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Congratulations to @Katrina Thompson on winning our Use of Color Photo Challenge! Katrina Thompson is a passionate photographer who pursues her love for macro, landscape, and wildlife photography while caring for her two young children. With over a decade of experience, her work has been showcased in Carrousel Du Louvre, Canadian Geographic and Sony Alpha Universe. Her ultimate goal is to travel the world, capturing its beauty one photograph at a time. We connected with her to learn more about how she made this shot. In Annapolis Royal, Nova Scotia, there is a serene marsh that plays host to a magnificent spectacle every spring. This tranquil haven becomes a temporary home to many migrating hummingbirds, drawing birdwatchers and nature enthusiasts alike. On a recent visit, I found myself captivated by the enchanting sight of numerous hummingbirds flitting gracefully among the wildflowers, their delicate wings creating a symphony of motion as they indulged in the nectar of the vibrant blooms. The air was alive with the soft hum of their wings, creating a scene of unparalleled natural beauty. I had to remain still and wait patiently for this little bird, who eventually became curious and approached me. It seemed to pose for me while fluttering in front of me. For this shot I used my Alpha 7III camera. I find that capturing beautiful and memorable moments is a breeze with this camera as it has all the features I need and is unwaveringly reliable. My settings for this shot were 1/5000, F7.1, ISO 800, and focal length 500. I also used a Manfrotto Element Traveler Small 5-section Aluminum Tripod with a ball head which helped in capturing a crisp, clear shot of this hummingbird. I carefully edited the image using Adobe Lightroom. First, I cropped the image to achieve the perfect composition. Next, I used a brush to create a new mask, allowing me to highlight the hummingbird and enhance the highlights of its wings as well as the saturation of its body. To make a more dynamic image, I applied a linear gradient to darken the foreground while boosting the greens and blues and adding blacks. I also added linear gradients to the top corners of the photo to create a framing effect around the bird, enhancing the highlights and whites. Lastly, I denoised and sharpened the image to ensure its overall quality. Make sure you check out our most recent photo challenge, we’d love to see your work!

Thank you Brooke for such an insightful Forum Takeover!

If you saw my previous post about the Sumo Wrestling Tournament in Japan, I've been doing a mini East Asia tour in Japan and China the past month. Throughout my trip, I had a lot of fun opportunities to photograph in different situations and environments and it was fun, challenging, and a great learning experience. One particular fun experience was a dinner dance performance show I attended in Xian, China called: "Empress of the Great Tang". The story is based on the life of the famous historical figure in China: Empress Wu Ze-tian of the Tang Dynasty(618-907 CE). What made this an enjoyable and fun experience to photograph was the unique venue, vibrant costumes, flashing color lights, and the movements of the artists. I shot with a Sony a1 and the 70-200mm f2.8 lens. To maintain maximum flexibility, I used manual settings to change according to the performance act. My goal was to try to maintain the highest sharpness while maintaining low noise in my photos. Speed: 1/320 ISO: 1600-2000 AF: AF-C Burst Hi+

Last Saturday, I had a fun time photographing the Blue Angels at Fleet Week in San Francisco. Although the weather conditions were not ideal and the Blue Angels cancelled their performance, I made the best of the situation and tried to get as many photos I could in cloudy conditions. Gear: Camera: Sony a1 Lens: 600mm F4 GM Teleconverter: 1.4x TC ISO-640 Shutter: 1/2500 Aperture: f/5.6

Hi Bytor, When I ran into issues upgrading my firmware on the Sony a1, I posted on the Facebook Sony a1 group as well as the official Sony Support Community. I got fast responses and was able to spread awareness and get feedback which helped me troubleshoot issues. https://us.community.sony.com/s/feed/0D5Dp00001lFAQMKA4?language=en_US

My favorite place period is Antarctica. If I did not go to Antarctica back in 2020, I would not be here in this community today. My eyes were opened to a whole new world.

The Wildlife Photographer of the Year 61 competition is open for entries until 11.30 GMT on 5 December 2024. Enter here. The 2025 Prince Albert II of Monaco Foundation's Environmental Photography Award is open for entries until 3 November 2024. Enter here.

Last fall was a particularly colorful season, the colors were incredibly vibrant. I went to a state park, Hickory Run to capture some color. I used a circular polarizer over my 16-35 GM to help decrease glare and increase the vibrancy of the fall colors. I always like to do long exposures near water, they go so well with fall colors.

Great insights! I’ve been shooting with the 85 1.8 for 6 years and hesitated upgrading to the 1.4, feeling the extra speed was not worth the price/weight. So glad I pulled the trigger on the new 1.4 85. Super fast focus, and superlative image quality. The 1.8 was close, but noticeably below the performance of the new 1.4. The 85 will be a great compliment to my 50 1.4. After heavy testing of the new lens, I have 2 commercial shoots and 2 weddings in the next 3 weeks. Looking forward to putting it thru it’s paces.

Hi, Please see the link https://fotospeed.com/ebook/online That has great information about printing, page 33 has the information you are looking for. Mark Galer also has great information in his Resolution-Noise pdf and seminar. Hope that is useful.

Very nice article. I'm looking forward to capture the milky way in some forests completely in orange in the next few weeks.

"Valkyries on a red Italian horizon" Just before returning from a beautiful night, I decided to take a kind of portrait of a group of cows that were sleeping on the mountain with the Milky Way above their heads. They were also blocking my road... To my surprise, the white balance was all over the place, when I tried to correct it, I got even stranger results and, suddenly, I remembered that a friend told me, pay close attention because there are strong solar storms. That's when I realized, I looked up and almost died of astonishment and joy. This is just one of the many panoramas, including 360, and videos that I made. A truly beautiful thing.

This relatively new video settled the inner debate for me.

I have ONE MORE, and this is one that I wasn't truly expecting... "Valkyries on a red Italian horizon" Just before returning from a beautiful night, I decided to take a kind of portrait of a group of cows that were sleeping on the mountain with the Milky Way above their heads. They were also blocking my road... To my surprise, the white balance was all over the place, when I tried to correct it, I got even stranger results and, suddenly, I remembered that a friend told me, pay close attention because there are strong solar storms. That's when I realized, I looked up and almost died of astonishment and joy. This is just one of the many panoramas, including 360, and videos that I made. A truly beautiful thing.

Hi All For some reason, my ability to do manual focus on 200mm-600mm A1 has stopped. a) I have cleaned the contacts between the lens and camera. b) I have made sure that the MF switch on Lens is set. c) I have made sure that the dial on the A1 is set to MF. d) I have upgraded both the camera and lens to the latest firmware. e) I have taken off the lens and put it on a second A1 body, still the same issue. f) I can take a 100mm-300mm lens and get the MF to work. Any suggestions?

I suggest checking the menu on your camera and making sure that Menu -> Network -> Creator's Cloud -> Connection -> Off.

Yes I know and I've used Lightroom Classic ever since version 3. I don't mind minor dodging and burning and cropping and enlargement like could be done back in old days of the physical darkroom but I try to avoid digital manipulation as much as possible. Especially adding layers and alike such as you suggest. I attempt to get it as right as possible in the camera.

Check out this video where I compare the legendary Pentax 67 and 105mm f2.4 and the Sony A7RV and 50mm f1.2 and let me know what you think:

See this commercial I shot for Sennheiser on the A7RV completely handheld: It's wild what you can do nowadays with such little gear because it's so powerful. See this little video I shot giving a bit more insight into the A7RV and how I use it:https://www.instagram.com/p/C6e9sj0O25i/

In May 2024, after a run through Las Vegas, the Utah National Parks, back through Las Vegas, and Death Valley, my wife and I found ourselves up the 395 North of Mammoth Lakes on our way to Lake Tahoe. Towards the end of the day, we stumbled upon a little-known hot springs that we’ll never forget. Shot on A7RV

Wow, it's amazing to see the creativity in these photos is done with such minimal equipment. This article has me considering getting a really nice zoom lens so I don't have so many prime lenses while out shooting.

Dot finders are amazing! In my opinion they are a must if you're trying to do BIF shots. The benefit of the dot finders is that you can easy spot and track a moving bird without having to look at the view finder (assuming your auto focus settings are all set up correctly). Typically if you're viewing through the viewfinder your view is all magnified due to the telephoto lens. viewing through the dot finder is much easier because your view is not magnified and therefore easier to spot the bird. Just make sure to calibrate correctly. I think they work fine with the 200-600, but if I recall correctly some issues with the 600mm f4 (lens is too big, though I think this can be corrected by adding a expansion shoe adapter). The concept of a dot finder is very similar to a spotting scope for high magnification deep space telescopes.

Have you tried the Sony Imaging Edge software? It has a viewer and deleting in the viewer send things to trash

I still have a meteor shower to edit, so, I can't say THIS is my best shot so far, but I truly like it.

I was, sadly in a way, thinking about Shimoda like, probably the only option to consider if I want to mix all of the things I like. I'm also really happy that there is people out there like me, who wants to enjoy a good cup of coffee in the wild while taking some photos.