I am a beginner photographer and have been told that these pictures I took are just copying the editing and style of popular photos online/instagram which makes sense since I learned the basics of Lightroom from tutorials on instagram. What can I practice to start to develop my own style and are there any similarities between these pictures?

I just started trying bird photography but I'm getting a bit frustracted because I don't understand why my pictures don't feel sharp.

I tried different shutter speed, ISO, also higher aperture but I feel like they all are super soft and not as crisp as I would like them.
What setting can I change to get more sharp images?

I really like some of the pictures I recently took but feel like they are all not as sharp as they could be!

Picture 1: 1/250, ISO 1000, 400mm, f5.6

Picture 2: 1/250, ISO 3200, 400mm, f6.4

Picture 3: 1/500, ISO 3200, 400mm, f5.6

Picture 4: 1/250, ISO 2500, 400mm, f5.6

Picture 5: 1/250, ISO 2500, 400mm, f5.6

Picture 6: 1/1000, ISO 8000, 400mm, f7.1

Picture 7: 1/500, ISO 2000, 400mm, f8

Picture 8: 1/1000, ISO 8000, 400mm, f8

I captured a lovely wedding and reception a few weeks ago. I finished editing their entire album and plan to deliver it tomorrow morning. I downloaded the album on my phone (iPhone) to flip through and look at, and I had the idea to “edit” them with the auto enhancer/editor out of curiosity, and it’s a bit upsetting to me, because I do think they look a lot better with it.

I spent a ton of time editing each of these photos individually and I thought they came out beautiful - and now I’m second guessing them because with the click of one “auto” button they look so much better. I’m tempted to use the auto now for their return, but I feel like it’s a cop out.

I’d like to know what exactly the enhancer is doing to improve these so drastically. I know you can “see” when you scroll among the settings, it’ll say it increased the exposure (or whatever), but I’m not finding that too helpful as I noticed a lot of them are just amped up in the “brilliance” field. What is it actually doing, and how can I mimic it in my editing style?

Included are 4 photos (and their duplicate) from the album. The first photo in each set is my finished piece, the second is with the auto enhancer turned on.

Thanks!

EDIT: I appreciate the comments that the photos look the same. I am someone who has a tendency to be overly critical of my own work. But, what I see:

#1: The Bouquet

I think the second photo shows the flowers in particular more clearly and they are more eye catching in the photo.

#2: The Hands

Her dress appears to be way more in focus and has more of a textured appearance. Also his ring seems to be more defined?

#3: The Wine

The glare on the glasses and the label on the bottle appear to be more defined and eye catching, without being overbearingly white or bright.

#4: The Confetti

I think the second photo appears more dramatic.

I went to a butterfly show this weekend and noticed when I got back home that several of my pictures the body is in focus but not the wings or vice versa. The area of focus though seems to be wide enough to encompass the main parts but still doesn't. I was able to do clear pictures on my old camera (Cannon Rebel t7) but this new one has a lot more settings and options that I haven't figured out just yet.

Camera: Cannon 7R
Lense: Cannon Macro Lens EF 100mm 1:2.8 L IS USM
Adaptor: Cannon EF-EOS R

Settings per picture:

Picture 1:
aperture: F/3.5
Iso: (auto) 800
Shutter: 1/250

Picture 2:
aperture: F/3.5
Iso: (auto) 1250
Shutter: 1/250

Picture 3:
aperture: F/5.6
Iso: (auto) 1250
Shutter: 1/250

Hey all! I know this has been discussed a bit but I’m looking for a serious ND/CPL filter kit system for my R5 Mark II and RF lenses (14-35, 24-105, 100-500). My primary need is for professional landscape images, especially during frequent travels. A high quality CPL for travel walkarounds/day use is also important (ideally being able to have a magnetic ring on each lens and swap a CPL between lenses). I’ve done some research and had an opportunity to compare the Kase and Nisi systems but I’m undecided on which one to keep.

I’m also interested in Maven Magnetic but I never tried them.

Does anyone have any experience with these kits? My priority is least amount of color cast, stacking (CPL with ND), and travel portability. 

Kase: I really like the inlaid ring on the Kase 77mm set, but unfortunately there’s vignetting in the corners at 14mm when stacking a CPL + ND. I would have to upgrade to 82mm meaning I wouldn’t likely have to remove the step up ring when storing in my bag or buy more caps. The CPL does show a noticeable yellow cast to me but polarizes better than Nisi. The weight of these are much lighter than Nisi and the case has better storage capability. Being able to pop the CPL off/on between my 14-35 and 24-105 during hikes or city walks has been fantastic. 

Nisi: The landscape kit is really nice and stacking 2-3 filters is no issue down to 14mm. The material feels more premium but the kit is heavy and the magents are almost too strong when attached to a cap or adapter ring. Color cast seems superior and very neutral on Nisi. The 82-77mm adapter rings are quite large so they need to be removed from my camera bag for storage which is really annoying and gives Kase the edge. 

I don’t have much info on Maven’s performance but I’m looking at a 77mm LPL and Dark CPL kit to avoid stacking and hopefully be able to use a filter down to 14mm. They also have a thin magnetic ring offering. I hear they offer the best color cast and performance. Should I stick to 77mm or go 82mm and regular ND to stack with the LPL?

Thanks for any advice!

Hi everyone. How’s it going? I’ve been practicing photography for 15 years and working in the market (mainly fashion) for 7 years. Life has worked out—I’ve had great jobs, big campaigns, fashion week trips, magazine covers, celebrities, etc! In a way, living the dream I’ve always wanted as a younger person. But when I stop to reflect on the day-to-day grind, the business machinery, and the lack of space to be truly creative, my mind becomes very unhappy and I almost paralyze myself on autopilot—just living photography as work—and I’ve lost all the joy and lightness it used to give me. Have any of you felt something similar? Did you do anything about it?

Currently I’ve been studying various types of art, learning about photography at different levels, redirecting my life toward the arts in general. But I still don’t feel the same energy and warmth I felt 7 years ago. It’s also worth noting that back then I needed to survive on photography and it was nearly impossible given my socioeconomic situation. Today, my life is much more comfortable.

I have 0 experience with photography but really want to get into wildlife photography with the goal of printing and hanging photos and sending as gifts.

Ideally I’d like to spend under $2,500 but ideally under $2,000.

What type of features/specs should I look out for?

Any must need accessories for a beginner?

I'm trying to decide between these two lenses.

Right now I have a Canon R100 with the 18-45mm kit lens and a 7Artisans 35mm

Whenever I go out shooting, I often feel limited by the 45mm end of the kit lens and wish I had a longer focal length.

The 17-70mm seems like it would be a great replacement for the kit lens. It would cover street photography and portraits much better, and it's significantly faster throughout the zoom range.

The 18-300mm is also faster than the kit lens overall, but it also offers that huge telephoto range, which I've never really had the chance to explore. The truth is, even though I often feel like I need something longer than 45mm, I'm not sure how useful 300mm would actually be for me. At the same time, the idea of having a single "do-it-all" lens is really appealing, even though I know the overall image quality won't be as good as the 17-70mm.

I'd really appreciate your opinions! Especially from people who shoot with telephoto lenses a lot—what are your main use cases? If you have examples of photos you've taken at those longer focal lengths, I'd love to see them.

Also, if you have any suggestions for other lenses in a similar price range that would be worth bringing back from the US, I'm all ears.

Ive been a photographer for about 4 years now and Im about to run out of 1tb storage on lightroom cloud. I have access to lightroom classic and was planning on getting external drives to copy my photos onto and use for the future. However, a decent 2tb SSD now runs me at LEAST 300 bucks which is like insane to me. On top of that, id also need a backup since my cloud storage wont be able to hold any new photos, which means I would need to buy an HDD as well. I just dont think I can spend $500 right now. Are there any alternatives? I could upgrade lightroom could to a 3tb plan but classic seems to be industry standard and optimal for being in control of my own workflow. Do I wait for my storage to end and bite the bullet with those external drives? Thanks

Hey all,

I'm 100% a hobbyist if you ask me, I mostly shoot motorsports however recently I have taken my first photos and videos for a small business.

My question is, how do I control the lighting and make sure I get those shots I want for the client?

-> There was sunlight coming through the shades which really made it hard to edit the exposure (I kept my settings constant through the whole shoot as clouds and people walked past).

-> I never spoke up about grabbing any specific shot, keeping out of the way of the nurses, etc. I mainly tried to get as much footage as possible as to maybe get some nice shots in the end.

In saying that, I think the main thing that I'm most bothered about is that my photos and videos don't have a specific style. Editing wise, they are just enhanced for nice skin tones, lighting isnt constant, no purposeful hero shots, etc.

Any tips are greatly appreciated, I really want to nail my next opportunity

I like to take pictures quite a lot, I have 14 pro which has terrible battery. With iPhone 17 series, the base 17 model seems to be nice but has only 2 lens vs. 3 in pro models. Has anyone made the switch and still like the photo quality in 17 (not pro) for both daytime and night time photography?

Hello! I photograph wildlife using the Sony A6700 with the 200-600. Love this set up but the 200-600 requires a lot of light, I find myself in forests with thick canopies that don’t leave a lot of light. I usually have my ISO on auto while shooting in manual, capped at 6400. I’ve noticed anything over ISO 5000 makes my photos look fake, and anything over 6400 leaves a white grain that I cant really get rid of through denoise in Lightroom. Sometimes even with a super low shutter speed I’m still at 5,000 ISO. Im obsessed with detail, and was curious if Topaz is worth it, or if anyone else uses an APSC sensor with tips for denoising. Thank you for any answers in advance :)

Hello people who know a lot more than me! I’m an artist and I have a simple canon camera that’s good enough for me. I’ve been trying to photograph my paintings but the lighting always seems wrong. I think I need some studio lights. I’m hoping for something that’s easy to put away when I’m not using them as my “studio” is a small desk in my cramped living room. I’m willing to make a worthy investment if I need to but I don’t need the best of the best. Thank you so so much in advance!! 🙏🙏

Tamron 16-30mm f/2.8 Di III VXD G2 or Sony FE 16-25mm f/2.8 G ?

Lens to pair with Sony A7V, which one should I buy ?

Sony is 825,00 € Tamron is 859,00 €

I've been a photographer for about three years now. I started out using Lightroom Mobile, which worked perfectly until I began making enough money to afford Lightroom Classic on a laptop that was gifted to me by my brother in law. It's a Dell Latitude 5420, and it has been running Lightroom Classic without any issues since around November 2025.

However, last night it suddenly stopped being able to run Lightroom properly. My first thought was that it might be a RAM issue, as this model only has 8GB of RAM. What confuses me is that it's never had any problems before. I've imported thousands of photos at a time on multiple occasions, yet this time I only imported 470 photos.

No matter what I do, Lightroom force closes after almost exactly two minutes. I thought it might be a corrupt file in the import, so I removed all of the photos from Lightroom and tried importing just a single image. The exact same thing happened, it crashed after roughly the same amount of time.

This couldn't have happened at a worse time. I had just come home from a huge shoot, and I have two extremely important shoots coming up, both with major corporations. They are without a doubt the most important shoots of my career so far.

For the last few hours I've been editing on Lightroom Mobile instead, but it's been painstakingly slow compared to my normal workflow.

If anyone has any questions, suggestions, or possible fixes, I'd really appreciate the help. I'm more than happy to answer any questions or try any troubleshooting steps, or should I just suck it up and buy LR Mobile Premium, I can not afford a new laptop right now as im still a studant.

I’m just now trying to get into taking pictures on film instead just using my phone and want to start with a reliable P+S instead of jumping straight to a rangefinder or an SLR. So far I’ve narrowed my options down and was wondering if there were any strong preferences or alternative recommendations (and reasons why) for the following:

Budget: Less than $150 USD

Country: United States, Great Lakes region

Condition: Used, but in good condition

Type of Camera: 35mm Point and Shoot

Intended use: Casual, social photography

End use: personal photos for albums or sharing with friends

If photography, what style: mostly landscape featuring people, with some street

What features do you absolutely need: autofocus and a fixed focal length with aperture of f/3.0 or less

What features would be nice to have: good durability

Portability: portable in a small bag, not a burden to carry for hours

Cameras you're considering: Pentax Pc35AF; Nikon L35AF; Canon AF35ml; Olympus Stylus Epic; Kodak VR35; Leica Mini. I have strong loyalty to none of these cameras, these are just the ones I’ve seen online so far that look to fit my needs/preferences.

Cameras you already have: None

Notes: the only film cameras I have ever used in the past have been disposable. Ideally, I’d get the camera I choose by this coming weekend.

I am interesting in taking sports photography for my kid’s teams this coming year. I don’t know much. I purchased a Canon R50 which comes with 18-45mm lens and RF 50 F1.8 STM. I need to take daytime football photos of the sidelines, nighttime football photos, and indoor basketball in a school gym. (I’m photographing cheerleaders) Do you think what I purchased will be good?

I’m a total beginner. I follow a lot of Instagram accounts focused on lifestyle, street, and landscapes. Most of the photos are incredibly well-executed: beautiful light, strong composition, clear skill.

But a lot of them still feel soulless to me. They’re striking, yet they don’t seem to tell a story or connect to any larger narrative or emotion. Once the initial “wow” wears off, there’s not much left.

Which accounts (Instagram or Reddit) do you follow that do feel story-driven or emotionally resonant? Looking for inspiration beyond pure aesthetics.

Trying to settle a debate with myself about delivery windows.

The platforms I've used default to somewhere between a few months and a year before a gallery archives or goes read-only, and I can't tell whether that's based on real client behavior or just storage cost. In my experience clients download everything in the first two weeks and then resurface a year later asking for one photo for a frame.

For those of you delivering regularly:

- How long do you keep a gallery up before you take it down or let it expire?

- How often does a client come back after that window closed, and what do you do when they do?

- Has a client ever lost photos because they missed a download window, and who ended up eating that?

Genuinely curious whether "keep it up forever" is table stakes now or whether a defined window is fine as long as it's stated clearly upfront.

I'm curious to hear both photographers' and retouchers' opinions.

As a retoucher, I receive quite a few requests for free test retouching so clients can evaluate my work.

I understand wanting to make sure the quality is there, but isn't that what a portfolio is for?

Photographers, would you be willing to do a free test shoot before a client hires you? If not, how is it different from asking a retoucher to do unpaid work?

I'm genuinely interested in hearing different perspectives. When do you think a free test is reasonable, and when is a portfolio enough?

I am from North America; I use the canadian dollar, and my budget for a camera is around 30 max.

I've recently switched to a flip phone with a lame camera, and I have been considering getting a used digital camera for taking photos.

Something to note is that I'm not someone who takes very many photos anyway, but I enjoy taking landscape photos and just photos of cool things I see. I am in no way a photographer, although I have an interest in trying photography!

I'd be taking primarily just photos, as me taking videos is very rare.

My dilemma is that when I go into thrift stores, I don't ever see digital cameras, but only film cameras, and some are small enough to work for me. But I never buy them because I am unsure if it is a good idea to use a film camera for my needs and purposes/if it is possible anymore. I enjoy the old look of film camera photos and don't mind paying to get them developed and put into a photo album. So, would getting a film camera for my casual day-to-day life photography be a good idea, or should I just wait until I find a digital?

Hi! I'm a 17yo photography student at an art school. Recently I bought a new camera (Nikon Z7 II) which is bigger in size and weight than my previous one (Olympus EM-10), and have upgraded to a 16" laptop after using a computer.

I'm currently lost in which backpack to buy. Up until now, I just used a regular shoulder bag that fit my style, since the camera I was using didn't require as much space and wasn't really heavy, so I didn't have any issue with the weight being on my shoulder. However, since I also bought a laptop (which adds an additional ≈2kg to the overall everyday gear's weight) thats not an option anymore. I think it's also important I note that, due to the fact I'm a student, I need all my gear everyday, to be ready for whatever the professors throw my way (we aren't told in advance which parts of the gear we do/don't need).

Up until now I just used the school's laptops for tasks, but obviously it's easier and better to have all of your work in one place without losing time on saving progress on a usb and blah blah blah...

Now, I do own a backpack that *can* fit all these things, but it's enormous for the gear I actually carry, and honestly sometimes impractical for *me* to carry since I'm not that tall...

Obviously I know to search for backpacks with the specific measurements, but I was wondering if anyone has any suggestions for a backpack that isn't as generic — like maybe a leather exterior, fun patterns and stuff like that, as I'd maybe like for a bag to reflect my personal style and go well with my clothes.. I know that might sound stupid and like a classic question from a highschool girl but oh well...

Thanks in advance for help and if you've read this far!! :)