For several decades this competition has been one of the most prestigious competitions amongst wildlife-, nature and landscape-photographers from all over the world, and for a good reason: The consistent very high quality of the winning images. I have personally submitted photos for this competition several times and have twice been shortlisted just before the final selection. This year Canadian Environmental photographer Paul Nicklen not only won the Grand Price but also had a large selection of his images shortlisted across the various categories. The list of previous winners of this competition includes Frans Lanting, Jim Brandenburg and Hungarian Bence Maté from Hungary who won in 2010.
The winning images will be exhibited at the National History Museum and will later this year tour the globe stopping in most larger capitals both in Europe, US and Australia.
Take a look at the official page and enjoy some of the stunning images from this years competition here:
So, you have found that one item on Ebay that you just cannot live without – how to you guarantee that it ends up in your camera bag and not in someone else’s? If you follow the easy steps below there are a very good chance that you will succeed!
1. DONT bid before the last 60sec of an auction. Its easy to get caught up in the ‘bidding-war’ on items with starting prices of $0.99 but it’s a very stupid idea to participate in this ‘feverish and emotional’ act. Every time you place a bid on this item everyone else who placed a bid are notified and encouraged to place another bid.. I’ll explain the 60sec rule later.
2. Know what you are bidding on. Nothing can replace knowledge – whether you are looking for a brand new in box camera body or a second hand lens it is absolutely essential that you know how much it cost you if you had bought it in retail or even via other similar auction pages. Remember to factor in the delivery and postage charges when deciding on your ‘max limit’
3. Research and investigate the seller. Ebay has got a brilliant user-rating system which is a good indicator of a seller/buyers reputation – use it! I usually ever buy from someone with less that a 99.8% positive seller feedback score and I always read the negative feedback left for a seller as this is a good indicator if anything should be ‘fishy’. Do not settle on other payment terms than PayPal as that is currently the most safe and it has got you covered should the buyer turn out to be a cheat.
Explanation of the 60sec rule:
Latest numbers show that Ebay have got more than 100.000.000 active users world-wide, which basically is the amount of potential ‘competitors’ you are bidding against – so even before you start reading the product description your odds of winning an item is very low. If you follow this simple rule I can guarantee that most of the items will be your – I have successfully used it for years and have won very close to 95% of all items I have been interested in.
The idea behind the rule is simple: Bid only once and bid the absolute highest you are willing to pay for an item. When you find an item you are interested in, save in you watch list and ensure that you have notifications set-up on your smartphone (works on iPhone as well as android) and computer. Ebay will then advise you when the auction is about to end and you can prepare you attack. Having decided on you absolute maximum amount you will simply have to wait until there are less than a minute left of the auction and start you preparations: enter the amount in the box and submit when there are 2-6sec left – By doing this and winning you might just end up paying a few $ more than the second highest bidder and thereby securing yourself a bargain – or probably more likely a reasonable priced piece of gear as most bargains tend to be snapped up as ‘buy it now’ or via a fixed price.
Inspired by a recent post on Togtech where a selection of the World’s Top Photographers reveal their favourite piece of equipment I sat down and had a think about what my favourite piece of gear was – I found it very difficult to pick just one so I decided to make it a Top5 instead, so without any further ado here it is in reverse order starting with #5:
5. Giotto Air Rocket
A simple little bulb shaped hand-powered blower. Easily removes dust-particles and sand from sensors, filers and lenses. Comes in three different sizes and will not break the bank! Sometimes simple equals good
Giottos Rocket Air
4. LaCie Rugged Safe 500GB HDD
Only one thing is more important than backing up your photos when shooting on location and that is keeping them safe! This particular hard drive from LaCie is my absolute favourite: It is solidly build, shockproof and lightweight (less than 300g). The option of using Firewire 800 makes the transfer of files hassle free and fast. if you have multiple units you can daisy-chain them together to decrease the chances of loosing valuable photos/documents. I always have at least two 500GB drives with me on any job.
LaCie Rugged Safe harddrive
3. LowePro Vertex 300AW
I have had a great amount of backpacks through the last 15 years and have always been very picky when it comes design, construction and materials. I have used this pack for the last two years and I believe I have found ‘The One’: A very rugged design that is perfect for most adventures -whether being in the Australian Outback or in the Arctic, it’s my pack of choice!.
Lowepro Vertex 300AW
2. Carl Zeiss 50mm f1.4 ZE * Planar MF lens
The only item on this lens that is directly related to actually getting the shot nailed! I only recently acquired the lens but it has now become my absolute favourite go-to lens. On a FF body it is a brilliant standard lens whereas on an APS-C sensor it becomes a great 80mm portrait lens. Where it might be a tad soft fully open it absolutely excel stopped down a few stops, in particular in the f2.8 – f5.6 range! The MF is very accurate and smooth and when used with a Digital body such as 5D or 7D you will be able to utilise the cameras build-in focus verification which is very accurate most of the times. By pressing the shutter halfway before you focus almost resembles AF. When used for motion work it is very likely to be the very best 50mm on the market at the moment! I used to think this lens was overrated, but I have now been converted and would chose this lens as my primarily lens any day!
Carl Zeiss 50mm f1.4 *
1. Redged RMC-436 Monopod
The heavy duty construction of this tripod makes it my absolute favourite piece of gear! A special carbon fibre material make this pod extremely durable and strong without adding extra weight. I am supported by Redged but don’t think that is why I recommend this product: I honestly believe that this is the best monopod I have ever owned (and I have owned a lot!). I firstly discovered this particular product a few years back while travelling in the mountains of Nepal and I have not looked back since! I always pack this when shooting on-location!
Redged RMC-436 Monopod
If you could only pick one item what would be your favourite piece of equipment? use the comment section below.
If you are a reader of Fstoppers then I am sure you have heard about this little follow-focus tool developed by Daniel Bauen and Mark McJunkin? and funded via Kickstarter. Basically it is a small rubber gasket that fits around most standard lens sizes attached to a ballhead handle. A very clever take on a product that usually cost several hounded dollars! I have been watching the video presentation over and over again and have been wondering if there are any even cheaper way to solve this issue and have discovered that a very similar product already exists – in my own kitchen!
I then spent a further ten minutes on google and ebay and got my suspision confirmed! – I was not the first person to realise this! bugger!
…and the product?
A standard silicone jar opener like this one from Trudeau does the job extremely smooth and produces great results – and at a price of less than $6.00 – I bet you to find a cheaper solution!
I have also discovered a great video with the device in action:
I have earlier posted a blog about the award-winning photographer Terje Hellesö who won several major photo competitions with submissions which either was not shot by him or which had been manipulated from photos from online photo libraries. It now turns out that there are many other of his kind out there; During the last week I have hears of no less than three other cases which in at least one particular case exceeds the ‘Terje-gate’ in manipulation, cheating and sheer weird-ness.
The first case was brought to my attention via Twitter where American wedding photographer Megan Kunert was accused of using other photographers works as her own. Her ‘fame’ literally rose overnight as her abuse went viral not only via Twitter but also via Facebook, Pinterest, Blogs and LinkedIn. At some point during the process the good old Mr. Hobby from Strobist sent a tweet to his almost 70k followers -and then hell broke lose. It might have been an innocent act by an ignorant hopeful aspiring photographer but instead she has been forced to not only apologise to everyone whose photos she used but also see her ‘blooming’ photography-dream disappear. Today all her social media accounts have been shut down and there are no traces left of her activities..
The second case is not directly related to photographers but to blogging. Duane Lester spent several days working on a blogpost for his very popular webpage just to see in printed in the Oregon Times a few days later. word-for-word and even with Duane’s typos included. Duane decided to confront the editor (or red-neck hillbilly editor) and record it all on tape. The clip has now been seen by more than 200,000 people on youtube and I am sure the good folks over at the Oregon Times regret their ‘little’ mistake. See the clip here.
The last case is a case I have had a very hard time getting my head around. It has suddenly turned very complicated and extremely weird. In a nut shell, Photographer Jay Lee found one of his images being used by a one-woman law firm in Canada. He contacts her and files a DMCA copyright declaration with her host and this is where things go pear shaped; Jay Lee receives not just an email from the lady named Candice Swager but also a a threat of a lawsuit due to loss income, invasion of privacy and a lot of other legal stuff. The discussion are now out in the open and so far nothing has been settled… However, on her Facebook page another poster just revealed that another one of her webpages contains copyrighted photos taken by another photographer.. Guess we have to start all over again! – A lawyer who does not know the Copyright laws? A bit like a bus with a driver who does not know the traffic rules?
If you want to read a bit more in details about the above cases I recommend you take a look at these online blogs: SLRLOUNGE and PetaPixel .
A few weeks ago i received a message on twitter from a German artist ‘Willi Jung’. He invited me to be one of the participating photographers who will be photographing Willi’s ‘bird’ paintings for an art project he is doing. I received my bird painting recently and am proud to say that I have now delivered the first ‘Aussie’ batch of photos for Willi’s ‘Birds Swarm’ Art Project.
If you want to participate or read more about this crazy project please visit Willi here or read his Twitter feed.
National Geographic (Hungary) caption by Ken Kaminesky
Ok. so I admit it; I have not been as active on the blog recently, which I apologise -I have been flat out with work and will hopefully be able to show you some very interesting projects very soon.
However, until then I would like to draw your attention to one of my favourite fellow travel photographers;Mr Ken Kaminesky. I firstly noticed his work a few years back while writing a piece on HDR photography for another online blog. Whether or not you like the almost artificial colours which HDR tends to produce you can not deny that when it is done professionally and correct it does tend to produce a very striking final images.
Ken’s work has won him many accolades, including a cover of National Geographic and a commissioned two week shoot for the Tourism Board of Jordan.
I encourage you all to visit his homepage and his blog where you will find many more of his striking images as well as information about how they were created.
Just one hour ago Canon revealed their new flagship 4k video named the EOS Cinema C300.. As so often before they asked the DSLR guru Vincent Laforet to shoot a video. This time the film is called ‘Mobius’ and is recorded in the Californian desert with a simple drug-kartel related plot.
The C300 will be available from 2012 at a suggested retail price of $18k (or a mere $15k more than the 5D MK II!)
Please visit Vincent Laforets blog to get more information about this great video with interesting BTS and gear run-through.
As part of the user interaction of this page I would like to invite you to submit YOUR requests and wishes of what you want to read about here on this blog.
I do now have more than 3000 unique visits each week which is more than I could ever have dreamed of five months ago when I decided to close down Photorism and dedicate my work to this blog instead. This is why I ask YOU for help now!
Tell me what is important to YOU and what would make it even more interesting for you to interact and participate on here.
Submit your ideas and wishes to me either via TWITTER, by commenting on this post or via email (post@MortenLindholm.com)
The word is YOURS! (All ideas will be posted here on the blog – spam will be deleted)
Thanks for your input
Kind Regards
Morts
PS. Photo does not have anything to do with this post, I just like it!
On Tuesday 21 June 2011 six british photographers were assigned different areas of the City to photograph. Some used tripods, some went hand held, one set up a 5 x 4
All were instructed to keep to public land and photograph the area as they would on a normal day. The event aimed to test the policing of public and private space by private security firms and their reaction to photographers.
All six photographers were stopped on at least one occasion. Three encounters led to police action.
This is what happened.
Produced by the London Street Photography Festival 2011
Directed and produced by Hannah White
Edited by Stuart York
(all rights & text: Shoot Experience & Stuart York)
