Last week I introduced our standard location photography gear setup. We’ll be looking at different bags week by week and today it’s the heart of the business, the camera bag.
You won’t find the latest, trendiest equipment necessarily. This is what we’ve amassed over years in the business and what has produced a good return on investment for our commercial studio. We generally make equipment purchases at year end based on profitability and the guidance of our accountant.

Let’s take a look inside:

In the main compartment:

Cameras:
Canon 5D
Canon 20D (backup - it has …

As we were packing for location photography this week I thought it might be interesting to show an overall of just what we take along on the average location photo shoot. This is our “medium” location kit, sometimes we pack less, sometimes we take the whole studio. Most of our location jobs (probably 75%) fall around this “medium” category.
It’s important to have everything we may need and then a backup for each item in case something goes down. It’s also nice to have the extra equipment in case we decide …

video episode 28
I’m often asked, “how do I calibrate my monitor”? What exactly is color management and what are the benefits? The implementation of a good color management system will help you get consistent results when viewing your photos on-screen and when printing them. While implementing color management isn’t critical for the hobbyist, it sure can be nice to make prints that look the image on your monitor.
I’ll be honest, color management was a difficult concept for me to grasp in the beginning. In this video I’d like to share …

* I want to mention that this article has been revised after receiving a helpful comment from yz (check out the beautiful images on his photoblog). I appreciate the clarifications, we’re all here to learn…
In this day and age it’s possible to create quite beautiful photographs without fully understanding focus and depth of field. As long as your auto focus lens purrs when you hit the button and a little sensor lights up on the intended subject, you’re good to go.  But, really, that’s putting out a bare minimum of …

*Let me preface this post with a reminder that Epic Edits Weblog is having their very cool $50 Film Camera Project, running through mid-September. Shooting film can be a great way to break your usual photo routine.
There seems to be some curiosity about shooting film among younger photographers and it’s reviving the medium (just when you thought the film vs. digital debate was dead, the bones get dug back up!). I enjoy shooting film but never, ever made a head-to-head comparison of film vs. digital on the same day …

Have you seen the new Microsoft image technology “Photosynth” yet? I first saw the demo of this product about a year ago. After viewing the initial demo I was honestly left speechless.
First, a quick explanation. Imagine walking around a building, any building, large or small, taking multiple, overlapping digital pictures as you go, kind of like a David Hockney Polaroid collage. Zoom in and zoom out, capturing both overall shots and fine details. Now load those 100 or so digital captures up to the now very live Photosynth website …

How many megapixels do you need? Do most of your images remain in digital form, displayed on the web? Or do you create large prints for display?
As camera sensors grow in resolving power, greater demands are placed on lenses. A kit zoom lens that resolved just fine for a manufacturers 6 MP model might not rate so well on a 10 or 12 MP model. More resolution also means larger file sizes and increased data storage needs. With current cameras able to resolve well enough for many applications, is there …

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For the next three weeks we’ll be looking at outdoor portraits. Hopefully this episode will help out if you’re interested in ideas on how to photograph a senior portrait. It’s pretty timely, too, since DIYPhotography.net is running their Portrait Professional 8 Giveaway at the same time. If you’re looking for portrait inspiration, check out all the entries so far in the DIYPhotography.net flickr pool.
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The day of video shooting was perfect in most all respects except for one challenge we hadn’t encountered before: swarms of deafening locusts! If …

Over a month ago I set sail on an adventure, the purchase of my first Windows computer…ever. As the current owner of nine Mac computers and as an Apple diehard, I never considered a machine other than one running either the Mac OS or a distro of Linux. My first post on the purchase of this Windows laptop created quite a bit of feedback from prophotolife readers, both pro and con. Having lived with the Toshiba Satellite (and, more importantly, Windows Vista) for awhile, I’m ready to share some thoughts …

A couple weeks ago Brian Auer at Epic Edits Weblog mentioned a project he was putting together and I’ve been looking forward to it ever since, for a number of reasons. The short story is this: the project encourages readers to either buy or use an existing $50 film camera, then write a review on the camera and submit a roll of images for a chance to win a classic Diana+ camera and Ilford film. Brian will fill you in on all the details right here (I encourage you to …