Pho­tog­ra­phy pod­cast #137 finally returns to offer up 5 realistic photography resolutions that we can make for the upcoming year. Happy New year Everyone!!! Click the player at the end of this post to listen to or download this (almost)10 minute podcast. If you liked this podcast and want to review it on Itunes, this link gets you to the main page Please join the Photography.ca fan page on Facebook My Facebook profile - Feel free to "friend" me - please just mention Photography.ca My...

Pho­tog­ra­phy pod­cast #136 talks about creating dreamy images by placing Vaseline or petroleum jelly on an old UV filter attached to your lens. By doing this you are often able to create dreamy, impressionistic images. The procedure is simple; take an OLD UV filter (because removing the vaseline from the filter after use might damage its coating) and screw it onto a lens. Then place a wee bit of petroleum jelly (just a bit goes a long way) on your finger and apply it to the front of the UV...

Pho­tog­ra­phy pod­cast #135 discusses how going to museums to study painters and paintings can improve your photography. After all, both painting and photography are 2D media trying to represent a 3D world. When photographers study the compositional and lighting techniques used by painting masters, their own photographs often improve. Feel free to add to the conversation by leaving a comment or sharing/liking this post in some way. Click the player at the end of this post to listen to (or...

Pho­tog­ra­phy pod­cast #134 features an interview with Toronto, Ontario fine art photographer Bret Culp. During the interview we talk about finding and developing your own photography or shooting style. Bret offers up some practical tips on how to make this process easier. Feel free to add to the conversation by leaving a comment or sharing/liking this post in some way. Thanks to The Camera Store (The largest camera store in Calgary, Alberta, Canada)  for sponsoring the Photography.ca...

Pho­tog­ra­phy pod­cast #133 features an interview with Canadian fine art photographer Royce Howland. During the interview we discuss what camera features we think are essential. There are loads of extra bells and whistles on cameras these days and even though both Royce and I have kick-butt camera gear, we ignore the majority of the new features and focus on the essentials. We also discuss essential camera modes and touch on essential lenses. Of course feel free to let us know if you feel...

Pho­tog­ra­phy pod­cast #132 features an interview with Canadian photographer Bryan Davies. During the interview we discuss Bryan's rust photography. We cover what inspired the series, how it was shot, how it was post-processed and Bryan's plans for the future. Thanks to The Camera Store (The largest camera store in Calgary, Alberta, Canada)  for sponsoring the Photography.ca podcast. Click the player at the end of this post to listen to (or download) the 13ish minute...

Pho­tog­ra­phy pod­cast #131 reviews a Lensbaby lens. Lensbaby lenses are special in that they have a sweet spot of sharp focus in the center of the lens and blur out toward the edges. In addition to this (and where the magic truly lives), you can actually bend the lens to move that sweet spot of focus around the frame. The particular lens I tested was a 50mm Lensbaby Composer with double glass optic. It's great fun and fairly easy to use though you need to know in advance that it's a manual...

Pho­tog­ra­phy pod­cast #130 reviews the Big Stopper by Lee filters. The big stopper is a 10 stop glass filter that slows down shutter speeds in order to accentuate movement. Both clouds and water are classic subjects for use with this filter and the resulting photographs tend to be ethereal and dreamy. Aside from reviewing the filter, I offer up 6 tips on how to use it effectively. Thanks to The Camera Store (The largest camera store in Calgary, Alberta, Canada)  for sponsoring the...

Pho­tog­ra­phy pod­cast #129 talks about how to photograph strangers in public so that your images are stronger and more interesting. I offer up 4 easy tips on how to make this process easier so that your shots have more punch at the end. These photographs were mostly taken over a period of 1 week. In the podcast I discuss the differences between when the subject is aware and unaware of the photographer's presence. Thanks to The Camera Store (The largest camera store in Calgary, Alberta,...

Pho­tog­ra­phy pod­cast #128 talks about five reasons why I think the 50mm lens is the first lens you should get for your SLR or DSLR. Two of these reasons are all the aperture advantages this lens has to offer has and the fact that it's one of the most affordable brand new lenses you are likely to find (that aren't garbage). If you have a full frame camera the 50mm will act as the conventional 50mm lens from the film camera days. On a crop sensor camera the lens will act more like a 75mm or...

Pho­tog­ra­phy pod­cast #127 goes into why point and shoot cameras suck for learning photography. I actually rag on point and shoot cameras quite a bit in this podcast but it's because photography should be fun and learning photography on a point and shoot camera is rarely fun and almost never user-friendly. At the beginning stages of learning photography you need your camera to be user-friendly and it's nice when your camera can handle any shooting situation. Point and shoots are inferior to...

Pho­tog­ra­phy pod­cast #126 discusses the importance of the four edges of your photographs. They are seriously important and paying attention to them will improve your photography. The podcast offers up 6 (actually a few more than 6) practical tips on how to improve the edges of your photographs. Thanks to The Camera Store (The largest camera store in Calgary, Alberta, Canada)  for sponsoring the Photography.ca podcast. A sneak peek to one of the 6 tips which is useful to photographers of...

Pho­tog­ra­phy pod­cast #125 features an interview with photographers Darwin Wiggett and Sam Chrysanthou (apologies to Sam for mucking up her name) of oopoomoo.com where we talk about post processing in photography and how much post-processing is too much. Thanks to The Camera Store (The largest camera store in Calgary, Alberta, Canada)  for sponsoring the Photography.ca podcast. In this podcast we get into talking about the differences between photographers and digital artists in this...

Pho­tog­ra­phy pod­cast #124 features an interview with Arizona fine art photographer Tony Kuyper. After years of experimentation Tony has developed an intermediate post processing technique NOT based on the pixels that make up the image but rather the brightness levels or tones that make up the image. One of the game changing reasons to work in this way is the tonal control and level of precision you can achieve with your selections and the fact that these selections are naturally perfectly...

Pho­tog­ra­phy pod­cast #123 compares 2 entry level triggering devices for your camera. A 'trigger' is simply a device that allows your camera to fire nearly any portable flash, monolight or studio flash while it is OFF-camera. The ability to fire a flash or other light source while OFF-camera allows you to modify the direction and the quality of the light(s) to produce much more creative and professional looking photography versus direct on-camera flash. The 2 units tested are the...

Pho­tog­ra­phy pod­cast #122 features an interview with Royce Howland where we discuss how large we can print our photos. These days cameras of all kinds are everywhere and if we want to make big enlargements from those cameras we need to know how big we can print the image before it starts to look bad. Royce offers up tips on how to make 'the best enlargement', 'a better enlargement' or 'a good enlargement' based on the camera, the printing material, the subject matter and some other...

Pho­tog­ra­phy pod­cast #121 offers up 6 tips on how to make better self portraits in photography. Making a self portrait, sometimes known as an autoportrait has a long history in photography and many past and modern photography Masters (Man Ray, Robert Mapplethorpe and the extremely prolific self portraitist Cindy Sherman for example) have produced fabulous self portraits. Please know in advance that we are not referring to 'selfies'...which I rant on about for a little bit in this podcast....

Pho­tog­ra­phy pod­cast #120 provides tips on how to create, craft and tell more interesting stories through photography.  Some of the aspects we talk about include being active with framing, hunting down the gestures and watching the edges. I'm super-pleased to welcome  The Camera Store (The largest camera store in Calgary, Alberta, Canada)  as a sponsor of The Photography.ca podcast! I've been buying my own gear there and recommending them for a few years now, and I'm a fussy bugger when...

Photography podcast #119 is the second of two episodes dedicated to manipulation in photojournalism. In this episode we feature a 70 minute casual conversation with Moe Doiron, a photojournalist with The Globe and Mail, Canada's largest National Newspaper. In the interview we revisit the 2012 winning world press photo by Paul Hansen, discuss the Chicago Sun-Times firing of their Photojournalism staff and chat about Moe's multi-decade career as a photojournalist. and photo editor.   Links...

Photography podcast #118 is the first of two episodes dedicated to manipulation in photojournalism. This first episode features an interview with Carl Neustaedter who is the deputy editor of the Ottawa Citizen, the largest daily newspaper in Ottawa, Ontario, Canada. Carl is one of the people who decides on a daily basis what images make it into the newspaper. In this interview we discuss how much manipulation is too much manipulation when it comes to news photography. In particular, we talk...

Photography podcast #117 features an interview with fine art photographer Royce Howland where we discuss the 'junk' that can get into our photographs. In particular we discuss and dissect noise, halos and chromatic aberration in photography. We talk about how to avoid getting these problems, how to fix these problems and how for some photographers - these aren't problems at all but rather, deliberate creative choices. Royce does an AWESOME job of explaining these problems so that they are...

Photography podcast #116 features an interview with German landscape photographer Michael Breitung where we talk about why and how to do focus stacking in photography. Basically focus stacking involves taking multiple frames of the same scene but each frame is focused at a different part of the image. Then these frames are blended together using a graphics program like Gimp (free) or Photoshop (expensive). The result is sharpness and depth of field on steroids that can't be matched by any...

Photography podcast #115 features an interview with Colour expert Joe Brady who works for Macgroup US. Joe knows pretty much everything there is to know about getting accurate colour from your monitor and your printer. Joe has recorded 2 podcasts with us already about monitor calibration and those links are listed below in the shownotes. In this podcast, we tackle some colour concepts that are a source of confusion for many people. We talk about monitor settings like colour temperature,...

Photography podcast #114 features an interview with light painter Patrick Rochon who discusses his new experimental 360 degree light painting technique. In a nutshell, Patrick light paints a model who stands in the middle of a ring as 24 DSLR cameras around the ring expose the scene at the same time. The frames are then strung together with software to give the illusion of circular movement. Patrick and I talk about his new work, his older work, and we talk about Patrick's light painting...