The ratio between the focal length and the aperture (diameter) of a lens is called the f/number. The smaller the f/number, the more light is let in. Fast lenses start around f/2.0, and the light let in goes as the inverse square. Compared to f/2.0, f /1.4 lets in twice as much light, f/1.0 four times, and f/0.71 eight times. The fastest camera lenses designed for DSLRs and widely available are between f/1.4 and f/1.2, but lenses as fast as f/0.75 have been made in quantity for special applications, and some of those are available quite cheaply via scrap yards, surplus stores, or eBay.

These ultra-fast lenses usually are branded either Kowa or Rodenstock and were designed for use in medical or semiconductor industry equipment, etc. They are not well-suited for use on DSLR cameras, and are no substitute for an f/1.4 or f/1.2 lens that was designed for your camera. However, they easily can produce very distinctive images. Here’s how to use one on a DSLR.
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This music video by YouTube celebrity Joe Penna (AKA MysteryGuitarMan) shows him dancing in various locations while the world around him moves in slow motion. What’s even cooler is that he also published a behind-the-scenes video showing how you can do the same thing. Check it out!
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This photograph, titled “Easy Rider“, was shot by photographer Chris McVeigh (AKA powerpig on Flickr). The photograph seems so unbelievable that many people asked whether it was faked using Photoshop.

In response, McVeigh posted the following video showing his technique.
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Google has a useful account on YouTube called GoogleWebmasterHelp that publishes short video answers to search engine optimization (SEO) questions submitted to them. If you have a website promoting your photography, then thinking about SEO can help you drive more visitors to your photography.

Here are a couple videos that are relevant to photographers:

How can a photographer’s image-focused site gain PageRank?

Takeaway points: include text relevant to the image(s) inside the img tag and around the image to help the search engine understand what the page is about. For example, you could include a description of the photo in the name or title tag of the image.

Secondly, allow visitors to comment on the image. This often leads to users describing some aspect of the image for you (i.e. “I love the light falling on the barn door”), which helps search engines understand what’s happening on the page.
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Tilt-shift lenses are usually pretty pricey, so many people fake the effect during post-processing by selectively blurring sections of their photographs. There’s even simple web-apps that can add such blur to give your photographs a miniature scale model effect.

If faking the effect isn’t legit enough to satisfy your photo-geekiness — and you’d rather not drop big bucks on it either — there’s a nifty do-it-yourself solution you need to check out: Bhautik Joshi over at cow.mooh.org has a new DIY Tilt-Shift project that teaches you how to convert an old lens into various kinds of tilt-shift lenses.
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Freddy Wong’s YouTube channel is a must-subscribe if you’re interested in video editing and home-brewed CGI. A couple months ago we featured an amazing video they made where an entire action scene was done using light-painting techniques. What’s neat about their channel is that they also create behind-the-scenes clips explaining how each one was made.
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Here’s a photograph titled, “The Inexplicable Occurrence” by Toronto-based photographer Scott McClellan:

What’s neat is that rather than use fancy “Photoshopping” to add the random objects flying around, McClellan captures each element in the scene individually and merges them together into a completed piece. The technique is the same as the one we wrote about in “7 Steps to Taking Clone Photographs“.

Here’s the neat behind-the-scenes video showing how the photograph was shot:

If you have someone who can help catch things you throw around, you can try this yourself at home!

(via Photoxels)