a studio? How much money should you spend to get started? Oh, and how do you relate to the person in front of your camera? We talk with pro portrait photographer Sandra Coan about shooting with just one light and one modifier—using film!—and her book Crafting the Natural Light Look.
The last time we talked with Rick LePage, he gave us the basics of printing your own photos. We’re pleased to welcome him again as a guest to go deeper into the topic, starting with the question: How do you choose what to print? It sounds like an easy query, but we discuss not just what you put on your walls (and which walls), but also how printing helps define you as an artist.
With photographers finding themselves with unexpected time on their hands at home, it's a great time to update the location data in the photos in your library. Pierre Bernard joins us again to talk about the new features in his Mac app HoudahGeo 6.0, indulging our lazy photographic habits, and...how HoudahGeo supports scuba divers?
This week we’re joined by Chris Niccolls, co-host (with Jordan Drake) of DPReview TV, one of our favorite video resources about photography. Yes, there are hundreds of photographers on YouTube, but we’ve long enjoyed Chris’s and Jordan’s friendly and knowledgable approach to reviewing photo gear and educating viewers about all aspects of photography and videography.
The autofocus capabilities in today’s cameras are amazing, so why would anyone buy a lens that offers only manual focus? Jeff and Kirk talk about situations where autofocus isn’t a consideration, such as buying inexpensive fast lenses or using an adapter to mount one brand’s lenses on another brand’s camera (like Nikon lenses on a Fujifilm body). We also chat about Jeff’s just-released book, The Photographer’s Guide to Luminar 4. We’ll be giving away a few copies to subscribers of the PhotoActive mailing list, and we also have a 40% discount code to share.
Camera sales worldwide have steadily decreased over the past several years, and now COVID-19 has thrown everything into disarray. Where is the camera industry headed? Special guest Barney Britton, Senior Editor at DPReview, joins Kirk and Jeff to talk about the factors that are contributing to these shifts. It’s not all grim news, though, and we also talk about what changes and advancements we might see in the near future.
A few months ago when we invited David duChemin to return as a PhotoActive guest to talk about his new book The Heart of the Photograph, we had no idea it would be at the disruptive beginning of a global pandemic. We talk with David about being creative in this new situation, and how creativity can translate into resiliency. Then we focus on his book, and the questions it raises for how we approach making and working with photographs.
Photos are meant to be shared, but with digital photos the options multiply. In this episode, Kirk McElhearn and Jeff Carlson look at several ways to share photos with friends and family.
Gentleman Coder Nik Bhatt returns to help explain a complicated topic with Apple’s Photos app: Photos Extensions. If you want to use another tool to edit images beyond what Photos offers, you can load that software’s editing tools within Photos. It seems straightforward, but soon gets tricky if you want to go back and adjust some of your edit settings or even if you perform a minor edit in Photos first. If you’ve ever been confused about the differences between Photos Extensions and the “Edit with” feature (which do two very different things), especially for raw files, this is the episode for you.
A listener in the PhotoActive Facebook group asks a great question, “How do I choose a subject to shoot?” In this episode, Kirk and Jeff explore how they approach a scene, with groups of photos from deliberate photo shoots that seek to answer that question.
On this week’s episode, we’re joined by Andrius Gailiunas of Pixelmator to talk about machine learning and how it powers some of the features in Pixelmator Pro. In particular, we’re impressed with ML Super Resolution, a way to enlarge photos beyond their original dimensions while retaining quality and crispness.
We’ve talked about several photo editing applications in the past, and in this episode we turn our attention toward Luminar 4 (and not just because one of us has a forthcoming book about it). Skylum has overhauled Luminar in significant ways for version 4, with an emphasis on AI features that save a lot of time and effort on your part.
At several points when recording the PhotoActive podcast, Kirk has said that the “Rule of Thirds” does not exist. Most books and articles about photography insist it does, that positioning objects at approximately one third distance from the edge of the frame leads to better composition. So in this episode, we get into it: Does the Rule of Thirds exist, and why?
It’s time to step away from your camera. No, not put it away for the holiday—we’re talking about triggering the camera remotely! In this episode, Jeff and Kirk talk about various ways to trip the shutter from afar, such as using an Apple Watch to control the Camera app on an iPhone, remote cable releases, and products that control a mirrorless or DSLR via apps.
With the holidays and Black Friday sales upon us, this is the time that photographers can often get good deals on equipment. In this episode, Kirk and Jeff ponder the reasons you might consider buying a second camera. Perhaps you want a backup for your regular camera, or maybe you want a smaller go-anywhere camera that might encourage you to take photos more often.
Now that iOS 13, iPadOS 13, and macOS Catalina are out, Jeff and Kirk have some strong opinions on the changes made to the Photos app for each platform. It's time to rant a little.
How do you make product photos look fresh and interesting? Do you need a well-equipped studio? Dan Bracaglia shoots thousands of images of cameras and other accessories in his job as photo editor at DPReview. Dan joins Kirk and Jeff to answer those questions and more.
You can control depth of field in a photo using narrow apertures, but what do you do when that’s not enough to get everything in focus? For macro and some landscape photography, the answer is focus stacking, a technique that blends several images shot at different focal lengths. Kirk and Jeff talk about how it works and when you’d want to use it.
Kirk and Jeff both bought the latest models of Apple’s digital camera - sorry, we mean the iPhone 11 and iPhone 11 Pro. Does adding a third camera make a difference? Is the ultra-wide camera just a gimmick? And what is “semantic rendering” anyway? We explain why nothing is really real, and yet these might be the best-looking photos people create.
We solicited photography questions from the great folks in the PhotoActive Facebook group, and now we have answers! All the answers. Or maybe just the most interesting ones. But definitely some answers. Panoramas, shooting photos in public places, revealing edits, and more.
