Our Picture This! assignment this month was festivals and parades, and we asked readers to submit images from gathering spots and events where people dress up, fly in hot air balloons, and generally experience things that are quite out of the ordinary. We received images from festivals all around the country that delved into all sorts of cultures and holidays, all of which...
It was something I read in a magazine not too long ago that inspired this column. The writer was talking about the three levels of creativity: imitative, adaptive, and innovative. I wish I could remember the context, but I made a quick connection to photography. We're imitative at the start; we copy others. Then we're adaptive; we make what we've imitated our...
There may not have been many new printer announcements at PMA this year, but that certainly didn't affect the paper vendors from going all out with new products. It's clear that old is new again, as many of the surfaces shown mimic those of traditional darkroom days. If you're a lover of fiber-based papers, this is a great year for you with plenty of new options...
As digital camera resolution is increasing, memory card manufacturers are keeping up, releasing new products with greater speed and storage capacity. Whether you shoot raw or the finest JPEGs, there's definitely a benefit to using the fastest memory card. The extra speed is useful primarily for greater burst depth--more frames in a long series--but also for shorter...
The absence of the major camera and digital back manufacturers, including Hasselblad, Mamiya, and Phase One, probably reflects less on the viability of the format than the fact that this show is more oriented toward amateur and advanced amateur photographers. But the lack of those exhibitors didn't dim one of the most interesting announcements at the show--a camera that...
It appears someone hit the dimmer switch when it came to lighting this year: the number of entries was sporadic, at best. But the good news is that there were a few shining lights. In strobe lighting the focus was entirely on self-contained monopacs, notably in lighting designed with digital control, smaller and easier-to-use lights, and one super-lightweight battery...
Considering the many D-SLRs that are introduced each year, it's no surprise that virtually every lens manufacturer is also expanding its line of new products. That includes both digital-only lenses--for cameras with a typical small sensor--and multi-platform lenses suitable for any SLR. The latter are particularly important now because of the increasing number of...
PMA 2008 is not going to go down in history as the year of the new printer. Unlike past years where every major company had multiple new product announcements, this year was relatively quiet on the inkjet front. That does point to a maturing category, one where the existing quality bar is already very high. Indeed, you could take any of the top three (Canon, Epson, HP) and have...
Here is a quick tip list on letters for the HELP! desk: Please confine yourself to only one question per letter. Both postal letters and e-mails are fine, although we prefer e-mail as the most efficient form of communication. Send your e-mail queries to editorial@shutterbug.com with Help in the subject header and...
Big, brash, and more digitized than ever before, this year's show exhibited scads of interesting photographic items intended to whet the photographic appetite of any type of photographer. This report covers memorable items that don't fit into any specific category but were worthy of mention.