5 Things That Are Worth Splurging On in Photography (and 5 That Are Not)
Photography has a spending problem, and it starts early. The moment you get serious enough to move past the kit lens and the auto mode, the industry opens a firehose of recommendations pointed directly at your wallet. Better bodies, faster glass, studio lighting, editing software, bags, straps, filters, presets, printers, and accessories that promise to make your work look professional before you have figured out what "professional" means for you.
Photoshop 27.6 Has 14 New Features: Here's What Changed
Photoshop 27.6 dropped with 14 new features, and some of them are genuinely useful while others expose real limitations in Adobe's AI tools. Knowing what works and what doesn't before you spend credits on generative fills can save you a lot of frustration.
The Viltrox 35mm f/1.2 Lab N Fixed What Was Already a Near-Perfect Lens
Viltrox's 35mm f/1.2 Lab was already one of the sharpest, most capable lenses in its class when it launched. The new "N" version strips out the OLED screen and replaces the unconventional control ring with a traditional aperture ring, and that single change makes a lens that was optically exceptional finally handle the way it should.
Sony RX1R Mark III vs. Leica Q3: Which Premium Compact Actually Wins?
The Sony RX1R Mark III launched to a lot of ridicule. At $5,100 with no IBIS, no tilt screen, and a battery that's been around since 2013, the internet had a field day, and honestly, the criticism wasn't wrong on the specs alone.
Canon RF 35mm f/1.4 L VCM vs. Sony FE 35mm f/1.4 GM: Which Flagship 35mm Actually Wins?
Canon and Sony each make a flagship 35mm lens, and on paper they're remarkably close in size, weight, price, and optical spec. But close on paper doesn't always mean close in practice, and the differences that do exist could matter depending on how you shoot.
Why the 85mm f/1.8 Beats the 85mm f/1.4 for 95% of Photographers
The 85mm prime is the rare lens that almost every working portrait photographer owns, eventually. It is the focal length that does the most flattering work on faces, the easiest one to recommend to a portrait beginner, and the lens most photographers reach for when they want to make a person look the way they want to be seen.
Critique the Community: Dark
Welcome to the April Critique the Community! For this contest/critique, we are doing another abstract theme that should allow more photographers to enter. For this month we want to see your most "dark" or "low key" photographs. If you have images that play off of darker tones or contain mostly black, unlit areas, we would love to see them!
I Still Shoot With an iPhone 8 in 2026 and I Don't Plan to Upgrade
Let's get this out of the way: this is not nostalgia.
I'm not trying to "bring back" anything, especially a smartphone. I'm not interested in retro aesthetics for the sake of it. And I'm definitely not here to argue that older technology is somehow superior.
I use an iPhone 8 because it works for me, and a smartphone for me is just a smartphone — something I use to communicate.
5 Natural Light Portrait Mistakes That Make Your Images Look Flat
Shooting portraits in natural light sounds simple until you realize how many ways it can go wrong. Knowing the five most common mistakes, and how to fix them, is the difference between images that look flat and ones that have real depth and drama.
The Best 35mm Lens for Fujifilm X Isn't What You'd Expect
Choosing a normal-length prime for your Fujifilm X system sounds straightforward until you realize there are seven legitimate autofocus options sitting in roughly the same focal length range, each with a different price, build, and rendering character. The gap between the best and worst of them is smaller than you'd expect, but the differences in autofocus reliability and real-world usability are anything but trivial.
Why a Career Canon Shooter Is Switching to the Nikon Z 8
The Nikon Z 8 is a camera that has generated a lot of conversation since Nikon acquired Red Cinema, but most of that conversation focuses on specs and codec comparisons. What's harder to find is a perspective from someone who actually shot on a Red camera for years, sold it, moved on, and then picked up the Z 8 expecting to be underwhelmed.
Fujifilm X-T30 III Review: 6.2K Video in a $1,000 Camera Is Hard to Ignore
The Fujifilm X-T30 III sits at $1,000 body only, positioning it as one of Fujifilm's most accessible entry points into the X-series system. For that price, you're getting a 26-megapixel APS-C camera with some video specs that don't match what you'd expect from a camera in this range.
Photographing Urban Wildlife: First Steps Into the Wild Next Door
Wildlife photography is often associated with iconic species such as lions on the savannah, elephants crossing golden plains, or bears roaming in areas like Yellowstone National Park. These adventures are extraordinary, but they are also expensive and not always accessible to beginner photographers.
The Pentax K-3 Mark III and Why DSLRs Refuse to Die
The Pentax K-3 Mark III was officially discontinued in Japan in January 2025. The Monochrome variant has been more complicated: B&H's original black Monochrome listing is now marked "No Longer Available," though it points buyers to a current matte-black Monochrome listing still shown as in stock. After roughly four years of production, the K-3 Mark III is being phased out in stages rather than discontinued cleanly, and the last major APS-C DSLR from a major manufacturer is winding down. By the standard industry narrative, this should be the end of the story. DSLRs are dead.
Why Your Camera Choice Is Killing Your Storytelling
Photojournalism and documentary work demand a different relationship with gear than most photography does, and Jorge Delgado-Ureña, co-founder of the Raw Society, has spent nearly two decades figuring out exactly what that relationship looks like.
What Lightroom's Yellow Warning Icon Is Actually Telling You
That yellow warning icon in Lightroom isn't just a minor annoyance you can ignore. It's telling you something specific about the order in which your AI edits were applied, and clicking "update" without understanding what's happening can quietly change your image in ways you won't notice until it's too late.
This Handcrafted Wooden Pinhole Camera Shoots 6x17 Panoramas and Lets You Change Focal Length Mid-Roll
Pinhole photography strips the camera down to almost nothing: a box, a hole, and light. Most pinhole cameras are exactly that simple, but the Mania, handcrafted by German woodworker and photographer Ralph Mann, is a modular wooden pinhole system that pushes what a camera without a lens can actually do.
24-70mm vs. 70-200mm: Which Zoom Should You Buy First?
Choosing between a 24-70mm and a 70-200mm zoom is one of the most common lens decisions you'll face when building a kit. Both are professional staples, both are genuinely useful, and neither obviously replaces the other.
Leica Is the Most Honest Camera Company, and Also the Most Expensive
There is a thing Leica does that no other camera manufacturer is willing to do, and it is the thing that makes Leica interesting even to photographers who will never own one. Leica refuses to pretend to be what it is not.
When Expensive Gear Stops Working
Most photography now lives online. In the feed, in algorithms, in a constant stream of images. This is where the idea of what a photographer is supposed to need gets formed. Cheap did not become better. It became sufficient.