Nik Collection 9 Releases a Major Update With Color Grading, More AI, and New Filters
The Nik Collection of software tools goes way back to when Nik introduced some editing plug-ins for Photoshop in the 90s. Google bought the tools in 2013 and brought several of the tools together into a collection. But Google, as Google does, sold the collection off to DxO in 2017, and they began to rewrite everything with new code, and released a 7-app collection, adding an 8th shortly thereafter.
2023 marked the first release of the software using entirely DxO code, and that's pretty much the Nik Collection as we know it now.
16 Signs You Are Ready to Go Full-Time as a Photographer
The question is not whether you are talented enough. Talent got you to the point where going full-time even feels possible. The question is whether the business infrastructure, the financial runway, and the personal support system are in place to survive the transition without collapsing under the weight of it.
New Topographics in the Age of Permanent Change
Look around any expanding city today. Warehouses rise where fields stood five years ago. Housing developments stretch toward dry hills. Highways carve through fragile terrain. Data centers replace factories. The landscape is no longer something we visit. It is something we continuously build, erase, and rebuild. It is progress, they say.
If photography once sought the sublime in untouched nature, our era demands something else: a sustained, critical observation of the man-altered world.
What Focal Length Should You Use? A Practical Guide for Every Shooting Situation
Focal length is one of the most consequential decisions you make before pressing the shutter, and most people learn it the hard way, through years of trial and error. David Bergman's goal here is to compress that learning curve into a single, practical framework you can start using immediately.
Lightroom Classic 15.3 Adds Background AI Processing and Three New Firefly Workflows
Lightroom Classic 15.3 adds more Adobe Firefly integration than most people realize, and some of it costs more credits than you'd expect. If you shoot high-ISO work or do any bulk AI processing, at least one of these updates will change how you work.
Photoshop Beta's New AI Model Handles Glasses Reflections Better Than Anything Else Right Now
Removing reflections from glasses in portraits has always been a frustrating problem, and the existing tools in Lightroom and Camera Raw fall short when the window reflection isn't the dominant element in the frame.
Why Top Gun Still Looks Better Than Its Own Sequel
The original Top Gun was shot in 1986 with heavy film cameras, no drones, and a U.S. Navy that charged by the hour. Nearly four decades later, Top Gun: Maverick used six Sony Venice cameras and some of the most precisely engineered aerial photography ever put on film. The gap between those two productions tells you almost everything about why one of them still feels like lightning.
The Difference Is Clear as Day: We Review the New Viltrox 35mm f/1.8 II EVO
This isn't just another third party lens for your mirrorless camera. This new lens focuses (pun intended) not just on aiding the shooting process but even more so on delivering quality images.
Nikon Officially Teases New Line of Cinema Lenses
Nikon has just teased a first look at a brand-new line of cinema lenses. So what should we expect from the final reveal?
I was literally in the process of rigging up my Nikon ZR camera for a shoot with YouTube on for background noise when the algorithm surfaced a new video I wasn't expecting. Simply titled "A New Chapter Begins," the thumbnail gave away the secret. Well, part of the secret.
9 Things That Go Wrong on Every Landscape Photography Trip and What to Do About Each One
Landscape photography looks serene from the outside. A lone figure on a hillside, tripod silhouetted against a sunrise, communing with nature. What the Instagram post does not show is the two-hour predawn drive, the boots soaked through before the first frame, the sky that refused to cooperate, and the 200 exposures that produced three usable images. Landscape photography is not a passive activity. It is an ongoing negotiation with an environment that does not care about your shot list.
Sharp and Smartly Priced: We Review the Viltrox 55mm f/1.8 EVO
The nifty fifty has earned its reputation as the go-to standard prime, but the Viltrox 55mm f/1.8 EVO feels like a quiet refinement of that formula. Just a 5mm shift in focal length is enough to change how you see and compose a scene. After testing the new Z mount variety on location, the quality of this lens becomes clear.
We Review the Ultimate Precision Tripod: Rogeti T32MAX With C32GK + RG-1 Geared Center Column and Head
It has been a long time since I felt genuinely excited about a tripod and gear head, mainly because this segment of the industry has felt largely stagnant.
Why Photographers Talk About Gear (And What We Should Talk About Instead)
Sit down with almost any photographer these days, and the conversation goes one of several ways: camera specs, gear rumors, and the perennial question: "What are you shooting with?" What would happen if we changed that conversation to something more?
Stop Editing Photos Without Asking This First
Shooting in thick sulfur smoke with burning eyes and barely enough air to breathe, Mitchell Kanashkevich still managed to walk away with images that communicate something real. Most edits of a scene like that end up feeling like nothing, and the reason almost always comes down to one flawed habit that's remarkably easy to fix.
Spot Metering Is the Most Misunderstood Mode on Your Camera
Exposure metering is one of those fundamentals that separates guesswork from consistently well-exposed images. Even with today's sophisticated camera systems, knowing how your camera reads a scene and when it gets it wrong changes how you shoot.
How a Cell Tower Worker Became a Professional Nature Photographer
Picking a photography niche on Instagram or Facebook right now is an uphill battle. The platforms are flooded, and standing out as a working photographer takes more than great images.
One Desert Location, Three Different Days, Completely Different Images
Shooting the same desert location across multiple days and radically different conditions is one of the best ways to push your landscape work forward. This Arizona desert shoot is a masterclass in staying adaptable, and the images prove that preparation and flexibility matter far more than waiting for the perfect moment.
Inserting Products Into Existing Photos With AI: What Actually Works
One of the more practical uses I've found for AI in photography is product placement — specifically, dropping a product into a photo you've already taken. Not generating a scene from scratch, but salvaging or extending a shoot you already have.
Title: Pentax 645 vs Mamiya M645 1000S: Which 645 Film SLR Should You Buy?
If you're trying to choose between the original Pentax 645 and the Mamiya M645 1000S, you're not really asking about features. You're asking which one will make your portraits and landscapes look the way you want.
I shot both systems with my favorite focal lengths — Pentax 45mm and 55mm, Mamiya 75mm and 150mm — and what surprised me wasn't sharpness. It was behavior. One camera encouraged speed and familiarity. The other made me simplify and commit.
10 Summer Photography Projects You Can Finish Before September
Summer is the easiest season to photograph and the hardest season to use well. The light is long, the weather cooperates, and the subjects are everywhere. But without a specific project to anchor your shooting, those three months dissolve into a scatter of random images that do not add up to anything.