Photo Accessory News

Amazon Prime members – and you know who you are – you have until Wednesday at 2:59 am ET (or 11:59pm Tuesday PT) to take advantage of all the great photography gear deals out there for Amazon Prime Day.

One of the most misunderstood and overlooked of photo accessories is, without a doubt, the lowly lens hood. At best, most photographers simply take lens hoods for granted. At worst, they leave them in their camera bags where they serve no purpose except to take up valuable space where you could be storing filters or extra batteries.

There is only one photo accessory that improves 100% of your images: the tripod. However, traveling with an extra set of legs can be cantankerous. Ask any centipede. Our friends across the pond have a couple new products that eliminate the temptation to leave the tripod at home.

Over the past 72 hours I’ve removed 19-inch-deep snow from my driveway and spent three days and nights without heat or lights. Things were so bad my faithful dog ran an ad in the newspaper looking for a new home. I don’t know what I did to irk the snowplow driver but he neatly sealed my drive with a four-foot wall of solid ice. And did I mention that four of my trees fell from the weight of the snow, one narrowly missing the house? So in the wake of this madness I did the only thing a sane person would do: I made of list of the new camera stuff I want to get if the sun ever shines again in New Jersey.

Most photographers have experienced the trauma of being on a daylong shoot, draining the camera's battery, and discovering that their spare is sitting on a charger at home. There’s not much you can do about that, unless you check out the video below.

There are two important facts about flash photography that everyone should understand: The first is that a simple external flash mounted atop a camera (or used remotely for even better results), can make a huge difference in photographs when shooting indoors or out. Number two is that the use of an accessory flash is much easier than most photographers think.

You need a tripod. If you shoot video, panoramas, fireworks, time exposures, selfies or macro work in addition to general picture taking, you may even need two tripods. Selecting a tripod that matches the way you work is important, and not at all difficult if you approach it in the right way.