Photos of distant planets are fascinating, right? But how often do we get to see a photo of a planet as it’s just being formed? Scientists at the Max Planck Institute have recently captured a planet as it was forming around a young star. The photo is incredibly detailed and it’s the best photo of a planet’s birth taken so far. The Max Planck Institute scientists were working with the European Southern Observatory’s very large telescope in Chile when they captured the star being formed....

The world of commercial shooting, whether stills or video, is an attractive one. It can be a tough one to break into, but it can also be a lot of fun. But it’s not like shooting for yourself or for personal clients. There’s often big crews to deal with, time and budget constraints, venue hire, actors, and a whole host of other potential issues to deal with. On a recent commercial shoot for Nu Skin, filmmaker Parker Walbeck documented what went into making it....

I think all of us experimented with camera movement when we got our first camera. But British photographer Simon Painter raised this little game on a new level. He moves and rotates the camera while shooting to create fantastic photographic art. He is fascinated by light, texture, and movement, and his photos are very atmospheric. They are sometimes hectic, sometimes delicate and soft, but they are always inspiring and beautiful. Even the prestigious Sony World Photography Awards chose Simon’s photo “Fractal Leaves” as one of the top 50 photos of 2017 in the “Motion” category....

As somebody who likes to make stuff, I follow a lot of channels on YouTube that have nothing to do with photography. People like Alec Steele, Clickspring and Jonathan Katz-Moses. Now all of these guys work with some pretty dangerous equipment. Like, limb-severing types of equipment and safety is paramount. When it comes to table saw safety, there’s the obvious blade guard, but there are also companies like Sawstop, which produce saws that can actually detect if your skin touches the blade and stop it spinning immediately (almost literally)....

The camera’s hotshoe is generally the last place you want to place a flash as your main light source. Sometimes, though, it can’t be helped. It’s common at weddings and events where you’re constantly walking around looking for the shot. It’s more about the memory than the quality of the light. Although that doesn’t mean we should neglect it entirely. This video from photographer Ed Verosky shows us three ways we can modify the light coming from a flash on top of our camera....