Digital Photographer

This time of year is often a limbo period for photographers. While we might be looking forward to the promise of colourful spring landscapes, longer days and gorgeous light, we’re presented with a more bleak reality of winter scenes for months to com

Pink Lady® Food Photographer of the Year will be holding its 10-year anniversary exhibition at the Royal Photographic Society (patron HRH The Duchess of Cambridge) in Bristol, UK. Dr Michael Pritchard FRPS is director of education and public affairs

When logistics allow you to, it’s always a good idea to visit your shooting location at least once before an important commission. In an ideal world, you don’t want the first time you get there to be the day of the shoot – if you do, you’re more like

Following its online debut in September 2020, The Photography Show & The Video Show team has announced that its second virtual festival, Spring Shoots, will run on 6-7 March 2021. The free-to-enter event for photographers and videomakers will include

International photographer Rankin and musician Stefflon Don recently collaborated to create content entirely shot on the new Galaxy S21 Ultra 5G. The collection of portraits and social content pays tribute to the iconic female trailblazers of the 80s

Some of the greatest features of modern digital cameras are the semi-automatic exposure modes, namely Aperture Priority (A or Av on a camera’s mode dial) and Shutter Priority (S or Tv). These work effectively for most shooting situations, leaving you

The relationship between shutter speed, aperture and ISO is at the heart of all photography. At one time, shutter speed and aperture were the only exposure variables you could change from one shot to the next, as the ISO was set by the type of film y

The exposure was wrong here, so we underexposed to retain detail. Colours and tones are starting to clip to pure white, so there’s some detail loss. The highlights are blown in the neon sign, and details in the face have been lost. ■

This is a self-portrait in my Tesco uniform complete with my essential tools: my box cutter I call Toby, and my Singaporean-imported mask. I am an events photographer, so my work was literally banned overnight from the start. I’m British with Singapo

Website:www.jeremywalker.co.uk Price: £45/$60 UK-based landscape photographer Jeremy Walker used the first lockdown to put together this inspirational 232-page hardback book with images from England, Wales and Scotland. Many of the images include

There has been something on my mind recently about the current state of landscape photography, and perhaps indicative of the times in which we currently live. That something is the fear of missing out, or ‘fomo’ in today’s lexicon. I’m enamoured with

Unlike most cameras, which have a colour filter array over the sensor to enable them to reproduce colour, the Q2 Monochrom has no coloured filters over its CMOS chip. This means that each pixel receives more light, which is good news for noise contro

Camera settings are full of technical terms and jargon, and we use the word manual in two different ways when we talk about cameras. Unlike the Manual shooting mode, which allows you to set exposure parameters like aperture and shutter speed, the Man

Red Bull Illume Image Quest, the world’s top adventure imagery contest, will open again for entries in March 2021. The annual competition showcases dynamic and captivating images of extreme sports, adventure and action from around the world, and illu

Use the viewfinder Frame the sun just behind the palace (or object of your choice). It’s easier to shoot handheld so that you can position the starburst. Set a narrow aperture You’ll need to stop right down, going as narrow as f/22 for a full starbu

PRICE: £1,099 ($1,299) FOCUS DISTANCE: 28cm WEIGHT: 1,110g Tamron lenses have always had a meatiness to them that conveys ruggedness and instils confidence. The SP 15-30mm f/2.8 Di VC USD G2 (model A41) inherits this quality, and its proportions an

Portraits can be quite tricky to take. This image of our model Claudia was no different, as she was totally lit by this neon sign in a shop window. Here we locked off the white balance and set it to Fluorescent so that we would consistently get a vib

1 Canon 5D Mark IV Jeremy has used this full-frame DSLR for around three years. Although the Canon 5DS R is his main camera, he finds the Mark IV to be better in low light, producing less grainy results when lifting dark shadow details. 2 Canon EF 2

An often-overlooked image parameter is aspect ratio. Beyond simply being the shape of the sensor in the camera, the format of an image is an important choice for the photographer, and it can greatly impact the look and feel of a photo. While most sen

Image title: Half Dome during Sunset What camera, lens and settings did you use? Nikon D850, 24-120mm lens, 1/10 sec, f/8 Where and why did you take this shot? The sunset and snowy mountain peaks created a beautiful backdrop for Half Dome, in

Colour is an important part of photography and plays a significant role in the mood of your images. Your camera’s white balance can make an image appear warmer or cooler to correct for colour casts, and can ensure that neutral hues in the shot, such

1 Use a tripod "I'm setting up the tripod to full height because of the way the foreground is positioned. The legs are folded out fully for stability, which is needed in the low light levels." 2 Compose the scene "I'm using the gate as a leading li

It has not always been possible to operate a business as normal with the restrictions we have all faced over the last year. Many photographers have chosen to work from home, rather than from a dedicated studio space, to save on overheads, since studi

One of the first things we learn in photography is that, when shooting a landscape image, it is vital that sharpness extends from the very front of the scene to the furthest background detail. But while in most cases this will produce a reliably high

Price: £199 / $222 (Discover kit) The LEE85 system is aimed at photographers using smaller camera systems who are looking to travel light but not willing to compromise on design and – most importantly – quality. Given the preference towards smaller

In your camera’s semi-automatic modes, such as Aperture Priority and Shutter Priority, you are able to input some of the exposure data – one or more of aperture, ISO and shutter speed. The camera will then use its built-in metering algorithms to work

Pricing can vary depending on who your major clients are. One-time individuals are unlikely to be willing to pay the same as business customers, so divide your pricing structure to account for B2C (business-to-consumer) and B2B (business-to-business)

Pricing your work has to be the most tricky aspect of running a photography business. While you are clearly generating a product with your images, it can be difficult to define exactly what you should be charging, and how to value the effort you put

I am now at the point where I have so many images that when I need to find a specific one it’s taking me a long time. Do you have any tips on how I should sort them? Linda Lloyd Linda you’re not alone! We can’t stress enough the importance of creati

Price: $199 (approx £148) for Filmmaker version Video editing can be a time-consuming business, and grading is an art that can take years to master. Cinema Grade simplifies and speeds things up by enabling intuitive adjustments and easy shot-matchin

I find this a bit of a boring subject and one I’ve been putting off researching, but I’ve got to the point where I have so many images I don’t know what to do with them all! I’m worried about losing them and need to invest in a better storage system

For our latest competition in association with Photocrowd, we challenged you to submit your best images of Winter Details. After working through thousands of brilliant entries, the winners have been selected. Both crowd-voted and expert winners will

Peter is our in-house writer and photographer, and now our official technique editor – as of this month! In this issue, try out his expert black and white photography techniques in both the main feature on p36 and fine-art creative project on p52. Pe

Don’t get us wrong, semi-automatic shooting modes definitely have their place in a photographer’s shooting practice. They help you to shoot more simply, flexibly or quickly, and they’re great for scenes where the light or subject is changing quickly.

Price: £4,994 / $5,995 The Leica Q2 Monochrom is a very unusual camera because it combines Leica’s Q2 full-frame compact camera with technology from its Monochrom series of black-and-white-only cameras. As a result, the Q2 Monochrom has a 47MP CMOS s

Difficulty level: Intermediate Time taken: 1.5 hours Landscape photography is a genre that benefits greatly from monochrome treatment. Black and white landscapes conjure up images of the work of Ansel Adams and others experimenting with photography

In addition to the manual focus and aperture rings, the Q2 Monochrom has a third ring that enables the closest focus to be reduced from 30cm to 17cm. Exposure is set using the shutter speed dial and the aperture ring, so the camera can be used in Pro

When you’re exposing for a particular scene, you’re actually carrying out a delicate balancing act. The aim is always to get just the right amount of light coming through the lens to hit the camera’s sensor, by adjusting three core variables: apertur

Winter weather is some of the most intense in the year, so capture this in your images! From stormy landscapes to impressive skies and rainy streets, capture the mood of winter. Enter at www.photocrowd.com/digitalphotographer for a chance to win a li

While mirrorless cameras might be stealing all the attention at the moment, you shouldn’t overlook a DSLR. There are still some fantastic DSLRs out there, and this is certainly true when it comes to high-end enthusiast models that cost under £1,500 (

You’ll see histograms everywhere, from your camera’s Live View display to editing programs such as Lightroom. These graphs show you the exposure information of your shot: if it’s bunched up towards the left, it means your shot is underexposed and som

PRICE: £2,149 ($2,299) FOCUS DISTANCE: 50cm WEIGHT: 875g Medium format is more accessible than ever before, yet it remains a fairly niche area of the market. Any medium-format optic is going to be large when compared to the latest crop of APS-C mir

Although Manual mode enables you to take direct control of all three exposure parameters – aperture, shutter speed and the ISO value – many cameras enable you to select Auto ISO while you’re in Manual mode. This means you can lock off the aperture an

Black and white photography remains one of the most popular genres in photography. At Digital Photographer we receive a huge number of monochrome images from photographers around the world, demonstrating a near-universal appreciation for the power of

The Basic version of Cinema Grade costs just $69 (approx £51), but it doesn’t have the shot-matching with groups, or the automatic Log correction and Xrite chart compatibility that you get with the Pro version ($99/approx £73) – both key features for

Last year was mad and difficult for most photographers, both creatively and financially. But instead of sitting back or panicking when business as usual got turned on its head, many pros found new ways to bring in an income, create images or just sta