The deadly race to the South Pole

From the “Vox Darkroom” series: Robert Falcon Scott was a British explorer who dreamed of being the first person to reach the South Pole. In 1912, he reached the Pole only to learn that his Norwegian rival, Roald Amundsen, had beat him to it. Caught by freakish weather and a string of bad luck, his …

Automatically correct color distortion in underwater photos with “Sea-thru”

When diving you’ll notice that the colors start acting up: everything will become more washed out (and look more green/blue) from the moment you look down in the water, and everything will become darker as you descend. Colors like red go first: at a depth of 10m it looks brown. To correct this, underwater photographers …

3D Ken Burns Effect from a Single Image

Nice research by Simon Niklaus, Long Mai, Jimei Yang and Feng Liu: In this paper, we introduce a framework that synthesizes the 3D Ken Burns effect from a single image, supporting both a fully automatic mode and an interactive mode with the user controlling the camera. Our framework first leverages a depth prediction pipeline, which …

Why the Soviets doctored this iconic photo

With the recent 75 year remembrance of the Normandy Landings (D-Day), I was reminded of this video by Vox, from the Vox Darkroom series: “Raising the Flag on Iwo Jima” and “Raising a Flag over the Reichstag” are similarly iconic photos from World War II. They’re both beloved images of victory, and they’re both taken …

“Crowded Fields” – The Brilliant and Absurd Time-Lapse Photography of Pelle Cass

I like these photos by Pelle Cass, in which he composes several of the same shots on top of each-other. The contrast between the crowded fields (the name of this series) and the empty stands make this great. Booooooom: The Brilliant and Absurd Time-Lapse Photography of Pelle Cass →Pelle Cass: Crowded Fields →

The Potential Future of Selfie Photography

Adobe Research: What happens when we tap into the power of artificial intelligence and deep learning to transform bad portrait shots into good ones – all on a smartphone? By combining perspective effect editing, automatic, software-only photo masking, and photo style transfer technology, we’re able to transform a typical selfie into a flattering portrait with …

Upload directly from Lightroom to Instagram with LR/Instagram

LR/Instagram is an unofficial publish plugin for Lightroom, allowing you to post photos directly to your Instagram account. Simply install the plugin, add new service in Lightroom Publishing Manager and authenticate with your Instagram account. LR/Instagram – Lightroom Publish Plugin for Instagram →

TomTom Bandit Underwater Scene Mode

Being a diver myself (certified PADI Master Scuba Diver), this looks awesome: The latest TomTom Bandit camera update now automatically provides colour correction while filming in the water up to a depth of 15 m without the need for any additional accessories. View the difference! By the looks of it, mainly the white balance is …