Balloon lights are an uncommon light source for most of us. But such lights are often used in TV and movie production. They’re essentially huge light sources that are overhead of your subjects using very bright bulbs. The balloon part of it acts like a big diffuser to help soften and spread the light out more evenly. They’re not cheap, though. But this DIY option from Todd Blankenship at Shutterstock shows us a way to make one fairly easily using some shower curtains, LED strips and helium....

The sun was on the horizon, a perfect orange ball. It was another beautiful sunset in Hoi An, Vietnam and we were out on a photo tour through a local village – taking advantage of the dreamy light. While the group spread out to take photos of people harvesting rice in the paddies, I noticed one of my students walking back toward me. She appeared hunched over in defeat. “What’s going on?...

Lightroom’s Auto Mask option is a useful tool that can save you a lot of time. But this video from Signature Edits shows you how you can make the Auto Mask feature even faster and more efficient. This way you’ll be able to mask even very complex images in a few seconds, which will save you even more post-processing time. When making selections with the Adjustment Brush, the Auto Mask option helps you make accurate selections even without being too precise....

I was inspired by Tim Binnion‘s work with the Game Boy Camera and a cheap cellphone tele lens. I figured I’d up the ante and design and build a full Canon EF Mount for my Game Boy Camera. The GBC has a sensor size of about 3.6mm² which seems equivalent to a 1/4″ sensor (Wikipedia). This gives the GBC a crop factor of about 10.81. With my 70-200 f4 mounted on a 1....

This year, Instagram has become more devoted to protecting teenagers than ever. However, its latest effort is just… Silly. From now on, Instagram will prompt you to share your birthday. All. The. Time. Instagram cites “young people protection,” and warns that you won’t be able to use the app unless you share your birthday. The changes only apply to people who haven’t already shared their (real or fake) birthday on Instagram....