4 good reasons to buy a pancake lens

From Andrew Gibson at Picture Correct:

1. Simplicity: Pancakes are prime lenses. From an optical design point of view they are pretty simple, much like a 50mm prime lens. The Canon 40mm pancake lens has six elements, whereas zooms usually have ten to twenty elements. This translates to high image quality and lower manufacturing costs.
2. Price. Pancake lenses tend to be inexpensive. You get a lot of bang for your buck in terms of image quality.
3. Aperture. The maximum aperture of my 40mm pancake lens is f2.8. This is not especially impressive for a prime lens, but better than most zooms. If your main lens is a kit lens you will certainly appreciate the improvement.
4. Short minimum focusing distance. The 40mm pancake lens can focus on a subject within 28 centimetres of the camera. This is quite close, and you can get even closer by using extension tubes.

Just learning to shoot photos? Go manual, not auto

Beginning photographers often make the mistake of depending way too much on the automatic features in DSLR cameras, Peter Phun at PhotoCorrect says. He suggests learning in manual mode:

When you’re learning, the best you can do is to learn to adjust the settings on manual. That way you can figure out what you did wrong. Shooting on auto will not tell you much when you’re trying to troubleshoot. Programs that can read exif information which record shutter speed, ISO, aperture, White Balance are revealed when a picture is taken on Manual Mode but not so in Auto.

In this post, Phun lists nine more common mistakes that that beginners make.

3 simple steps to buying (and using) your first DSLR camera

For many folks, the hardest step in learning to shoot photos is deciding on a camera. Here's some
great advice from Chaz Curry at PhotographyBlogger:

1. Buy the cheapest Canon or Nikon DSLR (body only).
2. Buy a 50mm 1.8 lens.
3. Start shooting immediately.

For details, follow the link.

A pocket-sized tripod for iPhoneography

From blogger Glyn Evans:

The portable and flexible tripod makers Joby, have just released their latest creation, the GripTight Micro Stand. Designed for any smartphone with or without a case, the GripTight Micro Stand grips your smartphone safely and securely via a spring loaded mount/grip, allows multi positioning via a machined aluminium mini ball head, that lets you tilt your smartphone 36 degrees in any direction, and can be quickly unfolded when you need it and folds up compactly to about the size of a car key when you don't.

How to control your GoPro Hero camera from your smartphone

Here's the tutorial from GoPro. You will need a smartphone, the GoPro app, and a GoPro Hero camera armed with a GoPro wifi backpack.

It's all about the light: A short guide to getting the most out of aperture

Mobile publicists must master a wide range of media. It's no longer enough to understand just writing copy. We have to learn (among many other things) how to shoot our own photos.

Even if you are shooting with a smartphone, it's a smart idea to understand what photographers call the exposure triangle: shutter speed, ISO and aperture.

Shutter speed is simply how long the shutter allows light into the camera. If you want to stop a runner in mid-stride, you want to use a short speed. If you want to capture the moon at night, you need a long speed.

The ISO is a concept from the analog days of photography. It is the "speed of the film." A low ISO is good on a sunny day. A mid-ISO is good for indoor work. A high-ISO is good for darkness. But beware: The higher the ISO, the more "noise" you are likely to capture on your image. Generally, an ISO of 200 to 800 is considered all-purpose, except for the most extreme situations like night photography.

Then there's aperture, which controls how much light reaches the shutter. The smaller the aperture, the deeper the focus. So if you want everything in the shot to be in focus (think "Citizen Kane"), you want the smaller aperture you can reasonably use in your situation. If you want to blow out the background or the foreground, and focus entirely upon the main subject, then you want to open up the lens to the widest aperture that is reasonable for the situation.

It's all a matter of balancing how much light goes to through the aperture to the shutter, and how much light your camera registers on the image.

OK, that's the executive summary. Here's short guide to walk you through getting the most out of your aperture settings from blogger Ashley Beolens:

• Aperture – PictureCorrect

Baffled by all the new cameras coming out these days?

 Me, too. But I'm finding this online guide to be pretty damn useful:

• Photokina: An Easy-to-Follow Guide on the Latest in Cameras! (And then some) | Photojojo

Video: How to build a swivel adaptor for the GoPro Hero 2

From Randy Werner's YouTube channel:

A down-and-dirty approach to time-lapse photography

Time-lapse photography can provide a very cool change of pace for your videos. In this presentation, Chris Jarvis demonstrates four time-lapse set-ups featuring a Nikon D3S, a Nikon D7000, and two GoPro Hero2s. The results are intriguing:



Instead of shooting a landscape, imagine using the same technique to capture time-lapse of a demonstration, or a process, or even an office in motion. There's a lot you can do with this technique.

Of course, there's more to this technique than just capturing the images. If you are working with a DSLR, here's a good place to start: http://www.lightstalking.com/timelapse

If you are working with a GoPro, start here: http://www.all-things-photography.com/gopro-hd-hero-time-lapse.html

There are plenty of other sources online, some for free, some for pay.

7 secrets of street photography -- and why you should learn them

For the mobile publicist, practicing the art of street photography offers at least two advantages. One, it's endlessly fascinating. Two, the techniques you hone are useful when shooting photos at corporate events. It helps you get beyond the grip and grin, and allows you to produce photos that are far more engaging.

From Selena Walker at PictureCorrect:

The secret to taking great street photography is a combination of technique, emotion and a little bit of patience. If you follow the secrets below you’ll be on your way to creating inspirational images:

• Street Photography: 7 Steps to Success

How to tell a story like a photojournalist

From the Phoblographer:

Photojournalism is the process of documenting the happenings of life on camera through photography. These days, it tends to extend into videography but the main elements of the practice still hold their roots in still image capture. Photojournalism can still be a tough job as far as getting work and images that are different than other photojournalists but that is still a story that would hold an audience captive.

There are many factors that go into photojournalism. Many of them are ethically related and others are just how the industry works. But to tell a good story there are certain shots that are essential.