News / Other News

DxO Labs has tested 85 lenses on the Canon EOS 5D Mark III and analysed the results, looking at its two proprietary measures: 'Perceptual Megapixels' for lens sharpness, and the overall DxOMark score. In the first section of a multi-part series, it makes comparisons against both the EOS 5D Mark II and the Nikon D800, with results that may be surprising. Click through for a link to the full article.

Aerial photographer Neal Rantoul has written an article for The Luminous Landscape, explaining how he got started in air-to-ground photography, and sharing some interesting advice. Click through for extracts from the article, in which Rantoul explains his artistic approach, methodology and equipment. We've also gathered a small selection of Neal's impressive abstract aerial landscapes, and provided a link to the original article at The Luminous Landscape. 

Celebrated American photographer William Eggleston won a legal victory when a US District Court judge dismissed a claim of fraudulent and negligent misrepresentation brought by collector Jonathan Sobel. Sobel, an avid Eggleston collector, argued that by creating a new set of large format inkjet prints beyond the 30-year old dye transfer print limited edition of the same image, Eggleston was diluting the value of the earlier prints, one of which Sobel owned. Read on for more details. (via ARTINFO)

Nikon has come under fire from animal welfare groups and some wildlife photographers over its new 'Monarch' line of rifle scopes, designed for game hunting. Marketed as being 'Engineered for Safari' Nikon's Sport Optics division claims that the new Monarch-series scopes are created 'for those seeking dangerous game adventure on the Dark Continent' - an archaic term for Africa. Nikon has manufactured scopes like this for many years, and is not alone (so does Pentax, Leica and others) but the marketing behind its newest Monarch line has caused a degree of anger. Click through for more details. 

Benjamin Von Wong posted photos and a video from his impressive Paris photoshoot that combined fire, fireworks, and models into some dramatic imagery. 'Since we were messing around with consumable effects,' said VonWong in his blog, 'each time we started a burn I had to be ready to constantly change up my camera settings to be able to compensate for the lighting conditions.' (via FStoppers)

Soon after being drafted into the Vietnam War as a rifleman in 1967, photography enthusiast Charlie Haughey was taking photos of his unit for Army and US publications. Upon returning home his negatives sat untouched in boxes. In 2012 Haughey viewed these images for the first time in 45 years and began the emotionally charged process of captioning them for public display. The images are available on Flickr and digital prints will be on exhibit at the ADX gallery in Portland, Oregon on April 5. Click through to view some of the photos and read more. (via The Boston Globe)

An 83-year-old Turkish tailor has become photographer Zoe Spawton's muse for her blog 'What Ali Wore.' The Tumblr blog, styled after the popular fashion photograhy blog, The Sartorialist, features just Ali and his impeccable taste in clothes. In an interview with German website Spiegel.de, the photographer explains how Ali caught her eye as he passed by the cafe where she works wearing a new ensemble every day. Her daily snapshots of his ever-alternating outfits evolved into a full-blown photo project. Click through to see the photos and a link to Zoe's blog. (via Spiegel.de)

Bruce Livingstone, founder of iStockphoto (which has since been acquired by Getty Images), has launched Stocksy, an artist-owned stock photography co-operative. Under its licensing terms, photographers receive 50% of each royalty transaction. Each photographer also receives equity and is entitled to a share of the co-operative's annual profits. This launch comes hot on the heels of a recent and controversial deal between Getty Images and Google, in which Google Drive's image vault gives public access to over 5000 Getty images with very little compensation to the photographers.

A photographer has been reunited with her Canon PowerShot camera, six years after losing it in the ocean off Hawaii. The camera, which was in a waterproof housing, drifted for thousands of miles to the coast of Taiwan, where it was picked up by an employee of China Airlines. The airline identified its owner, Lindsay Scallan of Georgia, USA from photos on the memory card. Click through for pictures and more details (Hawaii News Now via Petapixel)

Russian photographer Vitaly Raskalov, known on the web for his 'skywalking' exploits in which he scales man-made structures (without authorization) has added Egypt's Great Pyramid of Giza to his list of conquests. And, as is his custom he has posted photos taken atop of one of the Seven Wonders of the World. Raskalov and his companions managed to hide from armed guards and climb the pyramid undetected at night. Climbing the Great Pyramid is illegal of course but you can click through to see the images Raskalov captured. (via Daily Mail)

A rare set of photos taken by an amateur photographer of the Beatles' 1965 concert at the Shea Stadium, New York have been sold at an auction for £30000 (~ $47000). Photographer Marc Weinstein used a fake press pass to get a spot next to the stage. According to Weinsten, the only other photographer present at the show ran out of film during the concert. Weinstein's 61 pictures fetched £30,680, compared with a pre-sale estimate of £15,000-£20,000. Click through for some pictures and links to the full story on the BBC, and an Examiner.com interview from 2009.

The Smithsonian Magazine is calling on readers to vote in its 10th annual Reader's Choice Award. Voters can select their favorite photo from among 50 finalists. This year's contest received 37,600 entries from 112 countries. The Magazine's editors will also select winners for five additional categories - Altered Images, American Experience, Natural World, People and Travel. Voting is open through March 29, 2013. Click through for the link and to view some of the finalist's images.

Frustrated by size limitations when uploading images to Google+, photographer Trey Ratcliff discovered a way to get around the limitations, and upload original full-resolution photos. In a blog post, he has put together a step-by-step guide on how to do it, which involves using Google Drive - Google's cloud storage service - and sharing images directly from there to Google+. Click through to read about how - and why - he did it. (via Reddit)

Nikon has said it will spend around ¥600m (around $6.3m) to establish a factory in Laos. The factory will conduct part of the production process for the company's entry- and mid-level DSLRs, with final assembly still taking part in the existing Ayutthaya plant in Thailand. The move aims to increase production capacity and help reduce costs, the company says. The announcement suggests all mass-market Nikons will still pass through Ayutthaya, where all production was halted for several months following a devastating flood in October 2011.

US photographer Brian Masck has filed suit against several parties over unauthorized and unpaid use of a photograph he shot 22 years ago that has since become an iconic image recognizable to almost any US sport fan. Among the defendants is the subject of the photo himself, Desmond Howard, who used the image on his own website.

Photographer Henrik Sorensen has uploaded an interesting behind-the-scenes YouTube video of his recent 'submerged fairy' shoot for the advertising campaign for Hasselblad's H5D digital medium format camera. Taking inspiration from Danish folklore and its royal history he opted to use a submerged castle interior as the backdrop. Click through to watch the video (via FStoppers)

The World Photography Organisation has announced the winners for the Open, Youth and 3D categories of the 2013 Sony-sponsored World Photography Awards. The organization announced a shortlist for all the categories last month, and will be announcing the professional category winners at Somerset House in London on April 25th. Click through to read more about the winners and see their winning images.

A service center in Taiwan has repaired a seawater-damaged Nikon 17-35mm f/2.8D IF-ED lens by boiling it. According to a post by Nikon Rumors, after investigating the damage, staff established that the AF motor of the lens needed to be replaced and some internal parts were 'rusted' due to salt water damage. To remove this 'rust', they boiled them in water. The lens was apparently fixed in three days. (via Nikon Rumors)

In a 'Master Series' video posted by lighting maker Profoto USA, celebrated photographer Greg Heisler shares a behind the scenes tale of how he created a unique on-location portrait of then-NBA star Alonzo Mourning. In explaining a lighting setup that even most other pros would struggle to pull off, Heisler breaks down his lighting diagram for a shot that he conceived, 'just because I think it looks cool'. (via Strobist)

Amateur filmmaker Marc Donahue of Permagrin Films recently shot a video with an array of fifteen GoPro action cameras to achieve Matrix-like bullet time special effects. The arc-shaped rig allowed him to shoot simultaneously from all cameras. In post, Donahue added the freeze frame and slow motion effects. Click through to watch the video. (via Mashable)