If you want to know the ins and outs of shooting a college basketball game, check out this awesome behind-the-scenes video with pro sports photographer Miguel Olivella. In it, he walks us through things like where to be, what gear to use, camera settings, and various tricks he has under his sleeve that help him get the perfect shot.

(via Scott Kelby)

Have you always wondered how to use the Pen Tool in Photoshop but have never gotten around to learning it? f stoppers published this uber-informative video tutorial by Sean Armenta teaching how it’s used and why it’s a tool that everyone should learn. The teaching is done on a Mac, so if you have a PC, just substitute CTRL for CMD and ALT for OPT.

You might have seen clone photographs while browsing around on the Web before, but do you know how to shoot and post-process photographs that have multiple instances of a person? Here’s a video tutorial by Gavin Hoey teaching you the process (the resulting photo can be seen here).

If you’d prefer a non-video tutorial on the same thing, we posted a pretty popular tutorial on it back in 2009, titled “7 Steps to Taking Clone Photographs“.

I had some stuff lying around as well as saw some parts as I was out and thought this would be fun to make. I have around $20 invested in parts. On eBay I saw ring lights for anywhere around $40 on up, so this will save you money and it was fun to make.
Read the rest of this entry »

If you use the LCD on your DSLR for shooting images or video, you probably know how much of a pain it is when sunlight shines directly on it, preventing you from seeing whether the scene is in focus. LCD viewfinders solve that problem, but can have devastating effects on your wallet. If you’re just a hobbyist that wants a simple LCD viewfinder for cheap, this video tutorial will teach you how to make one with items you probably have lying around the house worth $5.

You can also follow the tutorial in a step-by-step format here.

Here’s a nifty behind-the-scenes video tutorial by photographer Jay P. Morgan that shows how to make a cheap DIY rain machine for adding rain to your photographs.

(via f stoppers)

What does it take to shoot portraits of random strangers on a sidewalk? Photographer Clay Enos, known for his portraits for the movie Watchmen, walks us through his process for capturing impromptu portraits of passers-by on a white backdrop.

One takeaway is that it pays to be outgoing and social, since your conversation skills can do a lot towards making subjects feel at ease.

(via f stoppers)

I needed a foot switch for my DSLR camera so that I could take hands-free pictures. On a long-shot, I went down to the local Radioshack to see if they had one. As expected, they didn’t have any camera foot switches, but I did luck out that they had all the parts necessary to build my own. Here is how to throw together a 5-minute camera foot switch with easily obtainable parts from Radioshack.
Read the rest of this entry »

Here’s a quick tutorial on how you can fake a slow motion effect with only still photos using Adobe After Effects.

(via Photoxels)

We’ve featured a couple beautiful examples of fake slow-motion video created using Twixtor shot with the Canon 7D and 550D. If you don’t want to shell out $300 just for Twixtor, you can do something somewhat similar using only Final Cut Studio. The above footage was shot at 60fps using a Canon 60D and created entirely with Final Cut Studio. Yes, yes, we know the wheels look strange, but it’s still a neat effect and might produce interesting results with the right kind of footage.
Read the rest of this entry »